Ways Therapy Can Help You Manage Your Anxiety
There are a number of different forms that anxiety can take. Maybe it's generalized anxiety, where you just have excessive worry. You're just constantly worrying throughout the day. And then more specific anxiety where it can result in a very specific fear, maybe something happened that has created a fear of driving. And then there's also panic disorder where you break out in a panic attack out of the blue.
-
Melissa Wesner, LCPC: Hi, thanks for joining us today. Today I'm talking to Caroline Masucci who is a mental health therapist at Lifespring Counseling Services. Today Caroline will be talking with us about anxiety and phobias. Welcome Caroline.
Caroline Masucci, LCSW-C: Thank you so much for having me.
Melissa Wesner, LCPC: So Caroline, talk with us about what made you drawn to helping people with anxiety and phobias.
Caroline Masucci, LCSW-C: I think that I can personally relate. I have experienced anxiety throughout my lifetime and had my own treatment for it. And so now I feel drawn to helping others.
Melissa Wesner, LCPC: Yes. And, you know, that's certainly a good reason, right? It's relatable. And there are so many people who experience difficulties with anxiety. It's one of the most common things that we see bringing people to our office. So a lot of people coming in for that very reason. So Caroline, talk with us a little bit about anxiety and what might bring someone in. You know, the reality is that we all experience anxiety at some point. We have all experienced nervousness. So how does someone know when their anxiety is becoming a problem?
Caroline Masucci, LCSW-C: Yeah, I think it's when it impacts functioning, right? So when it keeps you from doing the things that you'd like to be doing. or doing them in the comfort level that you'd like to have. That's when it really, maybe it's something that you need to address. Yeah.
Melissa Wesner, LCPC: And can you give some common examples of how this might show up in impact functioning?
Caroline Masucci, LCSW-C: Yeah. So I think that there are a number of different forms that anxiety can take. Maybe it's generalized anxiety, where you just have excessive worry. You're just constantly worrying throughout the day. And then more specific anxiety where it can result in like a very specific fear, maybe something happened that has created the sphere of driving where I've had clients afraid of all sorts of different things. And so I don't want to limit it, but it can get very specific. And then there's also panic disorder, which, you know, you break out in a panic attack out of the blue.
Caroline Masucci, LCSW-C: And then that can induce this anxiety around, well, when will it happen again? And so it takes on all different forms.
Melissa Wesner, LCPC: Yeah, and I think that that's important to know that anxiety can look different for different people, right, that there's a lot of different ways that anxiety can present itself. Yeah. And so. When your clients come in and they're meeting with you for the first time and they're telling you what's going on and you know that it's related to anxiety in some way, what are some of their most common concerns?
SPEAKER_00: Oh boy, I think that it would be, well, I often hear that it affects glee.
Caroline Masucci, LCSW-C: Usually it creates some depression, right? Because it's exhausting to be worrying constantly. I have some clients who experience anxiety attacks, but not always. Not always within generalized anxiety. Just this worry that it consumes much of their day.
Melissa Wesner, LCPC: Yeah, absolutely. And ways that that might impact someone, right? If we're thinking about that worry, that showing up, what are some ways that you see that impacting people's daily life? What are you seeing? How are you seeing that impact to people's functioning? How are they seeing it impacting their daily lives?
Caroline Masucci, LCSW-C: Yeah. It can look like a difficulty concentrating irritability, which can affect their relationships with loved ones, performance at work or sometimes it can prevent sleep, affect their appetite, all sorts of different ways. I mean, particularly with specific phobias or fears, they can prevent someone from doing something that they once loved, like driving a car or getting on an airplane and traveling.
Melissa Wesner, LCPC: Yeah. Absolutely. And in our case, even maybe going to the Eastern shore, since we're here in Maryland, there are even some van driving services to help people get across the bridge, right? So a lot of different ways that those things can present. But I think it's important to know the different things that can show up around anxiety, right? How many people would maybe think about irritability and anxiety, right? And so people might be experiencing these things and not necessarily know that this is related to their anxiety.
Caroline Masucci, LCSW-C: All too often, I hear surprise around that. And I work with children and adolescents too. And actually, that's usually the number one symptom is irritability. And I think that that makes sense and that anxiety is exhausting. And also, Sometimes overwhelming until it quickly lash out.
Melissa Wesner, LCPC: Sure. And even in terms of that being exhausted and then being able to lay down at night and then not be able to sleep because your wheels are turning and now you have racing thoughts.
Caroline Masucci, LCSW-C: Right. And then you're hungry, but then you also don't really want to eat. Yeah.
Melissa Wesner, LCPC: So the important thing to know is that even though some of those things can be really difficult, exhausting, overwhelming, and they can have an impact on your daily life, the other thing we want people to know is that there is help available. And that's where you come in. So tell us a little bit about some ways that therapists who specialize in anxiety can help people.
Caroline Masucci, LCSW-C: Oh, gosh. are so many different coping skills, you know, related to breathing and mindfulness and living within the moment. And there's progressive muscle relaxation, but I think that aside from all of that, there's also some cognitive refraining, right? So changing our mindset. changing our perspective. When there's specific fear, there's exposure therapy, which I know sounds really scary. And sometimes they have clients will be like, Oh, that's the thing where I do something really, really terrifying until it's no longer terrifying. And it's like, well, it's not that scary. It's actually very gradual. So it's a little bit scary and a little bit more scary.
Caroline Masucci, LCSW-C: And hopefully when we get to the highest, the scariest scary thing, then it's not so scary because you've done all of these steps beforehand and so it's a gradual process.
Melissa Wesner, LCPC: yeah now caroline I know that you've had a lot of success you've seen a lot of success using gradual exposure, can you talk a little bit about what you've seen in terms of people making progress.
Caroline Masucci, LCSW-C: Oh yeah. I mean, I think that it's a game changer, right? So, you know, we'll usually set a plan, right? So we'll identify what the fear is or what the overarching issue is. And then we work to identify ways that we can build to it on a scale. I was like, okay, we want to test the limits a little bit. We want to create a little bit of distress. And then we want to We want to order it so that we're doing the least amount of scary first yeah and build up on it, and I think that through that it takes a lot of rapport between.
Caroline Masucci, LCSW-C: the client and I, that alliance is really important. And so I think there are a number of clients that come to mind where we don't start out with exposure therapy. We start out with getting to know one another so that they can really trust that everything will be okay.
Melissa Wesner, LCPC: Yeah, I was just thinking about that as you were talking, right? It sounds really scary, really petrifying, going in, you know, even gradually doing this thing that you're really scared about, but also remembering that you're doing this in the context of a relationship where you trust the person that you're working with, where you know that you have support that, yes, you're taking these steps, but you're not taking these steps alone and that you have someone who's supporting you and guiding you along the way.
Caroline Masucci, LCSW-C: Exactly. Exactly. And then through that self-compassion when, you know, maybe you're not quite ready for the next step and, you know, you need to work up to it a little bit longer, right? So there's, there's all of these complexities within it. But, and then for generalized anxiety, we may not choose to go that route. We may choose some CBT or something of that nature.
Melissa Wesner, LCPC: So let's talk about that a little bit because some people may not have any idea what you're talking about. CBT, what in the world are you talking about? So tell us a little bit about what that is and how that can help people who are dealing with anxiety or worry.
Caroline Masucci, LCSW-C: Sure. So it's cognitive behavioral therapy. And it's all about kind of connecting our thoughts, our feelings, and our behaviors. And so if we affect change in one area, we'll affect change within the others. And so, you know, if you are always worried about what others may be thinking about you, well, then you may want to test that a little bit. And so I always say to my clients, let's argue with that inner voice a little bit, kindly, you know, not aggressively, but kind of, you know, I'll argue back and ask like what is the validity behind that like how true is that and then what what proof is there to the negative thoughts and then what what facts are there to kind of suggest otherwise.
Caroline Masucci, LCSW-C: Yeah. Kind of a mindset shift. Yeah.
Melissa Wesner, LCPC: Yeah, which can be a process, right? When I think about sometimes the negative thoughts that people experience or the self-critical thoughts, sometimes they're so easy to just accept and believe that they're true. And we've never been given the idea that maybe they're not. And maybe we do need to argue with those beliefs a little bit. And I sometimes find that even though our goal is to help people recognize when a thought is not accurate, not helpful or not true, that when we're thinking about thoughts or helping them work on thoughts that are more accurate, more realistic, or more helpful, that sometimes we really argue with the helpful thought.
Melissa Wesner, LCPC: Like they really want to make sure that that more positive thought is true, right? Even though we don't argue the same way with the negative voice in our head, we're just like, yeah, it must be true. I'm not a great person. We really kind of test when we're trying to change our thinking. That's where we're really questioning. Can I, can I believe this other thing?
Caroline Masucci, LCSW-C: That's such a great point. So true.
Melissa Wesner, LCPC: Yes. Yeah. So now that we're never going to, we're not going to help you go to the other end of the spectrum and be overly positive and think things are not true.
Caroline Masucci, LCSW-C: Well, sure. And I mean, and why do we have anxiety, right? I mean, It's there for a reason. It's to keep us from doing dangerous, scary things, right? Like we should be anxious when in front of a bear out in the woods. But then there's also anxiety that's maybe not so necessary any longer.
Melissa Wesner, LCPC: Yeah, well, I'm glad you say that because I think sometimes we think about emotions as being good or emotions being bad or they're positive or they're negative. And I hear you saying, maybe there's a different perspective and that even anxiety serves a purpose. Can you talk a little bit about that?
Caroline Masucci, LCSW-C: Yeah, absolutely. I mean, something that I Always I find myself saying the clients over and over again is to go ahead and know and I don't even know where I got this phrase, but eat the frog. Do the uncomfortable to go ahead and sit with the anxiety of it to retrain your your mind to show your mind that it you don't necessarily need to be anxious that it's safe that it's okay that you're going to be all right. And yeah, eat the frog.
Melissa Wesner, LCPC: Yeah, I'm sitting here laughing a little bit because we were doing a different episode recording this morning and we talked about the same thing. We were talking about eating the frog in a slightly different capacity. But this seems to be a theme for today. Yeah.
Yeah.
Melissa Wesner, LCPC: So on that note, I'm wondering, you know, sometimes in therapy, there are these themes that just because they're so common, they just keep coming up over and over again. And sometimes we think that it's unique because it's our situation, not knowing that this is actually very common. This is a theme that comes up a lot that people experience. And so I imagine that there are some things that you are regularly saying to people. And I'm wondering what are some of those things that you find yourself saying to people regularly?
SPEAKER_00: Oh, I think that. I think that I will come to mind first is this.
Caroline Masucci, LCSW-C: This encouragement for my clients to be self-compassionate, right, to give themselves the same grace that they give to others. I think that we can sometimes be our own worst critics and it contributes to anxiety and depression and all sorts of things, but. I think that we need to arm you a little bit with that.
Search Our Other Blogs!
Interested in Counseling in Baltimore, MD for Anxiety, Worry, and Phobias?
If you’re a Marylander who knows that counseling is the direction you need to take, the therapists at LifeSpring Counseling Services are here to help. We offer online counseling services for mindfulness, depression, anxiety, trauma, and grief and loss. We also offer Brainspotting as a specialized service, and Brainspotting can be done online, too!
Here’s how you can get started! Online & in-person counseling for anxiety, worry, and phobias aren’t the only services offered at our Baltimore, MD office.
The counselors and social workers at our Maryland office also offer counseling services for trauma, grief and loss, boundary setting, communication skills, and difficult life transitions. We also offer specialized counseling services including Brainspotting and spiritually-integrated counseling. Because we are located next to several local universities, we also work with college students and international students.
