There are two major modes of treatment for anxiety disorders: medication and psychotherapy. It’s important to understand the difference between a treatment that helps you manage your anxiety and one that is geared towards helping you recover from anxiety.
For the most part, medications are used to manage anxiety symptoms, but they don’t “cure” anxiety disorders. Many people also find that changes in their daily routine can also help manage their anxiety proactively, such as making sure they get enough sleep, eat right and get exercise. Others find yoga, relaxation exercises and prayer to be helpful.
The goal of psychotherapy is to eliminate the underlying disorder. You are not just trying to manage symptoms, but also to get better so the symptoms don’t need to be managed. However, for reasons of biology or other causes, some people may not recover all the way from their disorder, so a combination of therapy and medication is often used.
What treatment is right for you will depend on your particular disorder, what is believed to be causing it, and your own preferences and needs. This is a decision you should make with your mental health provider.
Most of the medications used for anxiety disorders fall into two categories. The first category is benzodiazepines, sometimes called “benzos.” These drugs are essentially tranquilizers. Many people take them only as needed when anxiety symptoms start to rise. These are sometimes called “rescue drugs” because they can “rescue” you if you start to have an episode of extreme anxiety.
Benzos have pros and cons. On the one hand, you don’t have to take them every day if you don’t need them. You can just take them when you have symptoms, or when you are going into a situation you know will make you anxious. On the other hand, benzos are addictive, so you have to be careful not to take them more than your doctor prescribes. Benzos may also make you drowsy, especially at first. You also need to know that some people abuse them as a street drug, so be careful about where you keep them and who knows you have them. Of course, you should never sell your medication.
The other major category of drugs is Selective Seratonin Reuptake Inhibitors (SSRIs). SSRIs are usually prescribed to treat depression, but many people respond well to them for anxiety disorders as well. Again, SSRIs have pros and cons. They are not addictive and don’t make most people sleepy. They also have no real street value. However, if you are prescribed an SSRI you must take it every day at the same time, even if you’re feeling fine. It can take 4-6 weeks for an SSRI to build up in your blood stream, so you can’t wait until you have symptoms to take it and expect it to work. SSRIs also have side effects such as dry mouth and sexual problems, and they may increase thoughts of suicide in children and young adults, especially when they first start taking them.
There are other drugs that are sometimes prescribed for anxiety disorders. These include tricyclic antidepressants, antipsychotic medications and mood stabilizers. Like SSRIs, even though these drugs are usually used to treat other mental health problems, they sometimes work well on anxiety disorders. Your doctor can explain what your options are and what he or she recommends for you.
There are a variety of different therapies used to treat anxiety disorders. Most use a cognitive or a behavioral approach, or a combination of the two. The most tested form of therapy, in fact, is called Cognitive Behavioral Therapy (CBT).
Cognitive therapies work on changing your thoughts, because it is your thoughts, at least in part, that are causing your anxiety. For example, if you are afraid of being in large groups, you might, deep down, be thinking, “Everyone’s looking at me.” A cognitive therapist would help you challenge that belief by looking at the facts.
Behavioral therapies work, as you might expect, on your behaviors. Using the same example, a behavioral therapist might help you experience progressively larger groups and monitor your anxiety as you go. They might also help you learn techniques to relax yourself when you’re anxious.
It may be that there are specific reasons that you have an anxiety disorder. Something may have happened to you when you were younger, or your childhood may have been difficult in specific ways. If so, a therapist will work with you on those underlying issues to help ease your anxiety.