Anxiety
Do you feel like your mind is constantly racing? Is it hard to concentrate or pay attention to a task because you feel so worried? Do you experience a fixed sense of dread?
If so, you may struggle with anxiety. While it's absolutely normal to feel worried about the future, excessive anxiety makes it difficult to stay present in your life. Untreated anxiety often interferes with both your physical and mental health, and it can disrupt everything from your academic performance to your self-esteem to your relationships.
Fortunately, anxiety is treatable, and the right therapy can significantly improve your emotional well-being.
To begin therapy for anxiety, book with:
Amy Parsons
Dayirai Kapfunde (virtual only)
Kenneth Guye (virtual only)
Kim Cardinal
Samantha LeBlanc
Sarah Callin
Signs Anxiety May Be Seriously Impacting Your Life
What makes anxiety problematic? It isn't so much about feeling worried or stressed - those are normal emotions that we all experience.
Instead, it's about examining the role anxiety plays in your overall functioning. Here are some signs that you may benefit from anxiety treatment:
You constantly assume something bad will happen: Life is full of twists and turns, but if you feel a persistent sense of dread in your daily life, that level of anxiety makes it hard to stay present or even think rationally. You may be apathetic or cynical because you automatically believe you're doomed.
You struggle in social settings: Anxiety can coincide with low self-esteem, and many people with anxiety feel worried about what others think of them. You may find yourself avoiding certain social settings or constantly pleasing others to try to make them happy.
You can’t sleep well: Many people with anxiety experience sleep problems like insomnia or nightmares. In addition, sleep deprivation can disrupt your emotional regulation, which can exacerbate your anxiety symptoms.
You feel like you can’t turn your mind off: Some people with anxiety describe their emotional state as frantic or hypervigilant. If this is the case for you, it may feel like you can't think logically because your mind is so full of worry.
You avoid anxiety-provoking situations: Anxiety can result in people wanting to miss school, work, or other types of commitments because they feel so nervous. However, these avoidance behaviours often lead to more anxiety in the long run.
You cope with anxiety in harmful ways: Self-harm, disordered eating, substance use, or violence all represent various ways people sometimes cope with their emotions. Sometimes the anxiety symptoms feel so intense that you don't know what else to do to release them.
Understanding The Common Types of Anxiety
Anxiety disorders vary by type and intensity. You don't need to have an anxiety disorder to benefit from therapy, but it can be helpful to recognize some of the anxiety categories. If you recognize yourself having some of these symptoms, you're not alone. Therapy can be incredibly helpful in reducing your distress.
Generalized anxiety: Generalized anxiety is non-specific. People with this type of anxiety experience intensified worry without a specific reason.
Social anxiety: Social anxiety causes people to feel unsafe, anxious, or overly self-conscious in social settings. You might doubt that others genuinely like you, and you may feel especially afraid to speak in public or make new friends.
Illness anxiety: Illness anxiety refers to having a disproportionate fear of getting sick or already being sick. You may feel intensely worried about your health even if you only experience minor physical symptoms.
Specific phobias: Specific phobias refer to localized anxiety about a certain situation or object. There are many kinds of phobias, including the fear of flying, fear of spiders, or fear of the dark.
Panic disorder: Panic disorder refers to persistent, unexpected panic attacks. The fear of panic attacks can lead you to feel anxious in your surroundings, and it sometimes causes people to withdraw from social settings.
Perfectionism: Although it isn't a clinical anxiety disorder, perfectionism is often a cover for high levels of anxiety. Students or working professionals who struggle with perfectionism often feel immense pressure to perform well, and they worry they will be unloved or 'lose control' if they don't meet their unrealistic expectations.
Your Anxiety Treatment Plan
Research shows that therapy is one of the best treatment options for anxiety. Although everyone's treatment looks different, some of the main therapy goals will include:
Recognizing your anxiety triggers: Anxiety can sometimes happen randomly, but fear is often paired with specific situations or feelings. Recognizing these patterns can help you feel more empowered in how you choose to react to your anxiety.
Practicing cognitive restructuring: Cognitive restructuring is an essential part of cognitive behavioural therapy, and this skill encourages you to challenge your negative thoughts and examine alternative views of thinking.
Safely exposing yourself to stressful situations: Exposure therapy is sometimes part of anxiety therapy, and that includes gently confronting feared situations. The more you can handle these stressful moments, the less stressful they tend to feel.
Implementing new coping skills: In therapy, you will learn new ways to cope with stress. Ideally, you will integrate these coping skills into your daily routine, and they will help improve your overall emotional state.
Developing a relapse prevention plan: You can't cure anxiety, but you can learn to manage it. With that, it's important to be mindful of potential stressors that may exacerbate anxiety in the future. In therapy, you can review such barriers and discuss effective coping strategies.
Therapy for Anxiety Management in Fort McMurray
How to Start Therapy for Anxiety Management
Beginning therapy with Boreal Therapy Collective is easy and requires no referral. You can book your initial assessment here.
Understanding Length of Therapy and Treatment
Your first appointment will be 90-minutes long. For all future appointments, you can choose to book for 1 hour or 90-minutes. During your first appointment, your therapist will ask you questions to better understand you and your areas of struggle. This is known as an assessment. Depending on how much you share, the assessment phase can last anywhere from one to three appointments. The assessment is critical. It helps you and your therapist understand your goals, and it helps your therapist develop a treatment plan to support you in achieving these goals.
After the assessment is complete, treatment begins! In the treatment phase, you will be introduced to a variety of skills to practice and implement to better manage your symptoms. Most people will have a therapy session every two weeks, and we recommend this for optimal treatment. Effective therapy typically takes somewhere between six to twelve appointments (for some more, others less). Many choose to continue therapy once formal treatment is complete. This is referred to as maintenance. People who do this typically have an appointment once every six to eight weeks. This is not a requirement and is a matter of personal choice.
Therapy for Anxiety Management at Boreal Therapy Collective
Where We Are Located
We’re located at 8530 Manning Avenue, Unit 104. You’ll find us in the Service Canada building (on the side of the building that faces the Clearwater River). To check out our space, click here.
Parking is located at the front and back of the building. The front parking lot is closer to us but tends to fill up quickly. There is also an empty dirt lot adjacent to our office that many use for parking. If you park at the back (where Service Canada is located), you can walk around the building to reach our office. To learn more about parking, click here.
Importantly, you do not need to be in town for treatment. We offer in-person and virtual therapy and our therapists are happy to provide whatever option works best for you!
Rates & Benefit Coverage
Initial assessments are billed at a rate of $300.00 for a 90-minute appointment. Follow-up sessions are billed at a rate of $200.00/hour or $300.00/90-minutes (you can choose your preferred appointment length when booking). We offer direct billing to 25+ benefit providers. With your consent, we will always direct bill first. If we are unable to direct bill, you can pay via email money transfer or credit card. You will be given a receipt once payment has been collected. For more information, click here.
