Anxiety and Stress Forum - My Anxiety Was Cured...

Ok,
this may be a long read, but please endure... It may help you - it cured me.

I am now 26 years old - I have had varying degrees of anxiety for approx. 8 years. I have had:

chest pains (or chest feelings - indescribable but very worrying feelings - pressure on my chest?)
dizziness
dissorientation
back pain
sleeplessness
panic attacks where my heart felt like it skipped a few beats and I was surely going to pass out (and die)
nightmares
unexplained tingling sensations in my fingers and toes

these symptoms, especially the chest pains were heightened to an unbearable level about 3 years ago - due to percieved stress. At that point I was sure I was going to die - I ended up feeling so helpless I gave in - I surrendered mentally and stopped fighting - the feelings eased slighltly.

About 6 months ago, I was in the same situation again - I ended up in the emergency ward of the local hospital, getting an ecg to check my heart - I was again sure I was going to die - after all, with these chest pains there had to be something horribly wrong with me.

I now feel better then I have in a long, long time. After researching anxiety and related conditions for a while, I found something that worked for me, it may work for you too,

water! I drink 2-3 litres of water a day. I can't explain it, but dehydration has huge detrimental effects on the body. Obviously, drinking water instead of anything else also cuts down refined sugar intake a lot - especially if you are used to having 1-2 softdrinks (sodas) in a day.
Water (and lots of it) is almost a cure in itself for anxiety/depression and a whole host of other conditions.

What also helped me was getting my thoughts back on track and positive rather then negative (it's amazing what you're thinking when you think you aren't thinking). This is what counselling is all about - cognitive behaviour therapy. You probably don't need a counsellor though... Once you can identify the negative thoughts that are in racing around in your mind and change them (doesn't take that much practice), the positive thoughts help greatly. I worked my way through a cbt course online (free, set up by an education department) and it helped as well. You can find it here: http://moodgym.Anu.Edu.Au/

i cannot emphasise enough how much just drinking water rather then anything else has changed my life, and i'm glad I didn't go for the drugs my doctor was considering - it only took a week or so before I started feeling a lot better.

If you suffer from anxiety/panic attacks, please try this - it doesn't cost anything - you'll feel healthier, and if you have the same response as me - anxiety will have been a gift - your body was just trying to tell you that you needed water (the 2nd most important ingredient to life besides oxygen).

Good luck, I hope this helps. I just wanted to share what worked for me, and I hope it works for others....