Anxiety Therapy in Austin, TX
Effective therapy for anxiety
Does Anxiety Have A Stronghold On Your Life?
Do you suffer from the consequences of constantly saying “yes” when you really want to say “no”? Is your head steadily spinning as you try to stay focused on your work responsibilities? Has the stress you feel impacted your personal relationships?
Anxiety can show up as constant worry, racing thoughts, irritability, difficulty concentrating, trouble sleeping, physical tension, or a feeling that you can never fully switch off. For some people, it is tied to a specific situation. For others, anxiety becomes a persistent background presence that affects work, relationships, decision-making, and the ability to enjoy everyday life.
At Enteave Counseling, our Austin anxiety therapists help clients understand what is driving their anxiety, recognize the patterns that keep it going, and develop healthier ways to respond. Treatment is personalized because anxiety does not look or feel the same for everyone.
Anxiety Is The #1 Mental Health Issue In The U.S.
According to the Anxiety and Depression Association of America, nearly one in five people suffers from anxiety in the United States.1 This statistic translates to about 40 million people—anxiety is the most common mental health disorder in the country.2
Anxiety might be so common because so many of us struggle with stressful events in our lives and then fail to address them. Nor do we practice the self-care needed to neutralize the effects of stress. In turn, we may develop anxiety because we’ve ignored our own need to feel better, and the stress we feel inside begins to manifest itself externally. Perhaps we can’t sleep. Our muscles may twitch, and we breathe rapidly. Or maybe we develop compulsive behaviors.
And it’s not just one stressful event that may have led us to struggle with anxiety—it can also be the daily onslaught of life. It might be the steady consumption of politics or the news cycle angled to highlight the negative. It could be social media posts that innocently lure us in, and as a result, we can’t help but to compare ourselves to others. Or perhaps it’s the stress that might show its face at a red light in an hours-long commute. And let’s not forget to add to the list our work expectations, parenting duties, and the need to make time for ourselves and our partners.
While some stressors are out of your control, others can be avoided when you start to honor your experiences. Anxiety treatment can help you find a happy medium between honoring yourself and honoring others, offering you a chance to identify your triggers and build coping skills to manage them.
What Should You Look for in an Anxiety Therapist?
Finding an anxiety therapist in Austin is not simply a matter of choosing the closest practice or the first provider that appears in search results.
A good therapeutic relationship should give you room to speak openly without feeling judged or rushed. At the same time, anxiety treatment should have direction. You should be able to understand what you are working toward and why particular strategies are being used.
It is reasonable to ask a prospective therapist about their experience treating anxiety, the therapeutic approaches they commonly use, and how treatment is adapted to different clients.
You should also pay attention to something less technical: whether you feel comfortable talking to that person.
You do not need to immediately disclose everything that makes you uncomfortable. Trust develops over time. At Enteave Counseling, your therapist works with what you are ready to discuss and helps create a treatment environment where difficult subjects can be approached at a manageable pace.
How Anxiety Treatment at Enteave Counseling Works
Your first sessions are an opportunity for your therapist to understand what you are experiencing and what you would like to change.
Treatment begins with an intake and discussion of your background, current concerns, symptoms, stressors, and goals. Rather than applying the same formula to every client, your therapist uses that information to develop a treatment plan around your particular needs.
You may explore questions such as:
What situations tend to trigger your anxiety?
What thoughts appear when you become anxious?
What do you currently do to cope?
Are those responses helping you in the short term but creating problems later?
What would be different in your life if anxiety became more manageable?
As therapy progresses, your goals can change. New issues may emerge, circumstances may shift, and some strategies may prove more useful than others. Your treatment plan can evolve with you rather than remaining fixed around what you discussed during your first appointment.
Therapy Approaches We May Use for Anxiety
Enteave therapists draw from several therapeutic approaches depending on the individual client and the issues being addressed.
Cognitive Behavioral Therapy
Cognitive Behavioral Therapy, commonly called CBT, examines the relationship between thoughts, emotions, and behavior.
Anxiety often involves predictions about what might happen: I am going to fail. They are going to judge me. Something bad is going to happen. I will not be able to handle it.
CBT can help you identify these automatic thought patterns, evaluate them more objectively, and develop more useful ways of responding. It can also address behaviors such as avoidance or reassurance-seeking that may unintentionally reinforce anxiety.
Dialectical Behavior Therapy
Dialectical Behavior Therapy, or DBT, can help clients develop skills for managing difficult emotions, tolerating distress, and responding more deliberately instead of reacting automatically.
One of the central ideas behind DBT is that acceptance and change can exist together. You can acknowledge the emotions you are experiencing without allowing those emotions to determine every action you take.
Solution-Focused Therapy
Not every anxiety concern requires spending months analyzing its origin.
Solution-focused therapy places greater attention on the changes you want to make, the resources you already possess, and practical steps that can move you toward your goals.
For some clients, this provides a useful balance between understanding anxiety and actively doing something about it.
Mindfulness
Anxiety has a way of pulling attention into the future.
Mindfulness practices can help you become more aware of what is happening in the present, including your thoughts, physical sensations, emotional reactions, and surroundings.
The objective is not to force your mind to become blank. Instead, mindfulness can help you notice anxious thoughts without automatically treating every thought as a prediction or command that requires a response.
Maybe you still have questions about anxiety treatment...
I don’t have the time for therapy--nor do I have the money.
Yes, we understand that therapy adds an additional cost to your laundry list of expenses. However, we’d like to encourage you to look at therapy as a good investment because what you invest today can yield an exponential return tomorrow. Consider the ways your life is now impacted by anxiety and what you would be able to do if you were able to alleviate that pain. Then ask yourself, Would treatment be worth it?
Will therapy just be talking about what makes me anxious?
Talking is part of therapy, but productive anxiety treatment is not simply repeating everything that went wrong during your week.
Sessions can involve identifying triggers, examining patterns of thought and behavior, developing coping strategies, practicing new responses, improving boundaries, increasing emotional awareness, and applying what you learn between sessions.
For one person, treatment might focus heavily on worry and catastrophic thinking. Another person may need to address work stress and an inability to set limits. Someone else may be avoiding social situations or struggling with panic.
That is why personalized treatment matters.
I can deal with anxiety on my own.
You can likely deal with a number of anxiety symptoms without professional help, but are your coping strategies constructive or healthy? If you want to be sure to cope in a healthy way, working with a therapist will give you an edge. Therapy can also introduce you to evidence-based tools that you can apply in your day-to-day life beyond sessions. You can certainly address some of your anxiety on your own, but it is a serious medical condition, and an anxiety counselor has the training and scientific expertise to fully support your healing.
I’m not comfortable sharing my personal issues with strangers.
This is a powerful and valid objection. You deserve to feel safe, and therapy is a good place to begin to feel a sense of safety. Our therapists do not pry and only work with what you choose to share. This is your treatment, so you decide the topics we discuss.
One thing to note is that you have a legal right to your privacy. Therefore, our online sessions are HIPAA-compliant, so what you say in sessions stays in the therapeutic space.
Are You Ready To Free Yourself From Anxiety And Take Flight?
Everyone deserves to live a life free from the weight of anxiety. If you’re ready to face your challenges—and overcome them—I invite you to email us at info@enteave.com or contact us via our website at www.enteave.com to schedule an appointment.
NOTE: During the COVID-19 pandemic, Enteave Counseling only offers teletherapy.
1 https://www.cdc.gov/childrensmentalhealth/data.html
2 https://www.cdc.gov/childrensmentalhealth/data.html
3: https://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2014/09/140925205629.htm
