• Skip to primary navigation
  • Skip to main content
  • Skip to primary sidebar
  • Skip to footer
  • Online Therapy
  • Rehab
    • Alcohol Rehab
    • Drug Rehab
    • What Is Rehab?
    • What Happens In Rehab
    • How Long Does Rehab Take?
    • How Much Does Rehab Cost In The UK?
    • How To Choose A Rehab Centre
    • Rehab Through The 12 Steps Program
    • Does Rehab Work?
    • I Can’t Afford To Go To Rehab
    • Inpatient Rehab
    • Outpatient Treatment
    • Private Residential Rehab Clinics
    • Luxury Rehab
    • Private Health Insurance
    • Private Paying Patients
    • Rehab options for NHS Patients
    • Online Rehab
    • Professional Referrals
    • Can I do rehab at home?
    • Co-Occurring Disorders
  • Alcohol Addiction
    • Alcohol & Alcoholism
    • Alcohol Rehab
    • How to Detox From Alcohol Safely – The Alcohol Detox Process
    • Alcohol Withdrawal Symptoms
    • How To Stop Drinking Alcohol
    • Private Alcohol Detox at Home
    • Alcohol Drinks Journal
    • Alcoholism, Addiction And Recovery
    • Alcohol Units Guide
    • Excessive Alcohol Intake -The Health Risks
    • Help For Alcohol Addiction
    • Sobriety Calculator
  • Addictions we help
    • Help For Alcohol Addiction
    • Addiction as a Symptom
    • Addicted to Drugs or Alcohol At Birth
    • Drug Addiction & Treatment
      • Drug Detox
      • Drug Withdrawal Symptoms
      • Drug Rehab
      • Dual Diagnosis With Addiction
      • Cocaine Addiction
      • Crack Addiction
      • Cannabis Addiction
      • Heroin Addiction
      • Prescription Drug Addiction
      • Amphetamine Addiction
      • Crystal Meth Addiction
      • GHB Addiction
      • Ketamine Addiction
      • Mephedrone Addiction
      • Steroid Addiction
      • Narcotics Addiction
      • Opioid Addiction
      • Drug Classifications
    • Addiction And Anxiety
    • Addiction And Depression
    • Gambling Addiction
      • Am I a Gambling Addict?
    • Sex Addiction
      • Porn Addiction
      • Am I A Sex Addict?
      • Sexual Behaviour
    • Binge Eating Disorder
      • Body Dysmorphia
      • Help for Bulimia
  • Detox
    • How to Detox From Alcohol Safely – The Alcohol Detox Process
    • Private Alcohol Detox at Home
    • Drug Detox
    • What Is A Detox?
    • What is Secondary Rehab treatment?
    • 7 Day Treatment & Detox
    • 14 Day Treatment & Detox
    • 28 Day Treatment & Detox
    • Inpatient VS Outpatient
  • Helping Others
    • Stage An Intervention?
    • Help For My Addicted Husband
    • Help For My Wife
    • Help For My Daughter
    • Help For My Son
    • Help for a Friend
    • Help my own addiction
    • Help For A Work Colleague
    • How Do You Help A Loved One Trapped In Addiction?
    • How to stop enabling a drug addicted child
  • Rehab Near Me
    • Drug & Alcohol Rehab London
    • Drug & Alcohol Rehab Birmingham
    • Drug & Alcohol Rehab Bristol
    • Drug and Alcohol Rehab in Leeds
    • Drug & Alcohol Rehab in Newcastle
    • Drug & Alcohol Rehab Hackney
    • Drug & Alcohol Rehab in Liverpool and Merseyside
    • Drug & Alcohol Rehab Ipswich
    • Drug & Alcohol Rehab Leicester
    • Drug & Alcohol Rehab Luton
    • Drug & Alcohol Rehab Manchester
    • Drug & Alcohol Rehab Milton keynes
    • Drug & Alcohol Rehab Plymouth
    • Drug & Alcohol Rehab Preston
    • Drug & Alcohol Rehab Sheffield
    • Drug & Alcohol Rehab Somerset
    • Drug & Alcohol Rehab Southampton
    • Drug & Alcohol Rehab Suffolk
    • Drug & Alcohol Rehab Watford
    • Drug & Alcohol Rehab Wolverhampton
    • Drug & Alcohol Rehab York
  • Blog
Help 4 Addiction

Help 4 Addiction

Drug & Alcohol Rehabilitation

Call Us: 0203 955 7700

Get Rehab Prices Start Your Consultation
  • Online Therapy
  • Rehab
        • Alcohol Rehab
        • Drug Rehab
        • What Is Rehab?
        • What Happens In Rehab
        • How Much Does Rehab Cost In The UK?
        • Online Rehab
        • How Long Does Rehab Take?
        • How To Choose A Rehab Centre
        • Rehab Through The 12 Steps Program
        • Does Rehab Work?
        • I Can’t Afford To Go To Rehab
        • Inpatient Rehab
        • Outpatient Treatment
        • Private Residential Rehab Clinics
        • Luxury Rehab
        • Private Health Insurance
        • Private Paying Patients
        • Rehab options for NHS Patients
        • Can I do rehab at home?
        • Co-Occurring Disorders
        • Professional Referrals
  • Alcohol Addiction
        • Alcohol & Alcoholism
        • Alcohol Rehab
        • How to Detox From Alcohol Safely – The Alcohol Detox Process
        • Alcohol Withdrawal Symptoms
        • How To Stop Drinking Alcohol
        • Private Alcohol Detox at Home
        • Alcohol Drinks Journal
        • Alcoholism, Addiction And Recovery
        • Alcohol Units Guide
        • Excessive Alcohol Intake -The Health Risks
        • Help For Alcohol Addiction
        • Sobriety Calculator
  • Addictions we help
        • Help For Alcohol Addiction
        • Addiction as a Symptom
        • Addicted to Drugs or Alcohol At Birth
        • Addiction And Depression
        • Addiction And Anxiety
        • Drug Addiction & Treatment
          • Drug Detox
          • Drug Withdrawal Symptoms
          • Drug Rehab
          • Dual Diagnosis With Addiction
          • Cocaine Addiction
          • Crack Addiction
          • Cannabis Addiction
          • Heroin Addiction
          • Prescription Drug Addiction
          • Amphetamine Addiction
          • Crystal Meth Addiction
          • GHB Addiction
          • Ketamine Addiction
          • Mephedrone Addiction
          • Steroid Addiction
          • Narcotics Addiction
          • Opioid Addiction
          • Drug Classifications
        • Gambling Addiction
          • Am I a Gambling Addict?
        • Sex Addiction
          • Porn Addiction
          • Am I A Sex Addict?
          • Sexual Behaviour
        • Binge Eating Disorder
          • Body Dysmorphia
          • Help for Bulimia
  • Detox
        • How to Detox From Alcohol Safely – The Alcohol Detox Process
        • Private Alcohol Detox at Home
        • Drug Detox
        • What Is A Detox?
        • What is Secondary Rehab treatment?
        • 7 Day Treatment & Detox
        • 14 Day Treatment & Detox
        • 28 Day Treatment & Detox
        • Inpatient VS Outpatient
  • Helping Others
        • Stage An Intervention?
        • Help For My Addicted Husband
        • Help For My Wife
        • Help For My Daughter
        • Help For My Son
        • Help for a Friend
        • Help my own addiction
        • Help For A Work Colleague
        • How Do You Help A Loved One Trapped In Addiction?
        • How to stop enabling a drug addicted child
  • Rehab Near Me
        • Drug & Alcohol Rehab London
        • Drug & Alcohol Rehab Birmingham
        • Drug & Alcohol Rehab Bristol
        • Drug and Alcohol Rehab in Leeds
        • Drug & Alcohol Rehab in Newcastle
        • Drug & Alcohol Rehab Hackney
        • Drug & Alcohol Rehab in Liverpool and Merseyside
        • Drug & Alcohol Rehab Ipswich
        • Drug & Alcohol Rehab Leicester
        • Drug & Alcohol Rehab Luton
        • Drug & Alcohol Rehab Manchester
        • Drug & Alcohol Rehab Milton keynes
        • Drug & Alcohol Rehab Plymouth
        • Drug & Alcohol Rehab Preston
        • Drug & Alcohol Rehab Sheffield
        • Drug & Alcohol Rehab Somerset
        • Drug & Alcohol Rehab Southampton
        • Drug & Alcohol Rehab Suffolk
        • Drug & Alcohol Rehab Watford
        • Drug & Alcohol Rehab Wolverhampton
        • Drug & Alcohol Rehab York
  • Blog

How to Cure Anxiety Attacks

3rd September 2018 by Nick Conn

There is much written about anxiety attacks (proper name: panic attacks). Some is helpful, some not, the latter because it’s either commercially motivated or innocently misguided. I recently read an article that was probably well-meaning, but certainly misguided. It recommended distraction and avoidance, meaning distraction during the attack and avoidance of situations that trigger attacks. Both approaches might reduce panic in the immediate sense but would certainly make it worse in the longer term.

 

As a psychologist and practicing Cognitive Behavioural Therapy (CBT) and Acceptance Action Therapy (AAT) therapist, both cognitive-behavioural approaches, I’ve treated many clients suffering from panic. All were quickly cured. This is certainly one of the easiest psychological problems to resolve.

 

Independent advisory bodies such as the National Institute of Clinical Excellence (NICE), universally recommend cognitive-behavioural approaches as the treatment of choice for panic and other anxieties. In recent years treatment has been enhanced by combining traditional CBT with more modern acceptance-based approaches, such as AAT, ACT or Mindfullness.

 

The most effective treatment for any anxiety problem is a combination of acceptance, that is acceptance of both the anxiety symptoms and the trigger, and behavioural change. Acceptance is the opposite of resistance, where ‘resistance’ means having negative thoughts about something or wanting something to be different (those two definitions are effectively the same thing). Anxiety is always caused by resistance of the symptoms of anxiety and/or resistance of the trigger.

 

Panic always involves resisting panic. A fearful thought initiates the panic cycle. That fearful thought is often anticipation of panic. The fearful thought generates a release of adrenalin. Anxiety is often referred to as the fight-flight response. It developed during our evolution to increase our chances of survival under threat by helping us to fight or flee.

 

Physiological responses to adrenalin include an increased heart rate, to get more blood to the muscles to enable us to fight or flee, increased breathing, to get more oxygen to the muscles, perspiration to keep us cool, shutting down the digestive system, to release more blood to the muscles (reflected in a dry mouth or throat as adrenalin shuts down the saliva glands, or a desire to go to the toilet as the intestine relaxes) and tingling on the skin due to blood being diverted from the capillaries to the muscles and due to changes in carbon dioxide levels resulting from heavier breathing. Some people experience all these symptoms, others just some of them.

 

With panic the person experiencing the symptoms becomes fearful of the symptoms. Often this is because they know from experience that the symptoms will lead to panic. Fear of the symptoms results in more adrenalin being released. And so a vicious cycle of adrenalin and increasingly fearful thoughts is initiated, leading to panic.

 

These days, the body’s automatic adrenalin response to a fearful thought is usually unhelpful, since most fearful thoughts are no longer related to physical threats. So the fight-flight response is now largely an unwanted irritation.

 

AAT provides the understanding that anxiety, and the adrenalin that drives it, are harmless and the experience is bearable. AAT also provides tools to enhance our willingness to experience discomfort. These understandings and acceptance tools enable us to be willing to experience anxiety and to accept it.

 

Acceptance immediately diminishes the anxiety, since it interrupts the fear-adrenalin cycle. But more importantly it enables us to follow the CBT behavioural response of stopping avoiding, or escaping from, situations that generate panic. And this ultimately is the key to resolving the problem.

 

Most people naturally try to diminish or avoid panic, either through attempts at distraction or through avoiding, or escaping from, situations that trigger panic. Unfortunately all these actions reinforce our resistance of anxiety and prevent us from finding out that anxiety, like any other feeling, is harmless and bearable.

 

So the cure for panic is: stop using distraction, avoidance or escape as a means of controlling it, understand that it’s harmless and bearable, accept that there’s nothing wrong with experiencing panic, stay with it and watch the feelings rise, peak and subside as they always do. To speed up the cure, seek out situations where you’ve previously panicked.

 

And so join the thousands of others who have suffered from panic attacks and now no longer fear them, so they no longer arise.

 

 

Graham Price

Filed Under: Latest News

Sharing is Caring

Primary Sidebar

  • FREE CALLBACK SERVICE

    We offer a free
    callback service 24/7

    Simply enter your number below
    and our addiction counsellors will call
    you back in a few minutes.

  • This field is for validation purposes and should be left unchanged.
  • Facebook
  • Instagram
  • Twitter
  • YouTube

Related Articles

Addictive Behaviours and You

27th February 2020 By Dipesh

Tips for Overcoming Feelings of Powerlessness In Addiction

17th January 2020 By Dipesh

sex-addiction-cover

Self-Care for Spouses: Dealing with Addiction

20th November 2019 By Dipesh Leave a Comment

Naloxone

Naloxone for Opioid Addiction – Is it worth it?

15th November 2019 By Dipesh

Coping Tactics when Recovering from Drug and Alcohol Addiction

5th November 2019 By Dipesh

Tags

Birmingham Brighton Bromley Bushey Cambridge Cheshire Congleton Devon - Cullompton Devon - Paignton Devon - Plymouth Essex - Brentwood Essex - Romford Hemel Hempstead Hertford Hoddesdon Hove Kent - Goudhurst Kent - Tunbridge Wells Leicestershire London - Finsbury Circus London-Maida Vale London - Paddington Radlett rehab Sheffield Skype Staffordshire Staffordshire Moorlands Stoke On Trent Surrey - Farnham Surrey - Fetcham Wakefield Wales - Neath Wales - Swansea Watford Worcester

We work with all the major insurers

Footer

Get Help Now

  • Phone 0203 955 7700 or enter your phone number and get a call back.

    FREE CALL BACK SERVICE 24/7

  • This field is for validation purposes and should be left unchanged.

About Us

Our experienced team at Help4addiction are always on hand to offer you the most personal and cost effective options available for Alcohol and Drug addiction treatment

0203 955 7700
support@help4addiction.co.uk

Additional Links

  • Private Residential Rehab Clinics
  • Alcohol Addiction
  • Alcohol Rehab & Addiction Treatment
  • Alcohol Withdrawal Symptoms
  • Online Therapy
  • Detox from Home

Get Help Now

  • Phone 0203 955 7700 or enter your phone number and get a call back.

    FREE CALL BACK SERVICE 24/7

  • This field is for validation purposes and should be left unchanged.
Help 4 Addiction, The Pharmacy,
Battlers Green Farm,
Common Lane, Radlett,
Hertfordshire, WD7 7PH

© 2021 Help 4 Addiction. All Rights Reserved.

  • Privacy
  • Terms & Conditions
This website uses cookies to improve your experience. We'll assume you're ok with this, but you can opt-out if you wish.Accept Reject Read More
Privacy & Cookies Policy

Privacy Overview

This website uses cookies to improve your experience while you navigate through the website. Out of these, the cookies that are categorized as necessary are stored on your browser as they are essential for the working of basic functionalities of the website. We also use third-party cookies that help us analyze and understand how you use this website. These cookies will be stored in your browser only with your consent. You also have the option to opt-out of these cookies. But opting out of some of these cookies may affect your browsing experience.
Necessary
Always Enabled

Necessary cookies are absolutely essential for the website to function properly. This category only includes cookies that ensures basic functionalities and security features of the website. These cookies do not store any personal information.

Non-necessary

Any cookies that may not be particularly necessary for the website to function and is used specifically to collect user personal data via analytics, ads, other embedded contents are termed as non-necessary cookies. It is mandatory to procure user consent prior to running these cookies on your website.

SAVE & ACCEPT