Anxiety – a mind-body perspective for recovery

Our blog this month comes from Lynne Sutherland, physiotherapist and coach, who used a neuroplastic (or mind-body*) approach to recover from decades of anxiety symptoms. 

My history with anxiety

If I am being entirely honest, I had probably been living with anxiety and periods of depression throughout my life starting in my teenage years. I had my first “diagnosis” of anxiety and depression around age 19, and was given medication and a DVD on depression to watch. This repeating cycle continued on and off throughout my adult life and no matter what I was achieving on the outside with a career and happy family life, I would keep returning to periods of anxiety. I learned to live with this mainly by keeping my world smaller and I was an expert at hiding how I was feeling. I firmly believed there was something wrong with me that needed to be fixed. This stole a lot of joy from my life.  

Living with anxiety – and trying to resolve it using conventional medical approaches 

Much like chronic pain, anxiety can be such a horrible feeling to live with, one that you just want rid of or someone else to fix. For me, it would show up as a fast heart rate, sensations of panic and dread, and I used to describe my thoughts as being stuck on a hamster wheel of negative loops of thinking.  

I tried various treatment approaches that were available at the time – counselling, psychology, Cognitive Behavioural Therapy and eventually at age 35, a well-meaning GP told me I would just always feel this way and to keep taking anti-depressants. I remember feeling so much despair at hearing this and also hope being extinguished. But, I do have a stubborn streak in me and now I am very grateful to my GP as this allowed me to I finally hear a little voice inside that knew there must be a different way, that I didn’t want to be stuck like this forever. 

A different way to view and treat anxiety 

I started to explore, firstly, mindfulness and meditation and then coaching using a mind-body approach. I learned that there was nothing broken. I understood that the anxious thoughts and sensations were a nervous system response that I had learned over many years based on old experiences. My body had responded in a really wise way at the time. Anxiety and fear is a brilliant response when we are actually in danger – our body’s way of surviving under threat. However, in the present moment, there wasn’t any danger and although I knew that logically, my body still liked to follow these old responses coupled with a lot of unhelpful thinking and beliefs.  

Using a mind-body perspective allowed my body and mind to respond to life differently, to access places of safety and calm within my own nervous system.  I also learned that beliefs are just thoughts we have had over and over again and we definitely don’t need to keep trusting them as true. 

I realised that after all these years of believing there was something wrong with me, that in fact there was nothing “wrong” with me and nothing to fix. My “alarm system” had learned to respond to life experiences through a lens of fear creating a loop of fight/flight and freeze within my body. I had always looked outside of myself to “fix” what I believed was causing these anxious sensations in my body instead of working WITH my body to re-connect to a feeling of safety and well-being.  

Using a blend of somatic practices, an exploration of old beliefs and experiences and Compassionate Inquiry*, I started to notice how differently I was experiencing life, and my world started to open up again. Along with understanding myself at a much deeper level including honouring the impact of my life experiences, I slowly started to expand my world again. Returning to a place of well-being within our bodies takes time, patience and trust but it is entirely possible. 

Reflections on my healing journey

I reflect back, now age 50, and am very grateful to the part of me that “knew” instinctively to look in a different direction. I know now how important it is to take the time to ask someone who is experiencing any kind of chronic symptoms what has been happening in their life both currently and in the past.  To understand that the body is often sending us little signals to look in a different direction.  

How is my life today?

My life now looks very different both on the outside but, most importantly, on the inside.  My career as a physiotherapist has expanded to becoming a mind-body coach and creating my own business to help others who are also stuck in cycles of anxiety or chronic pain. Something that my younger self would never have believed possible! I have a much deeper connection to myself, my family and my friends, life is lighter and I can experience so much more that life has to offer without fear of anxiety running my life. ​

Hope is such an important part of recovery. You may not know exactly how the journey ahead is going to look but if you have that spark of curiosity and belief that things can change, that’s all you need to take the first step forward.  

Lynne today

​​References:

*Various terminology is used to talk about chronic symptoms that are rooted in nervous system dysfunction & stress. Often the term 'mind-body' is used. At Living Proof, we like to refer to 'neurophysiological symptoms' acknowledging the interconnection between the brain/nervous system and the body. We also talk about the 'neuroplastic' approach to recovery, which harnesses the power of the nervous system to learn and adapt - meaning symptoms can change; they can be unlearnt. 

**Compassionate Inquiry is a therapeutic model developed by Dr Gabor Maté.  It helps people to explore the unconscious thoughts and beliefs that influence their behaviour and thinking (and ultimately their life)  – and to break free from these.