You find yourself stressed out and anxious more often than you’d like. You worry. You feel stressed a lot of the time, and it’s wearing you down.
You tell yourself, ‘I should be able to handle this.’ But trying to do it alone isn’t working anymore.
Are you someone who gets caught up in your thoughts, overthinking things? Do you have episodes where your heart starts pounding, your head’s spinning, and it’s hard to focus? Do you feel overwhelmed at times?
You know that feeling anxious, worrying or having panic attacks is hard to take. Left unchecked, this can lead to other difficulties like relationship problems, poor job performance, exhaustion and low mood.
Our Anxiety Therapists Are Here to Help
We’ll help you understand your anxiety and teach you techniques to reduce your stress and worry. And you’ll learn techniques to feel calmer. That leads to you having more energy and feeling comfortable around others.
But it takes time. Successful clients know it takes time and commitment—and know it’s worth the work. And the skills you gain stay with you for the rest of your life.
Schedule an Appointment for Anxiety Counseling Today
Become a less anxious version of yourself. Make an appointment now and start feeling better about yourself and your life.
Common Symptoms of Anxiety
Seek Help From One of Our Anxiety Therapists in Winnipeg
If you have any of these symptoms of anxiety for an extended period of time and they’re interfering with you living your life, then you may need to seek help from a qualified therapist. Dealing with anxiety doesn’t have to be the norm, our therapists can help you resolve those problems.
Common Types of Anxiety we Treat
With generalized anxiety, you regularly worry about all kinds of things. It might be about family, finances, health, work, and other issues that are not directly related to you. It’s like your mind won’t shut off. It’s busy all day, and it’s hard to shut it off at night. That makes it hard for you to relax or sleep.
Then, you avoid get-togethers with family and friends because it feels too stressful. But, sometimes, you have to socialize and do what you can to cope with the uncomfortable feelings.
It’s common in Canadian culture to drink alcohol while socializing. But for people with social anxiety, it can be a crutch and lead to dependency. While alcohol seems to help ease your discomfort at the moment, it doesn’t fix the underlying problem. You still feel uncomfortable, ill at ease, and self-conscious around others. And, after you leave and are alone, you are still thinking over and over about things you said or did.
You experience intense fear that comes on quickly. It’s all-consuming. It’s hard to breathe, and your heartbeat races. It feels like you’re going crazy or going to die. Panic attacks are frightening. Specific situations or events can cause these attacks, or occur during a stressful time in your life, a significant change, or even by too much coffee. Panic attacks can also happen for unknown reasons.
Panic attacks usually last a short period—but it can feel like forever when you’re in the middle one. Some people can experience a panic attack once or a few times over a short period and never have them again. Some people can have panic attacks that start from a specific situation and develop into panic episodes that happen outside the initial problem. Untreated panic attacks can develop panic disorders. The sufferer feels fear and panic regularly, repeatedly for long periods of their life.
Regardless of the cause, panic attacks are very frightening, and it’s important to know that there are effective treatments. Getting help as soon as possible and sticking to your treatment plan is essential.
Post-traumatic stress disorder is the most extreme form of anxiety and the most complicated. People with PTSD can experience a range of anxiety problems. Examples include generalized anxiety disorder, social anxiety, and panic. Also, PTSD can consist of other mental health problems, such as depression, drug addiction, and social isolation. Untreated, the anxiety can also worsen and cause other issues like depression and alcohol and drug addiction
OCD is an anxiety disorder that can affect people of all ages. This form of anxiety involves unwanted, invasive thoughts that are upsetting or disturbing. It’s common to use compulsive, repetitive behaviours to manage and cope with intrusive thoughts.
However, some children can have separation anxiety in their early years, starting in kindergarten and extending into junior high school. Separation anxiety for children puts them at a higher risk for other mental health issues for the child later in life.
Our Approach to Anxiety Therapy
Is There an Effective Treatment for Anxiety?
The short answer is Yes and No!
Therapy can’t get rid of all your anxiety forever. Part of the reason is that anxiety protects us from danger when working correctly. It makes us jump when startled or ready to fight or run when feeling threatened. Anxiety is necessary. There’s a lot more to this complex process, and working with your therapist, you can better understand how your anxiety works and identify the unhelpful anxiety from the helpful anxiety.
Our therapists use various treatment approaches. Standard practices known to be effective include cognitive techniques, mindfulness, mediation, exposure therapy and journaling. Importantly, My Winnipeg Therapist is committed to using the best approaches to help you.
CBT for Anxiety
We use therapy treatments that are backed by research. Research shows that one of the most effective treatments for anxiety is Cognitive Behaviour Therapy (CBT) (link to CBT page). In addition, research demonstrates the effectiveness of mindfulness and relaxation training.
CBT for Social Anxiety, Panic Attacks and More
Everyone’s experience of anxiety is unique—like a fingerprint. Your therapist works with you to understand how anxiety affects you, whether it’s social anxiety, panic attacks or generalized anxiety. You gain an awareness of your specific thoughts, feelings, and body sensations connected with your anxiety.
You are never forced to use a technique or exercise you don’t want to try. Instead, your therapist works to find methods and skills you can relate to and are interested in trying. It’s your counselling, after all!
One approach, a cognitive strategy, works with thoughts. Anxious thoughts can lead to negative thinking patterns and worrying about things that will never happen. These ‘thinking traps’ trick you into believing that your idea is accurate. Even though these thoughts are not true, they seem very convincing in our heads. And that makes them hard to ignore. Your therapist teaches strategies and techniques to identify, challenge and reduce these thinking traps.
While other strategies address unhelpful thinking patterns, CBT also helps us change unhelpful behaviours. Maybe you feel self-conscious around your friends and end up saying very little. But you later regret being so quiet. There are many activities we can be afraid of doing, and you discover approaches to overcome the fear and become more comfortable. Your therapist can help you learn skills and confidence to engage more successfully with others.
Being anxious drains your energy. Doing the work and going through the therapy steps to reduce your anxiety can make you feel less worried and more confident, less anxious and calmer.
How do I start anxiety counselling in Winnipeg?
If you’re ready to start counselling for anxiety, we’re happy to help you. You can book online, fill out the online form, or call us. Our Client Care Coordinator can answer your questions, see if one of our therapists might be a good fit, or help you start as soon as possible.
Other Services Offered at My Winnipeg Therapist
In addition to counselling for depression, My Winnipeg Therapist also offers a variety of mental health services. Our therapists offer specialized counselling for men and male youth, relationship counselling, marriage counselling, anxiety treatment, PTSD treatment and trauma counselling, and low self-esteem counselling. Contact our Winnipeg counselling clinic today to get the help you need to move forward with confidence.