Posted by Racer on November 22, 2004, at 9:59:36
In reply to Re: DAY 3 EFFEXOR--??? imput plse?, posted by crazychickuk on November 21, 2004, at 21:38:56
For anxiety, I do two things: I take propranalol, 10mg once or twice a day, which helps (although with the Wellbutrin, it's not helping quite as much); and I work hard on behavioral remedies: breathing, posture, muscle relaxation, logical thinking, etc. You know, all the things that are said to help lower anxiety ;-)
For me, the anxiety starts out physical, then my thoughts will often find something to match the feeling. Once the physical anxiety symptoms start, I'll find myself thinking about a lot of different things until I find something to worry about. So, if I stop myself and think that it's a physical thing, and I don't need to find a thought pattern to match, that helps. If I remind myself of all the reasons I don't have to worry about something right now, that helps.
The physical things I do, though, help the most. I remind myself to breathe slowly and deeply. I stretch my back up, my shoulders back, which helps. In part, the posture helps because it makes it easier to get deep breaths going. I check the angle of my hips -- the more open my hip angle, the the easier it is to relax and breathe deeply. I go through my major muscle groups, tensing them and then relaxing them, so that I know what untensed muscles feel like, and then do a check for which muscles are tense and consciously relax them.
All those physical exercises help a lot, and as a bonus: they give me something to think about that stops me from idly working myself up because I have nothing else to think about.
Give them a try, kiddo, and see if any of them help you. If they do, they're certainly healthier than drugs, eh?
poster:Racer
thread:418550
URL: http://www.dr-bob.org/babble/20041118/msgs/418919.html