In this episode of "Catch Me When I Fall," join host Ben Fairless as he dives deep into the world of anxiety, a common yet often misunderstood mental health challenge. Our special guest, Dr. Rachel Chin, a renowned clinical psychologist, shares her expertise and provides valuable insights into anxiety, its various forms, and effective coping strategies.
Throughout the episode, we explore the definition of anxiety, its distinct differences from stress, and the common symptoms individuals may experience. We delve into the causes of anxiety and shed light on the different types of anxiety disorders.
Dr. Rachel Chin offers practical strategies to help manage anxiety in the moment, as well as longer-term approaches such as therapy and medication. We also discuss the importance of self-care and lifestyle changes that can contribute to reducing anxiety.
Furthermore, we address the vital role of supporting loved ones who may be dealing with anxiety and offer guidance on providing effective assistance without being dismissive or intrusive.
If you or someone you know is seeking further resources and self-help tools, we highly recommend visiting the following support links:
Remember, you are not alone in your journey to conquer anxiety. Tune in to this empowering episode with Dr. Rachel Chin, gain a deeper understanding of anxiety, and discover effective strategies to reclaim peace of mind and thrive.
In this episode of "Catch Me When I Fall," join host Ben Fairless as he dives deep into the world of anxiety, a common yet often misunderstood mental health challenge. Our special guest, Dr. Rachel Chin, a renowned clinical psychologist, shares her expertise and provides valuable insights into anxiety, its various forms, and effective coping strategies.
Throughout the episode, we explore the definition of anxiety, its distinct differences from stress, and the common symptoms individuals may experience. We delve into the causes of anxiety and shed light on the different types of anxiety disorders.
Dr. Rachel Chin offers practical strategies to help manage anxiety in the moment, as well as longer-term approaches such as therapy and medication. We also discuss the importance of self-care and lifestyle changes that can contribute to reducing anxiety.
Furthermore, we address the vital role of supporting loved ones who may be dealing with anxiety and offer guidance on providing effective assistance without being dismissive or intrusive.
If you or someone you know is seeking further resources and self-help tools, we highly recommend visiting the following support links:
Remember, you are not alone in your journey to conquer anxiety. Tune in to this empowering episode with Dr. Rachel Chin, gain a deeper understanding of anxiety, and discover effective strategies to reclaim peace of mind and thrive.
[Music] Welcome back everyone to another episode of Catch Me. When I fall the podcast dedicated to helping you navigate the complexities of mental health and addiction. I'm your host Ben Fellas and I'm thrilled to join us today as we delve into an important topic during mental health awareness week in the UK, which is anxiety. Now, anxiety is something that affects millions of people worldwide and its impact on our daily lives can be very overwhelming. But fear not because today we have a special guest with us a highly knowledgeable clinical psychologist who will shed light on this often misunderstood subject.[Music] Join us today is Rachel Chin and esteemed clinical psychologist with years of experience in helping individuals. Rachel has dedicated her career to understanding complexities of the human mind and has helped countless individuals find relief and build resilience in the face of anxiety.[Music] Welcome to Catch Me. When I fall we're honored to have you here today to share the expertise and insights of anxiety during this mental health awareness week. Throughout this episode we'll explore what anxiety truly is, the various forms it can take and effective coping structures for managing anxiety in our everyday lives. We'll also discuss how to spot loved ones who may be struggling with anxiety. So if you've ever experienced anxiety or no someone who has, this episode is for you. Get really taken a deeper understanding of anxiety and discover practical ways to take control of your mental wellbeing. But before we dive in, a quick reminder to subscribe to our podcast and leave us a review. Your feedback helps us reach more people who may benefit from these important conversations. Without further ado, let's jump right into today's episode on anxiety with our esteemed guest Rachel Chin. Stay tuned and together let's learn how to catch ourselves when we fall.[Music] Welcome along Rachel. It's nice to see you again. For those that don't know who you are, who's a little bit of an intro of what kind of role you do and why we're here today. Thanks Ben. Yeah, of course. So, yeah, hi everyone, I'm Rachel and I work in CGL as a consultant clinical psychologist and I've been with CGL now for a year. So, yeah, in April it's a year. And loving being here, really exciting to think about developing psychology services across Lancashire. And yeah, I guess a little bit about my role. We've been doing quite a lot around some action planning over the last month or so really thinking about kind of the psychology vision and what we can lead on. So, a big part of my role over the next 12 months will be looking at developing our talking therapy service. So, we've got a counselling service currently, which our clients can access. We'll be looking at how psychology, how the addition of psychology can build on that service. So, things like psychology groups, one to one specialist therapy and kind of pulling all that together and then offering, launching that service offering it to our clients and evaluating that. And then, we'll be looking at how we can work in with some of our local services, so other mental health assessment diagnostic services and thinking about how we can work with our client groups. So, people that might have a dual diagnosis or around a substance use need or alcohol need, and how we can think about helping our clients to access services without, I guess, some of those barriers that we know people face in relation to the drinking or substance use. And so, that's really exciting. That's big part of the role, but there's a few more things as well. So, I'm happy to kind of share a little bit about that. Yeah, go ahead. So, the second piece of work working with some other of our colleagues and leads to look at reflected practice across Lancashire, so that we know that some really good offers at the moment in terms of our staff group having access to reflected practice. And that's kind of an opportunity for staff to come together in a group. So, this is in addition to their supervision and it gives them an opportunity to talk about the work that they do, particularly the impact of the work that they do because we know that many of our staff will have had their own experiences, lived experiences, traumas, but equally will be working with people on a day to day basis who will also have had similar experiences or variety of kind of trauma. And so, there's a lot of different experiences or variety of kind of traumatic experiences, mental health needs and a space where people can talk about kind of people that working with the emotions linked to that work as well. And I guess process some of that in a really healthy way to allow them to continue to offer a really good service to our client group, also ensuring that they're looking after themselves as well. I think that's really important because a lot of places we can get so fixated on and looking after the client, but sometimes we go through these scenarios as well, trauma that you've mentioned there as well. And if we don't have our own workforce looking after themselves and how can we expect our clients to look after themselves, we need the tools there within ourselves as well. So, it's a really good initiative that I think they're doing. And are people coming forward for that? Or is it something that we kind of just start enough now? Yeah, I mean, again, it differs across the services, but we've got really good offer across the East Lancashire already around with like some access groups. But I guess we're looking at across North and Central Lancashire. So, some of those groups have already started and we've had some really successful fee outcomes. And, you know, again, looking at how we evaluate this, you know, how does staff let us know the impact that these groups are having for them. So, in terms of how they think about clients that they're working with, how it impacts maybe some of their actions or behaviors in terms of the care that they offer. So, that again, really positive. And I agree totally what you're saying. I often think about it is as like staff are our biggest asset, like if we don't have staff, we don't have a service. So, as you said, how do we ensure that this is a big part of our strategy? We recognize kind of, you know, if we're looking at what we mean by trauma informed lens and a service, they start with our staff as well. So, we're really thinking about kind of what staff are exposed to. And I guess that leads nicely into kind of the third objective that psychology are going to be leading on. So, thinking about our staff support. So, what we currently have available from staff support servicing in terms of Lancashire's offer. And that, the me is looking at, I guess, psychological staff support. So, we're looking at preventative measures, but also when something's happened. So, for example, staff have been exposed to a distress in incident or heard or witness something distress in automatic. What support is available for them. So, we're looking at kind of, you know, staff support debrief sessions, looking at some of the really good evidence base out there. So, we've published literature coming out in the next few months from the Association of Clinical Psychologists that will be looking at, you know, reviewing some of that. And so I see our sort of staff support as kind of individual team and organizational level stuff like we've got our well being hour. We've got something that I launched when I started is daily well being exercises. So, sharing a short exercise with staff each morning on Microsoft teams or on an email. So, when they're logging, it's kind of you've got a bit of a evidence space brief intervention that staff can engage in in work or outside of work. Hopefully in work because we want to encourage a culture where we are creating more poor spaces. And then we've also launched a staff well being care plan, which I'm really passionate about because I guess for me, that's recognizing that when we're meeting with our staff in a supervision capacity that we ensure that well being conversations are being had with our staff. And again, you know, in our service that is part of our supervision agenda to ensure that actually we do ask about well being, but this offers a bit more of a template to do that. So, we kind of guides the supervisor and the member of staff for a set of questions to help really understand the members of staff well being needs kind of, you know, what supports them, what nourishes them, maybe what triggers they might have in relation to things that might cause them. A little bit more distress and actually things that they can do in work that help cope with things and then we've got some signpost in element to that in terms of what we've got in terms of our employee assistance program. So, EAP offer and other things that we can tap into, but I like the idea of having a tool to raise awareness around that actually well being is a priority. You know, our staff are exposed to so much as you said earlier and that checking in on how they're doing and not overlooking that, you know, we all know don't we've someone says, how are you, how are you doing. Often, but what's our answer? Oh, I'm fine, thank you. Yeah, yeah, all the same. It's just, wow, I mean, it sounds like you've been really busy. I mean, this psychological support then, I mean, it only seems, I mean, it might just be my ignorance, but I'm only really hearing about it like the last 12 months, maybe and really pushing it now. Is this just something that's quite new to CGL services always always been going on or is it, you know, want to tell us a little bit more about that because I, I'm only just hearing about more, more of this support and it's fantastic. You know, having that kind of support network that you're offering now to our services. It's definitely been on the radar for a while, so certainly before I joined and I guess thinking a little bit about how it all links in so myself and Danielle, our head of service, I'm part of our work well being work stream inclusion working groups. So we joined this group monthly and you have our director of EDI so quality diversity inclusion Simone and Matthew Rosser from H.R. that leads on that group. I guess this is where we're looking at what we're talking about kind of well being initiatives, thinking a little bit about kind of, you know, ideas around that and recently we've had the mine survey. So we've commissioned mine to come in and do a survey for our staff and to really ask about the well being and support needs. So we should be getting the results of that. I think to all the end of May beginning of June, which hopefully from that might direct us a bit more in terms of a well being strategy because I guess that's where everything will hang on from the organization. So when we're thinking about kind of what as an organization were offering our staff things like this will sit in with that. So I guess within Lancashire we're looking at a few ideas for individuals teams, which again preventative and responsive. But I see all this linking in with the big vision as well. Yeah. What's accelerated this then like as as have we seen some evidence has it been feedback and supervision. What what what's kind of like made is like put our foot down and really focused on this. I think I guess in Lancashire we've been on a trauma informed journey for a while now and I think I guess a big part of that is looking after our staff. So you know we can often jump into thinking about kind of the trauma informed and responsive environments for clients, but stripping that back a little bit and looking at kind of you know as you say. So we've been on that journey and I see that the staff work sitting within that framework. And again for me it's something that I'm really passionate about as well. So I guess kind of bringing some of that with me in terms of my past experiences. So I used to work in the NHS on mental health in patient wards. So obviously we've staff you kind of you got 24 hour care for staff and as in staff providing that care and thinking about again from that nurturing model who's looking after our staff to ensure that they can continue to offer the best quality care possible. I know that actually people need to be looked after in order to look after and offer that care. So that's kind of sort of you know some of my values like really thinking about compassionately to shit and trauma informed and staff wellbeing as something that you know when we're looking at psychology and what we can offer. I feel that's a big part of what we can offer a psychologist within these services. So we're looking at like direct one to one group work for our clients. But really thinking about maybe more the consultation part of our role where we're kind of working with staff to support staff to deliver things. So that's like you reflected practice groups and things like that and supervision. But yeah, I think I think nationally like you know, you know we're developing our own people plan but the NHS people plan, you know, a big part of that is talking about staff wellbeing and that we should be having these wellbeing conversations not just in supervision. And I think that links in really nice with a piece of work that's going to be happening across Lancashire around our mental health first aid us. So again, sort of launching that as a you know a project where we will have staff trained to be able to kind of spot those signs of kind of mental health difficulties early signs within our staff team and have the skill set and knowledge to think about actually how you have those conversations. And then a really important role is where we sign post people to get the best quality support as well. And you mentioned about the mind survey that I wanted quite a stringent survey wasn't it quite a lot of questions in there, but all important obviously and I can't wait to I mean I guess you guys can't wait to see the results of those and you can kind of customize your approach then to what the needs are all the own met needs are within the service. So yeah, it's really good that you can utilize these tools to be able to create a better service overall so no really a lot of it. Because we will get individual breakdowns as well of like what our staff across Lancashire have said so exactly that is similar to what we got from the pull survey, which was kind of like maybe last June and that had a real focus as well on pulling out some data around staff wellbeing and that was the driver behind some of the day you out well being exercises. And the staff wellbeing care plan because staff, particularly in the northwest were saying that actually they wanted to have more wellbeing conversations into provision and more space to talk about those things. So yeah, I think those sort of real drivers from that feed back will definitely be feeding into kind of some of our strategy as well. No, it's brilliant. I love it. So obviously today we are talking about anxiety in line because that is the theme for our mental health not mind everyone nationally the mental health. Which one is it mental health awareness week which actually starts on the 15th of May to the 25th. So yeah, so I'm pretty sure I just wanted to ask it's quite a simple question or is it a simple question I'm not entirely sure but can you explain what anxiety is in a nutshell and how it differs from stress because is stressed different anxiety. It's a really good point because if we look at stress and anxiety and we look at I guess the physiological symptoms so we had a bit of a diagram now a body map and we were drawing on things that we know so I guess even between us together some common signs that could come across stress and anxiety like we might feel a bit flushed in our face our heart might be racing like sweaty palms might feel a bit shaky tension. So if you drew out kind of stress response in the body and anxiety response you like it to get many similar things that we'd pull out really. And I guess the reason behind that because if we're thinking about stress hormones it's adrenaline and cortisol and when we're thinking about anxiety as well and when our threat system so we can talk a little bit more about our threat system that when our bodies emotion system so the threat system is activated in the body. It releases those stress hormones so cortisol and adrenaline so it makes sense that we get the same responses when we're stressed as well as when we're anxious. So I think just thinking a bit about what you said about anxiety like there are if we're thinking more like as a psychologist I don't necessarily worked through a diagnostic model so we use when I say that so someone might have a diagnosis a panic disorder or generalized anxiety disorder. But what we would do as a psychologist is you know I guess not everyone will have a formal diagnosis but what we would do is try and help someone to make sense of anxiety or the symptoms that they're having through like a theoretical framework so again it might be that we're drawing on cognitive behavioral therapy and like a model so it would help someone look up kind of triggers for their anxiety. What might be maintaining their anxiety as well so when we're looking at maintenance you know it might be kind of you know things like avoiding things certain situations experiences or it might be kind of what we call safety behaviors where we're actually kind of you know a given example of you know again talking about anxiety and it being so common like for me personally I have a real fear of lifts you know I don't do it. Yeah yeah. Lifts are in an elevator. Yeah. The walls are in my fridge. So I have I guess like I do get in them if I have to but the certain lifts that I'll get in more easily like a glass lift because I can see out so I know for me that's a fear that I've had for a long time and I know there'll be certain kind of things that I do so if I had to get in a lift or avoidance would be one of my strategies which we know if I keep on avoiding lifts I will never really I guess work out or give myself a chance to know that actually I'm okay so if I face that situation but what I tend to do that if I get in a lift I will like have a bottle of water with me I'll make sure I've got my phone on me like if the lifts really crowded I'd get back out and wait for it so not many people in it so actually as a fear. You know it has at certain points in my life being quite challenging like you know if you in a tall building and you can't so I you often see me getting the stairs and I'll make a joke of it saying or it's great for my fitness or get my steps in but I guess secretly there is a bit of an avoidance there as well. So yeah I mean I can't a sneaker as well because I'm also like that I don't think they like lifts and I don't really know what it is that I just thought like about whether it's just that they're known it's taking me up it's going to fall. I see lifts you know I've ever seen lifts when they're like broken and they're like halfway up and I'm like oh my god like I don't know I just like over I catastrophise basically that's what I do. But it's interesting then I think the catastrophise will touch on that because I think that's part of the gues of the main sentence but the whole thing about lifts like what you said so for some people the same experience can be there but actually the associations they meet with that so if we go with the lift example like it might be for some people that it's quite an enclosed space so it's like more claustrophobia but for some people it might be that actually that isn't an easy exit or get out. So which can be so it could be both or it could be one or the other so I think for me it's more that it's not easy to get out of like there's not clay like if you were trapped. Yeah feels like it would be and then then the the cat catastrophise it and the snowball in effect or the chain reaction of our thoughts. The rational part of me would know that actually someone would come and help it would be okay but you know my mind would be racing to what I forget to you heart what I've heard out of water if I need the toilet what I can't breathe because there's a lot of people in here and then we go into different territory because what I will notice is those thoughts are triggering a bodily response as well so my heart rate will be increasing and before you know it you're in a vicious cycle and it can be really hard then to try and implement some strategy. So I think there's lots of different types of anxiety we might not kind of all have an official diagnosis but I guess we recognize there'll be some common out some common themes with anxiety and often it relates to kind of how we appraise or make sense of the situation that can be different in terms of the anxiety presentation that we have. So we have behaviors that we engage in a guest to try and reduce the anxiety or which actually might be serving it so we know avoidance as much as it can feel healthy in the short term to avoid something long term when not breaking that cycle of knowing that actually we're all right in lips for example. I feel like I'm having a very possession review only because everything that you're saying is talking directly to me because just to share something similar to you. So I can drive right I can drive wherever you know but really don't really mind I can pot around in and out the town on the country roads. Within I don't know maybe a couple years ago now I will drive on the motorway and I will panic I will get anxious I will think I can't get off this motorway I start thinking I'm going to black out. I can feel my eyes closing even though the not but I feel like that if there's no hard shoulder oh my god that is the worst thing ever because I'm automatically looking at the hard shoulder trying to think where could if I have to go I need to go to the hard shoulder and I have had to do that a couple of times. So I when you're talking about avoidance and how that's you know it's healthier but it's not healthier but it's it's a short term fix isn't it and that's exactly what I have been doing and I know I need to and I need to you know force myself to do that. But maybe baby steps maybe someone in a car with me something like that so so it's just really it's really interesting to talk about this topic because I can relate to a lot of the things that you just that you're talking about there and it's almost like you saying what you're saying as well I'm thinking as you speak it like even that you saying like baby steps but actually we know to face fears it's it's for a lot of these fears the long standing aren't they kind of may have had it for a while the anxiety builds up. The more we think about it the more anxious we feel as well so it takes a lot of courage and wisdom to be able to approach the question like so I you know often make a joke I know I could kind of talk myself through some of the therapeutic techniques and I could try and really support myself to overcome the fear of lips but I'm motivated to do that and and the question is does it have a massive impact on my life that where it really affects my quality of life and I think it's not really important to me. I think that's often a question that we have to ask on the exploring anxiety because for me anxiety is a normal response you know it's it's very and it can be very functional as well so a little bit of nurse for example anxiety before a test actually could be quite motivating but I often ask that question how does this impact on my life on my quality of life and it's not every day that I need to get in a lift and you know or like actually let your example does it mean you like clocking up the miles or you just take in much longer if you go in more on a roads and the motorway so you know I think it's kind of way in that up and then I guess having the right support to support to overcome this because you know what we know is anxiety can be incredibly debilitating and having the right support and scaffolding and I think for me it's like someone that's compassionate like my worst thing is if someone goes I'll just get in the lift like what you know nothing's going to be a little bit more but you know nothing's going to happen and as soon as someone starts like those types of discussions with me like that's it you're not getting in that lift because one I wouldn't feel safe with someone that's responding to me like that so I think you know having good people around you people that recognize actually this is the genuine fear it has an impact on your body and you know and it's not easy to alter that without the right type of support so I think you've got to be motivated but I think knowing that you know what I'm doing is not really good. Knowing that you've got the right people around you and some good you know there's really good therapy out there for anxiety disorders. Yeah no and we will touch on that later on but you've mentioned an example I've mentioned one I just wanted to know how common is anxiety then and what are the most common symptoms I know you've kind of touched on something but would you say common anxiety is common you probably come across it a lot more than what I do in my line of work. Absolutely and I think you know we could give stats on this but I guess I don't even say if you're sat in a room with people like you know the next meeting you sat in the next gathering or social you are are if people are genuinely being honest and felt safe and comfortable to answer this question and if we went round and said you know how many people how many of us in this group in this room would say the experience anxiety I think most people in that group or we would put the hand up or indicate yes. So it might be that for some people it's not an ongoing experience but for some people it might be more episodic you know like so we have we might have like I mentioned earlier around exams or interview or you know big transition so like for young people like you know leaving primary school to go to secondary school for example or leaving one job and going to another. A big one is like accommodation as well you know accessing services if you if you bring it back to our line of work like you know so to engage and work with a new service to walk into a building so we know that anxiety is prevalent in most people but I think why it might not be I guess recognize as much is that awareness of some of the symptoms or people get sort of used to feeling like that that it can be quite hard to distinguish whether it's kind of anxiety. Whether it's kind of anxiety or other things but you know some of the obvious ones are kind of you know I tend to think about it as kind of how our body responds so we mentioned earlier around kind of the sweaty hands heart racing feeling kind of like you know our breath has changed so short and shallow we can feel like we're breathing much faster we might feel dizzy we might feel nauseous and again we might it can impact on our sleep as well so. There's kind of you know like jeertery legshaking wobbling us there's a lot in there we may know it's like grind our job in really tense or teeth grinding. The behaviors can tend to be kind of more around avoidance or as I said like if we do face something we might engage in like some things that keep helps keep us safer reduce the anxiety a bit like safety behaviors but our thoughts can be a really good indication around. anxiety as well so there often what we call negative automatic for so it might be that you know say for example ice go and stand outside a lift and someone that hasn't got fear of lips would press that button or the lips here right need to get to floor eight i'm thinking the lips here how many people are in the lift what if the lift stops so my thoughts are already. I thought inclined to be more negative about that event about that situation and then they're starting to chain and future think as well so it's very much when we're looking at anxiety and symptoms looking at behaviors body feelings or sensations and the types of thoughts that we're having about situations could you get lost in your thoughts can't you. Oh yeah big time yeah and I was just thinking as well like so you you've got a fear of element at this is just simple things like if you're booking a holiday are you automatically thinking I want to be on the bottom floor so if I was like to the point where that was really impacting my quality of life I think I would have had to have done something about it before that so I don't actively. I don't actively scan accommodation but I guess maybe there's a little bit of an unconscious level where I'm thinking oh that might be nice or a smaller hotel but I often straight away when we check in somewhere would ask where the stairs are and i've been known to do eight flights or ten flights. Probably an answer to your question I probably should check out a bit more and then save myself some steps but yeah I think it probably does impact maybe sometimes more than I want to let on but I think at the moment I kind of again you just get to points where if it was every day and it's not that we're going on holiday all the time it's not that I'm staying in tall buildings I've never lived in an apartment I think maybe for that reason. Where do you think it stems from then do you know. Yeah it's a really interesting one because again as a psychologist one of the things that we want to do is or when we're working with clients with people that we start to think about like the current experiences like the hearing now and how anxiety sort of triggered but if we go back a step we're starting to think a bit more about people's early life experiences which we know can really shape shape holes on how we view things and we can have to make a link back to kind of where problems started based on an early life experience and for the life of me I'm trying to think you know have I have been trapped in a room is anything like that happened and I really can't pinpoint a certain trigger I feel like it's just something I was aware of maybe from like a teenager but I think then it's sort of like at various points in my life maybe when I've been a bit more stressed or had quite like big life events. Notice that it's sort of gone up a level so it's often a good indication for me maybe where I'm feeling a little bit more anxious because I notice it creeping in a bit more but you know I guess again thinking about another fear or anxiety it's often some of us can pinpoint an experience. I think the only thing that I can think about which actually as you've said now and I always forget this but when I was a teacher again probably is a link with this but I was on a fair ground ride in my office and so picky daily gardens these to have the fair there and yeah me and my sister has sort of said to my mom please can we go on a ride while my mom went into a shop so she was like yeah you've got 10 minutes I'll meet you here and we decided don't know why to go on the eggs. I know like there were like a big wheel but it was like I think they were called the eggs but you in like an enclosed shop so you could see out but like more like small gaps and because the person running the ride was waiting for more people to get on the ride he. So yeah so we were stuck at the top and I guess we were stuck at the top for a long time we both started to think a bit more like God we said to my mom would be there at this point and I think some of that anxiety thinking my mom was going to be worried and we were shouting down to the guy like can you start the ride or get us off and it felt like I'm sure it wasn't 10 minutes but it felt like we were up there for a really long period of time so I think just the not being able to get out and him not hearing us or not bringing us down. But for me it was like I don't ever want to be in a situation where I can't escape so I do think and I wouldn't do an escape room as well you know there's been loads of team bonding exercises and yeah and I'm like help me out you guys going for it but I'm not about that. I can understand that honestly I can. So we mentioned a couple of things there and I've written down on here all the different types of anxiety and if so how do they manifest differently and I know like again speaking to myself like this health anxiety as well as an I know that's a big one. Is it other than any other types you know kind of like touch on a few of them there as well but I guess anxiety disorder so we looked at like the nice guidelines so that the national institute of clinical excellence so we're following guidelines from medical or psychological intervention or social elements these are guidelines in the UK that we'd be looking at yeah so I guess if you're looking at anxiety from that you've got some of the ones that like you've said so you know you know generalized anxiety health anxiety phobias panic disorder obsessive compulsive disorder PTSD so post traumatic stress disorder would come under that as well. You've got like a big umbrella of anxiety and I think like again if people haven't been officially diagnosed one of the things that we do as a psychologist or as a therapist if you are setting someone's anxiety. So I've got some really good questionnaires that are quite specific so if you get feel from chatting with someone like you know if you get feel like someone's got phobia like a spider phobia or a dog phobia there will be tools and questionnaires that I can use to kind of help me understand that phobia in a bit more detail that will be a lot of people's behavior body responses thoughts that they might be having so that's another good way of if we're not quite sure what and often it's like anything else I don't think it's where that someone sits in one category like with anxiety you can kind of you know thinking about the things I guess as well and often anxiety and low mood and depression can come hand in hand as well because you know if we're anxious about stuff one of the things that we do is avoid and a lot of anxiety disorders and actually when we avoid we minimize our social contact with others you know actually getting at for example getting outdoors you know if you are avoidant of kind of you know let's face it COVID and the pandemic really brought attention to that for us all didn't it kind of that heightened anxiety and being told actually not to go out and engage in certain behaviors so for a lot of people that actually by not being able to do that and a genuine fear and threat for life really heightened some of that response as well so I think a good way of checking out is doing an assessment like a really good assessment would use like what we've been doing you'd have a chat about the anxiety how it impacts on someone how it may have started some known triggers we might do it a questionnaire to help pinpoint a bit more and then what we might do is what we call socialize someone to a model so if we were going down the line of using cognitive behavior very pain each particular anxiety disorder would have like a model that would help someone to understand that type of anxiety how it might be triggered and maintained and then we'd look at how we might when we've got shared understanding we'd look at how we might start to make some changes so often we'd be thinking about helping someone to change the behaviors that might be keeping the anxiety going or we'd be looking at I guess some work around people's thinking patterns so and then with the hope that looking at thoughts and people's behaviors could help change the way we feel Yeah and I found it really fascinating actually you were talking about like childhood it says the Ferris wheel or eight you know what I mean yeah and and then you mentioned about covid pandemic and stuff and I think you know I have an FU who was born in like the pandemic and stuff well it was both to have gone to nursery in that but obviously couldn't go and I'm just thinking what kind of impact are we going to see these children in a few years of what kind of you know because they've been isolated they haven't been able to have those social skills going to nursery going to the groups going to the soft place and is that sort of stuff and we might actually be looking back in a few years time and some of these children are impacted from from that aren't we you know so that could be quite a big thing yeah no just I was thinking then I'll stop my end like but I think as you say Ben I think already by labeling that so we know that actually this could be a consequence of people not being able to go about the day to day routine or to make opportunity to connect and socialize so I think by understanding that actually this could be a problem across you know many age groups as well I think we often think about young children you know that transition between primary and secondary school for a lot of kids as well or high school and college and things that so understanding and bringing some compassion into that as well so whether that's from a teaching model and kind of how they you know raising awareness and some psycho education so some education around the impact of anxiety and what we might expect to see in terms of how we might expect people to present so some of the things we've spoken about already things that we can do to act to normalize and validate this because I think the big thing with anxiety as well is like the people to know they're not alone so the whole COVID response I think there's some shared connection with people around actually although everyone had different experiences there are some overlap in terms of maybe that shared sense of fear and people being in that threat system like we spoke earlier about that threat system but when that's activated in the body like and it can be activated through like anger, discourse, anxiety like any peps or that system it operates on a better safe than sorry so you know it's evolved that system in us it's designed to keep us safe so but what can be really hard is to distinguish between when we're actually in threat or there's a real danger versus a perceived danger so no longer are we in the situation where we're being chased through I don't know a jungle by a lion for example or Savannah but actually what we can do with anxiety is there can be lots of scenarios where we perceive them to be real threats rather than like perceived threats and with that when our body goes into the threat system what we see is an activation of those stress hormones so adrenaline and cortisol has an impact on the body but also the impacts kind of on our ability to problem solve and make decisions so often when we're really anxious you might notice that actually your ability to think rationally feels quite impaired as well so you mentioned catastrophizing so I guess the things we can do like as a system as a society if we understand that model that a lot of us will have been in our threat system because of COVID because it was actual danger and how we're no longer at that same level of danger but that some people will have remained in that system so they may have remained more hyper vigilant so scanning their environment really thinking about signs of threat you know again some of the behaviors around sanitization and cleanliness may have remained for a lot of people or even gone higher but I guess as a society we might be thinking about things that activate our body soothing system so you've kind of got your threat system and the soothing system and this is often described so it's not my analogy about I really like it as imagine you going down a hill on a mountain bike and the mountain bike is your threat system so it's often the threat system doesn't need pepping up it's often the system that's already readily available because when this system kicks in it's our fight, flight or freeze response body is flooded with the stress hormones but what we can do is try and activate some soothing so on the bike if you think about pressing your handlebars gently to try and slow you down so the soothing system or the handlebars if we've got some techniques that we can use can serve the purpose of giving us a bit of a break from that threat system so it might be that I don't know a breathing exercise for example could be a soothing system activation where you know often people say well it's not going to change the threat focusing on your breath and it sure isn't but what it could do is create a little bit of soothing so we feel a bit calmer and more relaxed and then we've got more of those skills to problem solve and plan ahead and think about something that would be helpful for us well I mean you kind of answered the what are some of the strategies people can use to cut things out in the moment you mentioned about the breathing exercises as well that's quite a big one isn't it yeah I mean could talk a bit more about that I guess the breath work there's a few things that I think about so when the soothing system is activated what that does so it's often activated by things that we can use within our senses so dams movement, singing, breath work, touch stroke in a pet for example so there's things that are designed to activate the system and when the system is pet top it releases a hormone called oxytocin and that's like the love and bonding and connection hormone so when we're around people that we feel safe with as well that's again those social interactions that really activate the soothing system so in COVID times a lot of the social interactions weren't allowed face to face so when we went remote and like there were lots of things where people connecting like that it was really important to establish that because methods that we relied on to activate our soothing system we weren't necessarily able to do so we really had to be adaptive but I tend to think about soothing as like some really good grounding techniques so with our thoughts we can be future thinking or past thinking and it's really important to try and bring ourselves back to the present moment and things that we can do like breath can be a really good grounding exercise so something as simple as taking two minutes to focus on breathing in for a certain count so it might be one, two, three, four pausing and then taking a lovely long exhale, six, five, four, three, two, one so your out breath being slightly longer and something like that or you could shorten it as you first learn in these types of breath work can be really helpful because one activating your breath so doing something like soothing, rhythm, breathing can have that positive impact on the body and what to activate the oxytocin but also if you can say it sort of means you're a bit more in the moment and not in your head yeah, another one, I don't know Ben do you do any breath work is that something that you... Well sometimes I try to and this is why when it says where was it now, what are some of the strategies that people can use to cope with the anxiety in the moment so if I'm driving and I'm having these thoughts I find it really really hard and I know it's practice, you know, it's all about practice but I find it really hard to get into the now because I'm already thinking you mentioned it there about the future I'm thinking I'm gonna crash, I'm gonna do this, I'm gonna do it so I find it really difficult to just try and erase that and think about the breathing but that is something that I'm trying to work on but it does... It's just that's what you mentioned that actually these aren't straightforward skills I think practicing them in a highly stressful situation is gonna be a lot harder than if you were sat there doing it at home so I'm really glad that you brought that up because anyone listening you know we're not saying that actually you know do some breath work and you'll be fine at not at all we know there's some good evidence for a breath work but we also know in your example there there may be some other things like another exercise we talk about is grounding with your senses so sometimes it's called the 5, 4, 3, 2, 1 exercise and it might be where you're using your senses for a few minutes to help bring you into the present moment so often we'd say can you look around you and say out loud or in your head five different things that you can say and then it might be four things that you can touch and label those then it might be three things you can hear then two things you can smell and one thing you can taste and again that could be because we know for some people that again senses can be really good to bring you back into the present moment I think your example though is interesting as well because it's the future thing can and when you drive in even to kind of apply a technique you need to focus and sweat but what I'm thinking a bit more is often sometimes I tell myself like that labeling out loud right your threat systems acted activated now you're not in immediate danger you're OK so even some like positive affirmations because awareness is the fact that you're aware that your thoughts are taking you there is the first step for me to make change the moment we're not aware then before we know it we're in a different place and we're even more anxious so I guess we've recognition so I often think labeling out loud like thanks for alert in danger but actually I'm OK today or I'm all right I'm holding the wheel I'm on the motor where no one going so bringing in some I guess statements but maybe what more of a compassionate tone because we can often go into that bully in mindset when we feel like you know we're being a bit dramatic around things like so if I spoke to myself outside a lift going myself together woman like that's an awful way of speaking to myself versus well you're a few explainer to the girl yeah I mean you're raising really good pice and I think even though you said you said the 5 4 2 1 technique I think I wasn't actually doing it but I think I was doing it in a sort of jumbled way because what I would do at the time is I would unwinder window so I can get a bit of fresh air so I'm smelling what's outside I get a bit of chewing gum put that in my mouth or mint or whatever that's the taste isn't it so I'm getting some of the elements there and it does seem to like help but then I'm off the next junction you know what I mean so it does it is kind of helping with what you're saying and I guess it's just like say practice technique all that sort of stuff the affirmations and stuff that is really good and now we'll be taking that on board and do you have any music then that you listen to in the car yes or create a bit of relaxation or you find soothing so my music is not really that soothing but I do listen to a lot of podcasts obviously so I try to put maybe like a maybe an anxiety podcast on or something like that but then sometimes I can trigger it so it's kind of like getting a balance as well so yeah it is a good idea to have something on maybe sing along to the music trying to strike yourself that sort of thing so yeah there are certain things that I am learning and trying to do it but it's not we're not we're not good to see that kind of thing I love that I'm terrified though that certain music actually might not be soothing but with the podcast it might be the topic but I've noticed like people that I follow I have certain like favorite hosts so even depending on who the guest is once you hear a voice like I love Elizabeth Day like her how to fail podcasts I love her voice she's got the most soothing voice as soon as I hear her speak it's almost like the topic I feel relaxed so the certain podcast that I might put on as I'm going to sleep not with the intention of really actively listening to it but actually just a bit of background so you've been to help me feel relaxed but the certain ones where I will drive to it as well so I think that's the other thing knowing you might have a few strategies but actually some might not be the best in every situation that music is very powerful but again a bit a little bit of a kind of warning there we know that some music can be quite triggering it can be bring back quite a lot of memories so it is about sometimes when you've got the radio on you don't know what songs going to come on versus if you've got a playlist on and you can be a little bit more like you might have like some instrumental music or some soothing sounds as well I often like like nature sounds and remember years ago in a group that I ran on the impatient what's one of the clients introduced me to the sound of rain as well as much as we recognize that as a regular sound particularly Manchester but I feel like listening to that or like forest sounds or nature sounds and actually it's finding a sound that soothes you because actually some people that have worked with again one of our assistants that have worked with he really likes like thunder sounds as well whereas for some people that could be oh I don't find that relaxing so trying different stuff and knowing that it's okay that actually you don't find breath work relaxing there'll be something else I often say we have like a top ten list of strategies we do number ten should be go back to number one we should never end a list of strategies with a final one yeah because I think there's always time to keep going with stuff and something will work at some point yeah no I totally agree is that why we put white noise on for babies so the soothing got sleep is that similar is it? I think that's been a godsend doesn't it to many paris yeah again and there's kind of you know all the sounds and noises that you know through research is told us that actually it can activate some of those emotion systems and the body so you know I guess it's like for a lot of people trial and error so listening to something for you that's relaxing like you know if it's if it's birds for someone if it's running water but again I always say when we're doing any exercises like this whether it's for staff or with clients to check out with people because someone may not find water soothing in a meditation practice because maybe a trauma links to water you know or a collar like I've never facilitated exercise where I encourage someone to think of a certain color as they breathe in and out and it's meant to be relaxing because actually as much as I love the color greed for some people that may not be a pleasant association with that color so I think the language and how we set things up is really important and I think that trauma awareness that you know just what's soothing for someone is not soothing for another person great no so are there any longer term strategies that can help manage anxiety such as therapy or medication? Yeah so we're going back to those nice standards so often it would be advocated again depending on the type of anxiety but you know often there's a place for medication and there's a place for psychological therapist and some people might do those together some people might just go down a medication room or some people might just go around down the talking therapist room but again I think to be open-minded following a good assessment of what would help that individual but I think you know going to you know if someone who's listened to this and has been struggling with anxiety for a long time it might be that you've tried a few tools yourself so some of the things we've been speaking about because there's a lot of good apps out there that run through some of these like breath work and meditation you know there's a lot I think there's a lot more resources out there good reputable resources that've got some good quality and governance around them but if someone has tried all that they've spoken to someone I'd say actually going to seek help from you GP as a first point for a referral and they can often sign post yet again depending on where people live there's different self-referrals in certain services but always going like for you GP can often be a good good starting point or having a look online at your local trust so for us it's Lancashire and South Cumbria NHS trust and there'll be services there that kind of again tell you a bit more about the referrals process whether you need to be referred in through a professional or whether you can self-refer so that's another thing for people to be aware of but I think for a lot of people after receiving therapy that's when they can say that actually it was live changing as in you know I've lived with anxiety for such a long time and you know how debilitating how much it impacted my quality of life and now there's so much more I can do because a therapist will work with you on your goals so often we look at it as like a problem list but if we flip that on its head and say well actually these are problems but how do we turn these into goals so actually for me it might be one of my goals would be to be able to go in all lips but we might break that down we might think about kind of some of the regular ones that I'm avoid in that would impact positive on my quality of life so and I think for a lot of people therapy isn't always easy as well like you know it takes a lot of courage and a big part of therapy is actually your relationship with the therapist or you know the person offering that psychological support so you know having a bit of time to build that relationship you know we need to feel safe so physically safe but psychologically safe as well so actually to sit in a room with someone or you know on a online platform or telephone it takes a while to build up that safety and trust and then understanding like a big part of any therapy is kind of the you frangzaiety disorders information so that people kind of know what they're experiencing this is part of anxiety like this is normal but actually the positive thing is we can help to make changes if you want to no no really like that I've got another question as well can I not know this one can anxiety ever be completely cured or is it something people will have to manage for the rest of their lives? great question so as in like if it's really debilitating and some of the things we've spoken about 100% some really good evidence based techniques for so yeah so again for a lot of people like if you have access to good therapeutic techniques and fingers you learn a lot in the therapy but a lot of kind of outcomes happen once for a person did for a lot of people so it's how you learn so in therapy you often like learn and build on a set of tools that then you can apply so for a lot of people it's how they have the confidence, the courage, the wisdom to apply those outside of the therapy room so it's a lot of work in in in in a sense so I think people are motivated to keep going with those techniques that we can certainly see positive changes but what people may find is that they come through a really bad period of anxiety they're good for a bit and then they notice there's been a bit of an increase again so this is normal as well like with anything the ups and downs and flows so I think there's no harm just because someone has access to therapy once it doesn't mean that they can't access it later on because it might be a few sessions like topple pull booster sessions you know it might not be a full like 12 week for example session you know offer but I think there's no harm in recognising that help and I think that's the first thing is okay not to be okay so going back to I think the sort of anxiety are we ever going to get rid of it I think going back to that threat system we've evolved as humans that to operate with that threat system is better to be safe than sorry so naturally in our body we're guided by a response when we perceive or there's actual threat our body does things so we're like we freeze we run away we fight those things are there to keep us safe so we might not be facing the same threats as we did many many years ago but I guess it's recognising that that's a system that might stop us walking to close to the edge of a cliff yeah because that system in our body but all like that might stop us running towards imminent danger because that system is kicking in yeah you might think you're completely cured from your anxiety or whatever it is that's causing that anxiety and then maybe a year later that actually comes back and I guess is it I presume that happens then yeah that obviously happens what is the best advice just to just to go back to what you originally did to overcome what it was you know the first time do you not only accept the imagine that happens sometimes and it could be such a downer a bit chronic as you think oh I thought I will cure the thought of done this you know why is this happening again and could it be because of some behavioural changes or some sort of changes that happen within that time period that has caused that then I presume then this is all yeah sorry I was just having that thing help loud then yeah it's really good to hear this making out loud because again these are the types of questions that could prevent people from coming to seek help so what I'd say is there can be many triggers why someone may experience another episode of anxiety so if you think about triggers as being things that happen in our environment so external triggers so it might be again anxiety is shot of for someone following a loss or bereavement that it might be a change in job or a move or a true some type of transition or some type of loss and I guess there may be also what we call internal triggers so that might be more kind of a pattern of thinking to kick in again you know maybe based on some of those external triggers or kind of our confidence has gone a bit and would be more negative towards ourselves and because anxiety and self-esteem like I said with low mood there's a relationship with all of that and I think going back to what you said then for me there's something about the first thing that I encourage people to do is listen to how we talk to ourselves because how we talk to someone we love care about or our closest best friend is often not the way we talk to ourselves so I think you know bringing in some kindness and compassion so you know I use the example like thanks for a little bit of me that I'm feeling anxious again it's tough for me you know kind of narrative and it might feel a bit odd saying it to yourself like that and if it does it might be that we have a go at writing something from more the kind and compassionate lens or we just focus on a few bullet points to practice but by saying that out loud and listening to the tone so there's a lot in if we're saying it in more than aggressive or a critical tone versus a soothing tone so the same for could be exactly the same but a person said that to themselves with a kind tone or more aggressive tone and they will feel different with complete sense but I can imagine speaking from experience you know when it happens again it's so easy to just be really negative in the way that you talk to yourself and stuff but it does make complete sense you know adjusting the way you talk to yourself will hopefully become best outcomes I would imagine so sorry for keeping you for so long Rachel so it's been lovely and just done the last part now really because it's kind of focusing supporting someone with anxiety if someone is struggling with anxiety what what are some other ways that you can support them I think again equipping ourselves with some knowledge so we just recognizing that we can often go into judgmental mode as well can't we and it again it might be different with people that we love and care about versus how we would be in a working environment but just recognizing have I got enough information about this like so there's some really good again some of the things I suggested and maybe we could put some things in kind of some of the notes as well of course you're every will yeah good resources that we can link into but I often think about kind of having an awareness of what anxiety is so if you're supporting somewhat awareness is crucial so you know when we have a conversation and when we just think got someone really gets me and it's often because they might be sharing information and saying actually this person what what I've read about this seems quite common so there's kind of like that normalizing and validating approach but I think that if we step back from that and rewind a little bit does it think about listening for me so we can often miss a first step so when someone's chatting towards about how they feel we can often go into trying to problem solve or think about what we might get say next to that person but really active listening so not thinking about what's going to come out of our mouth next but just purely trying to understand and make sense of what that person is telling us and then when we feel like we're doing that because often what people know don't they when you sat in a room with someone you genuinely know whether you've got someone's full attention whether they're tuned into what you're saying and that in itself can be really powerful so helping a loved one feel seen and heard educating yourself with some good resources and that might be self-help leaflets or website and also knowing your audience so if this was a young person it might be some really good kind of like again reputable quality tick-tock accounts that you could follow that maybe as is one best psychologist for example or another type of social media where you target audiences there as well so it's matching kind of someone's where they're at with technology if someone's a book person or an online or a podcast I would often have like a set of tools that I might then share depending on that person's needs yeah really like that adapting approach to the clients yeah because it's quite easy to just give a little any old leaflet isn't it just to anyone it doesn't really mean anything but adapting or customizing your approach to the individual is what will actually really get them to seek help yeah I like that and are there any specific things you should avoid saying or doing when trying to support someone with anxiety yeah think like we do you kind of said it yeah you know those things like you know even our self-statement pull yourself together it's not that bad God you know anyone can do that or you did it last time like things what we may perceive as more critical statement so I often think about it as does that statement nourish and support that individual or does it deplete that individual and I think we can tell can't we whether or advise or what we're saying actually lands how it lands because often people get defensive when it doesn't land well like they might shut down or they might attack back verbally so I think they're just trying to drop the judgment so I think I often like quotes from people and that's by some of this self-help stuff is really good because you know little videos or stuff that help really normalize some people's responses because I think it can come from a good place we can often think all like encouraging someone like avoidance maintains anxiety so let's get someone to get in that lift but actually if you do it in the wrong way you can set someone back even further because they then associate that experience with a really traumatic end or process so I think it's about going at their pace offering nurturing and encouraging kind statements and recognizing I always think do you think anyone really wants to be anxious? Do you think anyone wants to worry about the health every day or avoid going to certain settings? Absolutely not so if we hold that lens and think you know what no one wants this everyone would want to kind of maybe have a little bit that they can moderate and work with but when it's extreme it's debilitating so yeah kindness all the way Yeah, yeah again I just to quickly go over an example it's really it really talks about what you've just said there is again another experience for myself I went shopping with my partner into all traffic traffic centre and I was going through a stage where I used to go into like supermarkets and get really anxious and again I thought no way it's come from and I went into the traffic centre and we went into a shop in the traffic centre and I just remember it being really brightly everywhere and for some reason I just thought I'm going to faint I don't know what's caused it really don't it was fairly busy I would say I was for before before anything but and I just remember going out I had to go out of the shop and I had a little bit of such a shop partners like where are you? Where's he gone? So I not only did I have to get out I had to sit down because if I didn't sit down I felt like I was going to faint like I mentioned I'm black out and I sat on this bench and I'm like sweating you know sweaty palms and getting all worked up and stuff probably being really aggressive to myself as we were talking about before and now she doesn't do this anymore but at the time she didn't understand it and she came out she was getting quite angry with me saying oh you know why have you run out you know she just thinks I was trying to get away from shopping basically and so that kind of like that sort of experience it kind of made me feel even worse you know because of the way that person was talking to me but obviously all the time we've had that we've had chat some I've told her how I feel in them situations and why I have to do what I have to do and then work and on it luckily now I don't I can go to supermarkets and all that sort of stuff now and it doesn't really affect me now but it just goes to what you were saying it set me back it did set me back and so it is so my experience of my sort of tips on anyone who's listening is is to have those conversations with your partner and your loved ones and how and how it makes you feel and like you're not just trying to get out from shopping and yeah yeah so like what's helpful what's on the helpful like a bit of a like we plan ahead it's like coping ahead isn't it I know this is a situation that is likely to cause anxiety for me these are the things that I'll do myself these are the things that I'd like you to offer if I was showing more signs of anxiety because it's that shared agreement that can create that safety as well and I think that's the thing that can happen in a therapy session as well that you would never be forced to go and face your fears or whatever the anxiety is with you it would be coached and you'd be spoken about kind of building up to that point particularly if it's kind of you know situations or you know like the lifting, spider phobia and things like that you develop your hierarchy of kind of fears with the therapist so I think for me it's kind of yeah exactly that just having a chat and being really open and what you'll find is the more I found this as well like with clients that I work with the more I've been comfortable again to share something with a client that like and I wouldn't just go oh guess what I have anxiety and this is amongst us about this for me I get guest as part of how we bring in lived experience as a therapist so I'd often think about kind of if I was working with someone with anxiety and I felt that my experiences might be useful whether it's about how I've coped or to normalise I'd always check in with someone like you know I'm working with you know I've experienced certain types of anxiety myself and I've kind of come through a lot of that or I'm still coming through it I've got some ways that I find coping helpful would you like to hear about any of this and if not no but if I do share it it would be snippets and it would be a greed amount of time and what I share but then checking in with the client what was that like to hear that because often and like is there anything that I've said that you can relate to because we can use external material but often people might see a therapist almost like put them on a pedestal like God you would never have any of those problems I can't ever imagine you experiencing anxiety or low mood or whatever it is and I think sometimes sharing a little bit within a safe way and thinking about how we do it and consent and checking in with the client can help to normalise that we are all human and we will all it's like a continuum we all move up and down on this anxiety continuum yeah definitely and I think I think there's a bit of that manliness inside of me when I was I was in my early 20s and stuff and it's you don't want to take this mask off I guess in sort of way and I didn't really want to open up myself up and be like that vulnerable guy and stuff but so I guess my point is like to encourage any of our young guys as well just to like you know just don't worry just speak to that person and get it off your chest and let them know because you're only be covering it up on the way and it's much easier to just get it off your chest straight away but yeah Rachel I've kind of come up, oh well I've finished everything that I wanted to discuss and talk about and you've come up with some fantastic answers I'm really really happy with how it's gone I'm just wondering is there anything that any kind of last words or such from yourself that I may have not have picked upon or not? is there anything? Oh we kind of covered everything I guess just as a summary you know talk to people don't be on your own with it it's very common there is really good evidence-based support out there and people can get better like people with the right support people can see improvements and it's okay to you know how things come back I think that example of that chat with ourselves where just because you've had some support it doesn't mean that it's gone further that actually with a little bit of extra support then it could be back to that same point again it's like like almost little mini relapses with stuff but actually we can get back on track it's just a small deray often and again I can only thank you enough(Music)(Music)(Music) get your details in terms of the resources that we can use for for our show notes but if anyone who's listening you might need that additional support before the links are there as well but yeah just once they find very much spiritual good luck and you want? Thank you it's lovely to be on thanks Liam Bye(Music) Thank you for joining us on this insightful episode of Catch Me When I Fall we hope that our conversation with Rachel Chin the clinical psychologist has provided you with value and we will insights into anxiety and practical strategies for managing it Remember anxiety is a common experience and you're not alone in your journey there are resources support networks and professionals who are ready to help you along the way take the first step towards prioritising your mental health and seeking the support you need a heart felt, thank you to Rachel for sharing her expertise and enlighten us on this important topic your knowledge and dedication to mental health are truly inspiring we encourage you to continue learning, growing and spreading awareness about mental health and addiction remember to practice self-care so seek support, county, self and others together we can create a more compassionate and understanding world don't forget subscribe to our podcast and stay tuned for future episodes where we'll explore more topics related to mental health and addiction if you have any suggestions or feedback we'd love to hear from you reach out to us on our social media channels or through our website thank you once again for being part of our community until next time keep reaching out keep seeking help and remember that you are not alone take care and catch yourself when you fall(Music) Thanks forostering to watch this video.