Introspective Counseling
24445 Northwestern Hwy. Suite 220
Southfield, MI 48075
(248) 242-5545

Introspective Counseling 24445 Northwestern Hwy Suite 220, Southfield, MI 48075   (248) 242-5545

Treatment for Anxiety

Does it feel like nothing you do is good enough?

Does it feel like nothing you do is ever good enough?

Are you too stressed out to enjoy life? Do you spend so much time taking care of other people and other things that you have no room for self-care? Have work, finances, or relationship stressors cut into your ability to slow down and relax?

 

When you’re dealing with anxiety, you may suffer from panic attacks, sleepless nights, fatigue and low energy. Perhaps you struggle with perfectionism—nothing you do is ever good enough for your high standards. Regardless of your accomplishments, all you can think about is how you “should” be living and how your life doesn’t measure up to that. As a result, you may feel restless, irritable, and deeply unsatisfied with who you are.

Your Desire To Care For Others May Make It Hard To Establish Boundaries

Anxiety often masks itself as excessive busyness and an inability to set healthy boundaries. You may spend so much time tending to other people’s needs that you leave no space for your own. Because you’re always on the go and always taking care of someone else, you may push your feelings down and disregard the things you want.

Anxiety treatment is a chance to reconnect with your feelings and learn to set healthier boundaries. Here at Introspective Counseling, we want to help you care for yourself with the same energy that you care for others.

 

Believe it or not, anxiety isn’t always a bad thing. It’s your brain’s way of keeping you alert and attentive to potential danger. Feeling stressed can help you be more motivated when a big test or important event comes up. It’s when this stress goes into overdrive and affects your ability to enjoy life that it becomes a problem.

 

Anxiety is the natural result of a world hung up on unrealistic standards of success

Today, our culture’s unrealistic standards of beauty, popularity, and career success are the main culprits of anxiety. Many people become so consumed with social measures of success that it takes a toll on their emotional and psychological health. They place all their self-worth in what they can do instead of in who they are. Women, especially those of color, are expected to take care of too many things at once—their families, their partners, and their careers. In this way, many people end up living according to an inauthentic self and fail to recognize their deepest needs.

Oftentimes, the ways that we try to deal with stress aren’t entirely helpful. In the Black community, many of us have inherited coping skills from the time of enslavement. While these coping methods may have helped our ancestors, they may not be useful today. We all need to “update” the ways that we try to manage stress from time to time.

In therapy, you have a chance to assess what’s working and not working in your life. Our goal is to help you learn to regulate your anxiety symptoms more effectively and feel more at ease in your own skin.

Many Of The Coping Skills That Once Helped Us Regulate Stress May Not Be Useful Anymore

Living with uncertainty is hard. Anxiety makes you feel like you need to have all the answers in advance, but you don’t. Counseling can help you learn to live comfortably in the midst of uncertainty and find stillness in the present. Rather than get hung up on what you have to do tomorrow, you can learn to feel grounded in the here and now.

 

In anxiety therapy, any and all emotions are welcome. You don’t have to worry about holding back here—you can laugh, vent, cry, and express yourself freely. Whether you suffer from panic attacks, imposter syndrome, or social anxiety, treatment is a time to acknowledge your stress and learn new ways to manage it. While we want to help you improve your confidence and increase your self-awareness, the most important thing is that you learn to love yourself. We want you to accept who you are, flaws and all, and care for yourself as much as you care other people.

Anxiety Treatment Can Help You Become More Grounded In Who You Are

What to expect in sessions

Therapy is all about breaking out of rigid and unhelpful thought patterns and becoming more flexible in how you think. We want to know: what are the “shoulds” and “have tos” in your life? What are the expectations that you can’t let go of that are driving your stress? Together, you and therapist will explore the core beliefs that prevent you from accepting who you are and being able to live with uncertainty.

 

Shaking off unhealthy standards can help you realize deeper truths about yourself. By breaking down the false sense of self that’s driving your stress, you can form a deeper relationship with your authentic self and get in touch with your true values. The goal is to help you identify value-based behaviors and act based on them in daily life.

Tailoring Your Treatment Plan

Our approach to anxiety treatment: Acceptance and commitment therapy

One of the main approaches we use is called Acceptance and Commitment Therapy (ACT). At its core, ACT is all about assessing whether or not the coping skills in your life need updating. For instance, maybe you grew up in a home where pleasing others kept you from criticism and punishment. While this behavior may have helped you as a kid, it may lead to unhealthy people-pleasing and perpetuate your anxiety today. ACT can help you evaluate the workable and unworkable behaviors in your life and think more deeply about why you do what you do.

Additionally, we often utilize Cognitive Behavioral Therapy (CBT) to explore the connections between thoughts, feelings and actions. The goal of CBT is to identify the negative thought patterns that fuel your anxiety and replace them with thought patterns that are healthy and enriching.

Right now, you probably wish that you could just escape the unknown and figure out all the answers to your future. Anxiety therapy is a chance to live comfortably in the unknown and recognize that it’s okay not to have all the answers. By developing new coping skills and freeing yourself from limiting standards and expectations, you can transform your life and become more grounded in who you are.

No, you do not have to take medication. Taking prescription drugs is a personal decision and we empower clients to do what is best for them. Before visiting the question of medication, we like to explore all your other options for treating anxiety. Oftentimes, the relief that anxiety therapy provides is powerful enough that medication is not necessary.

If you’ve already worked hard at overcoming anxiety, that’s great. It gives you a head start in treatment. You may feel like you’ve already tried everything, but sometimes trying to fight anxiety makes it worse. It is a natural human impulse to try and eliminate stress by exercising more control and reducing uncertainty. The problem is that doing so doesn’t heal anxiety—it just suppresses it or pushes it down. Our approach to treatment seeks to address anxiety at its root, helping you let go of your need for control and your desire for certainty.

Our sessions are 100-percent confidential. Everything you say is between you and your therapist unless your safety is in question or you provide a signed release of information. You do not have to worry about friends, family, or employers finding out. Thankfully, the stigma surrounding therapy is declining rapidly and more and more people have accepted getting help as normal.

Life is stressful and unpredictable. While you can’t know the future, you can learn to find stillness in the midst of uncertainty. To begin your journey of healing and empowerment, you can fill out the contact form or call 248-242-5545. We look forward to hearing from you!

You don't need to know all the answers

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