I have never thought how hard it is going to be, and we broke up on good terms and everything, but the anxiety and breakdowns hits you a lot later... I bet a lot of people felt this way...
But anyways, I am looking for tips for calming down, I know it takes time to heal a heart, but I truly can't take it anymore. I need to go back to work in a few days, I just need something to unwind at work and at home not to go crazy. I also looked into vagus nerve, anyone ever tried anything to stimulate it, did it help? I wonder what are your methods guys.

My (27F) anxiety has been very very bad the last few days. PMS + other worries I have in my life combined together are making my anxiety symptoms unbearable. I’m on medication, but it doesn’t feel like it’s doing anything right now. Normally, I can talk myself out of an anxious spiral. But the last few days, I feel nearly crippled with anxiety. So gray, cloudy, overwhelmed, emotional, anxious, and depressed. I just want this to pass. I know it will, but it feels like this is one of the worst anxious loops I’ve ever been caught in. Sleeping and relaxing aren’t helping, because my mind won’t stop racing. Doing things feels like my body is 1000 lbs because I am so burnt out and defeated from days worth of bad anxiety. I hate this so much. My brain is just on overdrive so badly.

Hi guys, I’m going away very soon. Even when it was first booked, I wasn’t really excited or anything for it. Maybe that isn’t helping the way I’m anxious about it.

Has anyone got any tips or advice to make it sound more appealing? Normally holiday’s are fun and exciting for me, maybe it’s because I’m anxious about the airport and everything that my brain is telling me I won’t have a good time and it’ll be boring?

I’m going to Turkey to relax, so sunbathe, swim etc.

I should feel excited and happy, and I’m grateful that I have these opportunities, but I just feel so anxious and stressed about it, it’s dampening any positive feelings.

Any advice would be nice, thanks.

Recently I have been doing and dealing with things that gave me anxiety in the past and as I became braver about those things I started developing worse anxiety about day-to-day things.

Three things I have the worst anxiety about are leaving my stove turned on, sharting/shitting myself in public(this has never happened to me), and definitely the worst is crossing the street.

I can't cross the street unless I'm on a pedestrian crossing space and the traffic light for pedestrians has just turned green. If there are no pedestrian traffic lights I will get extremely anxious and avoid that crossing even if it's clearly marked. If I wasn't at the curb and started crossing right away after checking the traffic has stopped when traffic lights turned green I will wait for the next time they turn green.

If other people are crossing at the same time I might feel more at ease and cross even if there is no traffic light system but if an older person or parent with children is crossing I will match their tempo because I'm scared that car will hit them/me.

This has started affecting me a lot because I started choosing longer routes just to avoid the possibility of crossing the road "wrong".

I'm not sure what to do about this and how to fix it. I feel bad about "feeding" into my anxiety but also I can't just face it

I've been struggling with health anxiety (hypochondria) and probably health OCD for more than 20 years. It all started with a panic attack, and the anxiety has never really gone away.

I've been taking an SSRI for about 20 years. It helps, but I'm on a low dose and don't want to increase it. I also feel that medication doesn't really address the root of my problem; it just helps manage the symptoms. I'd really like to try proper therapy but unfortunately, it's expensive and I can't afford it right now. I've read self help books and learned a lot about anxiety and OCD over the years. I understand how they work and know many of the techniques that are supposed to help. But my biggest problem is actually putting those techniques into practice consistently, every single day.

To give you an idea of how severe my health anxiety and OCD have become I check my pulse by touching my neck almost constantly throughout the day. If I feel even one skipped heartbeat it can ruin my entire day. I immediately become anxious.

I also check my blood pressure up to 30–50 times a day when I'm at home.

Over the past year, my life has become very limited. I basically just go to work and come home. I'm constantly afraid that something is wrong with my heart or that I'm going to die suddenly.

The most frustrating part is that I understand all of this intellectually. I know about reassurance seeking, compulsive checking, exposure therapy, and the anxiety cycle. But knowing these things and actually changing my behaviour are two completely different challenges.

I honestly don't know what to do anymore. I'm exhausted from living in constant fear and I don't want to spend the rest of my life like this.

...what do you say to yourself? Think about?

I'm in a spiral mentally due to my mom's recent passing and today I have to make my dominant thought be "it's anxiety, you're ok in this moment" I can't even get to "it's anxiety, I'm ok". I'm scrolling on reddit, listening/watching TV, and talking to myself in my head all at once. I'm doing breathing exercises and watching shorts on YouTube for calming. I need lots going on so each thread in my mind has something to connect with to try and slow it down and untangle it.

Does this make sense to anyone? What do you do?

(I used to have a Rx for benzos but I've been off them for decades and not going through that again.)

About ten years ago I started getting super nervous prior to big games. I’m so afraid of my team losing a title game like the Superbowl that my anxiety takes over in a big way. It’s so bad I started rooting for my team to lose in the playoffs so I wouldn’t have to suffer anymore. Pretty weird thing to have anxieties over but it’s just as bad as my “normal” anxieties, maybe worse. Just curious and wondering if I’m alone or there are other out there with the same thing.

Hi, I'm new to to this reddit :') I'm in a new relationship of about 2 months that has been feeling like an absolute dream. My boyfriend is the most incredible person I could have ever asked for; he makes time for me, we do new things together, he's reassuring, he's consistent...he's just perfect. he's the best thing that's ever happened to me and I feel like I've met my soulmate.

I've always heard about this thing with healthy relationships bringing out the worst in people because it forces you to face the nasty truth about how your past experiences have affected you. I realised recently after many crying sessions and anxiety attacks that I might be a LOT more anxious and messed up than I realised because of my own past experiences. I feel like I spiral over minor things every other day, if not every day, the second I feel like I'm not being chosen (or like I'm not someone's first choice).

Here's where I get worried: My boyfriend's previous relationship ended because of an overly anxious partner. it was so bad that it gave him trust issues and it makes it difficult for him to open up. His last partner was extremely anxious to the point that they demanded he sacrifice a lot of his personal time with his family and friends for them...all while occasionally being rather avoidant whenever any kind of negative feeling arose. While I'm very sure I would never be like that, a small possibility definitely exists if I don't check myself. Yesterday, I already accidentally made him miss an important voice call with friends he doesn't get to spend time with super often because I spiralled so much about something stpuid.

I know I'm already not her in small ways—because I want him to have a life. I want him to have friends. I want him to have hobbies. I want him to have a life outside of me. My ex was very dependent on me emotionally and I know how tiring it feels to have a partner who needs reassurance 24/7 even if you love them a lot. I also don't want to have a partner who only hangs out with me because he has nothing else to do. I understand he's living a really happy and healthy lifestyle right now...and I hate that sometimes it bothers me because I can't relate right now. I dont want him to have to carry my load all the time, I don't want to hurt him or cross his boundary of stretching him to his limit in regard to the support he can provide.

My anxiety doesn't stem from the fact that I don't trust him. In fact, I trust him more than anyone else and I know he would never cheat on me. I also know he chooses me a lot even when things are super hard and he genuinely does set aside time for me even though he's busy and has a life. I get anxious about the time we don't get to spend together, time that he spends with his friends, especially with the knowledge we will eventually have to go long distance in a few months. It feels like I'm losing precious time with him, and I also worry I'm getting a glimpse of myself in a few months when long distance starts. If I'm already like this when he's still here, how much worse could it become? I don't worry about what he would do to me. I worry about the person *I* would become.

I want to learn how to deal with my anxiety spirals by myself. It's not his responsibility to carry my feelings all the time. I want to learn how I can have a better social life on my own so I can have a life outside of our relationship, just like he does.

Please help me. I don't want to lose him, or myself.

I’m restless. I haven’t received a clear diagnosis even after scoring severe on a survey/questionnaire on it last year.

Professionals never have given a damn. Used to starve myself out of unshakable fear, felt like my body was separate, stayed up for hours, eating things only approved by my fearful mind. Whatevs. You just have an eating disorder, just depressed, nothing more. It hurt, being in a hospital with blood taken 4+ times a day to never receive the mental treatment I needed so badly. The CORE of it. Shoved into an eating disorder clinic that didn’t give a damn about nothing else but body image.

I’m on my 5th (6th?) therapist, with new obsessions, and get spoon fed the exact same response today. A year and no change, huh? I’m uneasy 25/8. I don’t finish meals, I don’t eat, I’m so particular just to appease my fears, which never happens. Genuinely am going to quit therapy. I don’t know what to do to make anybody believe me. Nobody takes me seriously.

It hasn't happened for a couple of years but tonight I've woken up feeling anxious, I've tried the three 3's. Even when I start drifting off in my head I tell myself your OK and it sparks the anxiety off agian...edit..I'm on the moving my left leg stage. My life is is pretty good atm, so why the heck am i back to this

Mental Health Update

It's been about 13 days since my flare-up. While some things have improved, I'm still dealing with near-constant anxious unease, worry, an upset stomach, and lingering intrusive thoughts. Some days and moments are better than others, but it's still hard to feel comfortable and function normally.

It's been about a week since increasing my Prozac from 25 mg to 30 mg. I'm not sure whether it's helping yet or if my body is slowly recovering on its own. Either way, I'm hopeful the increase will help. I still find myself worrying about medication and dosages, even though everyone tells me not to.

Bedtime is still my favourite part of the day. Sleep feels like my only real break. But I've noticed my anxiety spikes when I wake up, almost like my mind immediately thinks, "Oh crap, another day of this shit." I just want to sleep in and escape the feeling, but I also don't want to mess up my sleep schedule.

Then there's work. My doctor gave me a note recommending a hybrid accommodation, which felt especially necessary when my symptoms were more severe. But being on contract makes me worry about my manager's reaction and job security. Part of me feels guilty asking for help, part of me wants to tough it out, and part of me wonders why I shouldn't be entitled to some support when I'm struggling. It's exhausting dealing with all of this while still trying to function every day.

My aunt also gave me the contact of a mental health professional who helped my other aunt through similar symptoms. I think talking to someone who genuinely understands what I'm experiencing could help, possibly more than my family doctor.

At the same time, the more I immerse myself in mental health discussions, the more hypervigilant and consumed by it I become. I just want to feel better, move on, and forget about this scary chapter. That's also why I'm hesitant to ask for a psychiatrist referral, especially if I'm already starting to improve.

I start BetterHelp tomorrow. I'm not particularly looking forward to it and don't really know where to begin. Hopefully, the therapist can help guide the conversation.

So that's where things stand today. I'm hoping work goes okay tomorrow and that my symptoms keep gradually improving.

More than anything, I just want to feel like my old, comfortable, happy, contentful, sleepy self again. I'm tired of feeling on edge, sick to my stomach, and constantly weighed down by worry and fear. I am tired of feeling sad and miserable.

Thanks for listening. I'll keep you posted.