Productive Ways to Manage and Reduce Anxiety Symptoms

In this article published in the Smarter Living Section of the New York Times on December 21, 2017,  Jen Doll discusses the prevalence of anxiety disorders, the difference between situational anxiety and anxiety disorders, and effective ways to manage and reduce ongoing anxiety symptoms.

How to Combat Your Anxiety, One Step at a Time

By Jen Doll

Earlier this year, I suffered my first major panic attack. For days afterward, my heart would race and my mind would fill with doomsday visions as I worried about everything around me, including whether I’d have more panic attacks and if I’d ever be able to stop them.

Knowing that it wasn’t just me, however, was strangely reassuring.

“Anxiety disorders are the most common condition in psychiatry,” said Dr. Naomi Simon, professor of psychiatry at N.Y.U. School of Medicine and director of the Anxiety and Complicated Grief Program at N.Y.U. Langone Health. Some 40 million people aged 18 or older in the United States, or 18 percent of the population, will suffer from an anxiety disorder each year, according to the Anxiety and Depression Association of America. In the course of a lifetime, that rate goes up to 28.8 percent of the American public.

Dr. David Rosmarin, the founder and (more…)

Body Awareness Increases Resilience in Coping With Anxiety and Stress

In this article published in the Well Section of the New York Times on January 13, 2016 Gretchen Reynolds emphasizes the importance of listening to your body, and becoming more attuned to our physiology to increase emotional and physical resilience when experiencing stressful conditions. The article cites a “focused breathing exercise” much like mindfulness meditation “to help improve your reaction in a stressful situation.”

To Better Cope With Stress, Listen to Your Body

By Gretchen Reynolds

To handle stress and adversity more effectively, we should probably pay closer attention to what is happening inside our bodies, according to a fascinating new brain study of resilience and why some people seem to have more of it than others.

We live in difficult times, as readers of this newspaper know well. Worries about the state of our world, our safety, our finances, health and more can lead to a variety of physiological and psychological responses.

“When faced with stress, whether it’s giving a talk in front of a hundred people or feeling pressured to get a second gold medal at the Olympics, we experience changes in our body,” said Lori Haase, a clinical professor of psychiatry at the University of California, San Diego, and lead author of the new (more…)