Master Post
Warning: this post is the opposite of a TikTok. It is very, very long.
If you are reading this and currently in the midst of debilitating anxiety, I’ve been there and know how you feel. It sucks. It can be scary, especially when you feel permanently broken but the “break” is invisible.
Anxiety is not a life sentence. Not only will you get through this, but you can get to a place of full recovery and be a stronger person because of it. No, you do not have to “manage” and medicate for the rest of your life. You can be fully healed.
If I can do it, you can, too.
I had panic attacks where adrenaline wakes me up at 4am with what feels like fire going through my nerves. I felt like I was going crazy and scared of my own thoughts, questioning where my intelligence and common sense went. I felt permanently broken and beyond repair, far from “who I used to be”. I felt ashamed and embarrassed that I “am like this” when objectively, I “have no problems”. I felt exhausted from the rollercoaster of anxiety to depression multiple times per day. I looked at others and couldn’t understand how they weren’t battling their minds everyday. I felt misunderstood. I felt hopeless that positive affirmations, yoga, pilates, self-love and journalling didn’t magically cure me. I was doing everything “right”, but still didn’t feel okay.
Part of me is embarrassed to share on this topic, but the other part of me hopes it can help one person going through this. Or, help them understand someone going through this.
In this post, I am going to refer to my year of intentional daily efforts (following a few years of avoiding the work) to the “recovery process”. I say “recovery”, because I do not believe that anxiety is a label. This may ruffle your feathers, but I will also use the word “illness” because it is not you, your personality, your limiting beliefs, your “low” self-esteem, or misaligned chakras. An anxiety disorder is a cureable, temporary illness.
An anxiety disorder is a temporary state of nerves that have become oversensitized by fear and fatigue, and now react to every little thought or feeling as if it were danger. It is simply a dysregulated nervous system. Recovery is possible however deeply involved and however long you have felt this way.
I recovered and regulated my nervous system. I also will preface that my anxiety disorder was of “the second type” that Dr Clare Weekes refers to: physiological oversensitivity of the nerves (simple anxiety, type 1) plus emotional entanglement (complex anxiety with guilt, shame, grief, etc., type 2). Fun. :)
But guess what? When I refused to accept that I was an Anxious Person and finally accepted that I had a pesky illness - it took me a year to cure what had bothered me for several years. A year! That’s it. A year. A year of daily work for a complex illness that I couldn’t figure out where it even began.
Your main quest is avoiding side quests from fully regulating your dysregulated nervous system. No distractions.
I think regulating a disregulated nervous system is like fixing up a Ferrari 288 GTO. The car is hot and sleek from the outside. Hmm, when you put it in drive it seems to start and stop abruptly. You lift the hood up, ah - the engine (physical approach) needs replacing. You tinker around, then notice the oil needs to be changed (cognitive work). You keep tinkering around, and see that you’re missing a transmitter (EFT). You add some fuel (positive thinking). You keep slowly replacing parts, tightening up screws, and before you know it - the car is purring. Did it matter which parts you replaced first? For the most part, no. Was it all obvious immediately from the inside, or even when you lifted the hood? Nope.
Everything I write below may seem like a lot and a bit intense. I don’t mean to overwhelm you. My one-year commitment started with a tiny step after years of denial, trial and error. I promised myself that if I was able to completely heal from this (after spending thousands of $), then I would write [a book] to share how I did it. I just want to share what helped me in the hope it can help you.
This master post is structured as follows:
My 3 approaches: cognitive, physical and spiritual
Five stages of anxiety
Data collecting
Relapsing
Polyvagal theory
On: self-love, positive thinking
Resources
As you read you’ll also see I tried a lot of little things and big things. As this great video says, I treated it like a chronic serious health condition - which it was, when it ran my life. If you don’t have time to read everything, these are what helped me the most:
Hope and Healing for Your Nerves by Dr Clare Weekes, the best book I have ever read on anxiety and clicked so many things into place
Eliminating caffeine completely
EFT tapping to clear blockages
Collecting data to undoubtably prove to myself that progress has been made
My Three Approaches
While the post is structured in five stages of anxiety, I will tell you that I took a triple approach of (1) cognitive, (2) physical and (3) spiritual recovery.
I started with a cognitive approach to my obviously cognitive “mental health” disorder with classic Cognitive Behavioural Therapy (CBT) working with my thoughts, because “duh, that’s where the issue is” and “I’m a logical person”. I hit a wall about 6 months in. No matter how many CBT exercises I did, the same negative thought loops and physical anxiety sensations kept coming back. I layered in positive affirmations and self-love voodoo, but these purely cognitive approaches were not regulating my nervous system.
I then said, okay, I still have all these physical symptoms, so let’s try a physical approach. Could anxiety be a symptom of something wrong in my body? This is the basis of polyvagal theory (see section at the end) and focuses on the mind-body connection of calming your body instead of out-thinking your thoughts. This included taking a blood test to check if anything was off (all clear, only low iron), giving my body some rest by limiting substances like caffeine and alcohol, and doing self-soothing exercises. In month 10, I was introduced to EFT tapping which exponentially helped progress.
The third approach I included was spiritual. The other two had a much greater effect so I don’t go into detail on this one, but I strengthened my faith in however you would like to call a higher power - God, the Universe, etc. My faith is a smorsgasboard of religious, metaphysical, woo-woo practices and beliefs that continue to evolve but bring me great peace, connection and strength. So not right away, but my recovery process ended up playing across these three elements in the five stages below.
Five Stages of Anxiety
Below are five stages of anxiety that I’ve noticed for myself. This is an amazing Reddit post that I highly recommend reading and inspired me to write this in this 5-stage format. And, of course, some artwork for each stage. :)
The Scream, Edvard Munch, 1832
Stage 5: 9/10-10/10 Anxiety
How I felt: Panic attacks, adrenaline running through the individual veins in your body, heart racing, crying (a lot), dread, hopelessness
This is the worst stage. It is physically and mentally scary and awful.
Stop trying to fight your symptoms. This is the basis of Acceptance and Commitment Therapy (ACT) used to treat anxiety disorders. The more you fight your symptoms, the more worried you become, which makes your nervous system flare up even more - bad cycle. Wait it out, let your symptoms pass. Fears, doubts, self-attacks will come - this is a normal process when your body is in fight or flight mode. (e.g., “Am I going crazy?” “Will it be like this forever?” No.) If that doesn’t work, ask for more (DARE Method). Say to your body, “That’s all you got? Give me more.” When you ask your body to make your symptoms worse, you’ll find it can’t. Keep running towards it until your symptoms gradually begin to ease.
Physically help your body. If recommended by a doctor, a nervous system relaxant like Lorazepam can help to ease you to a lower level of anxiety. Non-medical - passion flower drops. Deep breathing is always mentioned, but honestly, I can’t say it helped calm my thoughts at this stage.
Refocus. When your symptoms ease, direct your focus on something else. Anxiety is most easily fueled when you focus on it and will claw at you to get your attention back - distract, ignore, refocus. If you’re down bad, engage your senses without moving: 5 things you see that are blue, 5 sounds you hear, 5 textures you feel, etc. If you can, get up and do a short activities like making a meal or reading a few pages of a book. Watch a comfort show. These are a few short videos that helped “pull” me out:
Miroir de la tauromachie, Francis Bacon, 1990. This stage is like surviving with a raging bull in your mind.
Stage 4: 7/10-8/10 Anxiety
How I felt: Racing thoughts, constant worrying, fearful, barely functioning, exhausted, occasional panic attacks / lows, hopelessness
This can be an exhausting stage where you’re not fully debilitated, but your body and mind are still working overtime. You are a shell of yourself. You are on the edge, about to spill over anytime. You are in survival mode.
Therapy and / or medication. The Reddit post mentioned does an excellent job of outlining therapy and medication. I will say that it can be really frustrating to find a professional that works for you, but don’t give up. While we can be “our own” therapist with so many resources online, it’s a) overwhelming and contradicting at times, and b) there is power to healing with human connection and being heard, even if you’re paying for it. Medication (SSRIs, antidepressants) can help chemically calm your nerves at the same time as you understand and learn tools to regulate your sensitized nervous system.
Do a blood test. This helps rule out any underlying health issues that may be causing anxiety to be your body’s signal saying “Hey! Pay attention to me! Something’s wrong!” outside your nervous system. Check to also see if there are any supplements you can take to balance out what your body needs.
Read about anxiety. This was key. Ruling out any other physical illnesses, I went on a reading rampage trying to figure out what was “wrong” with me. Where is this invisible brokenness so I can superglue it together? How does one fix a brain? The thought of that is exhausting. Reading helped me understand that anxiety is a symptom of a dysregulated nervous system. This helped me shift out of some of the bewilderment and fear of having to “fix” my brain that had worked perfectly fine a few years ago, and reframed it into curiosity of regulating a nervous system - which also sounded a lot less scary than using my brain to fix my brain. Reading others’ stories of success gave me hope and ideas for this very cureable condition. These are the books that I found most helpful.
Hope and Healing for Your Nerves by Dr Clare Weekes. I cannot recommend this one enough. If you only buy one book to read on anxiety, please buy this one. I kept seeing this book come up and thought, fine, I’ll buy it. The fact that this book was written in the 1960s and is still the best book I’ve read - speaks for itself. Reddit posts like these - (1) and (2) - come up and I completely agree with them. TLDR: When a person experiences prolonged stress or fear, the nervous system can become sensitized, meaning it overreacts to even minor worries. What would normally cause a brief flutter now triggers a full wave of physical alarm (a racing heart, tight chest, trembling) as if real danger were present. This creates a cycle of fear —> adrenaline —> more fear keeping the body on high alert. This is not permanent damage but a temporary state of oversensitivity, like an overloaded circuit. Dr Weekes stresses that recovery is possible however deeply involved and however long. You’ll notice I keep coming back to this.
DARE: The New Way to End Anxiety and Stop Panic Attacks by Barry McDonagh. This book is similar to Dr Weekes’ book above (still better imo) but reframes her key points well.
Feeling Good: The New Mood Therapy by Dr. David Burns. Choose the chapters that apply to you. My key takeaway from this book are the Cognitive Distortions table and exercises that frame and challenge these thoughts.
My good friend Camille’s blog on her healing journey. This is the post that clicked in the idea of exploring a physical/somatic approach as I plateaued with purely cognitive tools.
Practice what you learn. Reading about anxiety and treatments is great, but it needs to be practiced. Again and again and again. When it sucks, when it feels like it doesn’t work, when everything is telling you not to. Spend money on professionals to help you if you cannot do it alone. Try different things, pivot, explore. Be curious. Keep track of what and when you practice with data to have feedback on what works.
Diet. Limit alcohol and eliminate caffeine. DRINK WATER and limit processed foods.
Alcohol: I say limit alcohol because I’m aware of the social effects of going completely sober in addition to the isolating effects of anxiety and depression. However, I noticed that at my higher levels of anxiety, I was very sensitive to alcohol. Even having a drink or two would have me in tears (yep, very fun for the boyfriend) the next day despite having a fun night with close friends and literally nothing changed from the day before. If you relate, here is hope: as I recovered, I noticed that this dramatic swing to the dark side the next day stopped and I can happily enjoy a glass or wine or two with friends. I’m not a big drinker so this hasn’t (and won’t) be tested out with a blackout night.
Caffeine: I strongly suggest eliminating caffeine. I went cold turkey drinking coffee/caffeine on August 29th, 2025 after reading this Reddit post and listening to this podcast. Thankfully there is no negative social effect from drinking coffee (unless) and you can always order a decaf. As I write this it’s been over a month since I had caffeine and it has been. a. gamechanger.
Processed foods: Reduce processed foods too. There are interesting studies on artificial sugars (Coke Zero, protein bars, etc.) showing the hormonal rollercoaster effects on body and mind: fake sugar triggers sweetness receptors —> increased insulin —> increased cortisol (anxiety culprit) + adrenaline —> crash. Some people are more sensitive to others (🙋🏼♀️).Supplements. The following supplements helped: L-theanine, magnesium glycinate and fish oil daily. However, do not expect tiny capsules to magically work on you if your overall diet is sh*t and full of alcohol, caffeine and processed food.
Remove triggers. This could also go in the next stage, but putting it up here in case. If you are set on fully recovering from anxiety, remove triggers as much as possible while you heal. I made some major moves to get to a healthier place: I moved home from the UK back to Canada, I left a time-intensive finance job, I moved home to my parents to receive help, I deleted social media (IG, TikTok), I stopped watching Netflix/TV and only watched old Disney movies (I’m not kidding, I told you I went all-in). Not everyone’s situation is the same and not everyone’s family will be a source of stress relief.
Stage 3: 5/10-6/10 Anxiety
How I felt: Racing thoughts, constant worrying, fearful, exhausted but functioning
This stage is similar to the one above, survival-but-functioning mode; this stage is a bit more manageable but still hard. However, this is where you start seeing results from putting in the grunt work.
I found a “sandwich” method worked for me - do something from this master post below right when I wake up and right before I go to bed. At least one thing daily. This kept “eliminating anxiety” as my top priority of the day by my actions alone. Days added up to weeks then months.
Don’t have time? Living in higher stages of an anxiety disorder is worse than finding time in your day to do these things. If you quit social media, congratulations - you now have an extra 7 hours per week. Choose your hard.
Start building a morning routine. I automatically want to roll my eyes at the words “morning routine”. For some reason, I have never been able to keep a consistent morning routine outside of the usual teeth-brushing getting-ready-for-work. The Power of Habit by Charles Duhigg emphasized over and over again is to start small. Add in one small thing. Don’t overwhelm yourself with a massive to-do list (or start doing everything in this master post right away). You’ll naturally build on it. Even starting a morning routine only came to me in month 9, on holiday in Italy (where I stopped drinking coffee - yes, nuts). My current morning routine is simple: wake up at the same time, 5 minute meditation / visualization, either do my planned exercise or (calmly) putter around, get ready for work.
Exercise. I put this here very cautiously. I went through a year-ish where running and HIIT - my releases - were taken away by anxiety. It was devastating. One km into my run, I would notch up to the stages above and end up crying or barely able to breathe. That was my body saying no, too much. I shifted to pilates and hot yoga instead, when I could. Walking, movement, stretching is all a very good way to get out of your head (and into your body), but listen and be respectful to your body. At this stage of anxiety (5-6/10), I was able to start running again, slowly. Signing up for a race (half marathon) and setting a time goal helped me make progress and get excited towards something.
Meditation. Sitting still was too hard for me at higher levels of anxiety. Closing my eyes to ruminate further on my anxieties brought me the opposite of peace. Social media may tell you to “look inwards” and give you a 5am 10-step morning routine that Tony Robbins swears by, but at certain levels of anxiety and depression, being alone with your thoughts does not help. And that’s okay. There will be a time and place that you will be okay with being alone with your thoughts, but there are times when not isolating and being around other people, using our senses to see and engage and speak, is what is best for us.
That being said, meditation can be a valuable tool when the time is right for you. I loved guided meditations in-person at my yoga teacher training. I love the whoosh of awareness centering into my nose, my chest, my heart. When I meditate solo, I find this cozy, warm feeling in my chest. My meditations now tend to be more sitting in states of joy or peace. I left a couple guided meditations for you in Resources, but honestly, it may be a bit of trial and error before you find what resonates with you.
The Starry Night, Vincent van Gogh, 1889
Stage 2: 4/10-5/10 Anxiety
As I write this, I’m around a 2-4/10 period and no medication. I’ll preface that EFT could have been used in the other stages but I only learned about it in month 10. Everyone receives tools - and the choice to use them - at different times of their healing process. My only explanation for this is that “the teacher appears when the student is ready”.
Emotional Freedom Technique (EFT) Tapping. A therapist I was seeing asked me if I would be open to trying this in one of our sessions as I had tears running down my face. She asked me to talk about a past situation and, as I spoke, I felt my emotions running hotter until tears started coming. I felt stuck in this emotional hole, no matter what I did or how much time passed. Throughout the 20 min EFT exercise, my emotions cooled back down until I actually felt good afterwards. Huh, I thought, that was fast relief. I’ll try this out. By this point I was good at taking action on new learnings, so I put a new habit in my Habit Tracker for 1 EFT video per day. The idea of EFT is to tap on specific acupuncture points while repeating statements. It works well for me as I like the mix of verbal affirmations with physical touch, not just one or the other.
I wish I started EFT earlier as I think it could have worked really well at the 6-7/10 level. Instead of meditation, which sometimes left me more aware of my anxious thoughts and ashamed I couldn’t feel peaceful, EFT does not require you to close your eyes. It rewires your mind, releases energetic / emotional blocks and your hands are busy creating sensations on your body at the same time. All it took was my therapist to do it once with me, then I felt OK doing a couple 5-minute YouTube videos daily. I think it really made a difference to have someone do it with me the first time.
While this sounds a bit woo-woo, I classify this as a hybrid of a cognitive-physical approach, not spiritual. If you’re curious about scientific studies done on EFT, take a look at this published article - the physiological effects of lowering cortisol, RHR, even gene regulation in addition to significantly decreased anxiety and depression are astounding. This is also an amazing documentary but I recommend trying EFT first before watching. I’ve provided a list of tapping videos at the end of this post that I do on my own. Thank you to my therapist Kali for this incredible introduction.
Stage 1: 0/10 - 3/10 Anxiety
xx
On collecting data
I highly encourage you to start to collecting data in your recovery process. When you have relapses (mentioned below) and doubt your progress, you can simply look back at your data and see the truth about how much incredible progress you’ve made. Data also helps keep you accountable. When you complain “I’ve tried everything” - have you really? Have you actually been getting enough sleep? Didn’t you have three coffees yesterday? Have you been consistent for more than two days doing an EFT video or whatever else you’re “trying”?
I did not start collecting data from day 1. These ideas came to me even at month 9, but I love seeing the progress I’ve made. These are the data sources I use to track my progress and easily share updates via screenshot with a doctor or therapist. Automatic refers to metrics that are automatically captured by a device; manual refers to my own daily inputs.
Apple Health app + Apple Watch:
Sleep with a goal above 7.5 hours (automatic)
State of Mind to track my mood, how many “low” days I had, etc. I try to do this 3 times per day. This is key as this recovery process is all about your mood, but funny enough, this is also the metric I forget to input most often (manual)
Steps to make sure that I spent time outside and moved my body (automatic)
Heart Rate Variability as I noticed my HRV was directly correlated to low mood days (automatic)
Alcohol Consumption to keep drinks at 0-2 per week (manual)
This app has been great to track, experiment with, and feel proud of habits that work for me. I’ve even moved it to my iPhone bottom shortcuts. Don’t be too hard on yourself if you miss a day. These are examples of some daily practices that stuck for me.
No caffeine - fun to see the streak grow
1 EFT video
3 mood check-ins - thanks to Cam, I check in with myself 3x / day to check my posture if I’m straight or slouching, my breathing is shallow or deep, my body is tense or relaxed, thoughts are racing or calm. I input my mood in the Health app mentioned above and also have a Notes page for any remarks (gratitude, synchronicity, funny moment)
Drink water
Wake up same time 6:30am - this is one where if I need to sleep in, I will
Home chores - I add this because I find cleaning relaxing and keeping my home tidy brings peace and joy
Running plan - although Runna and Strava also track this, I like the added satisfaction of checking it off here too :)
Again, I know it seems like a lot. I started off with just tracking sleep and ended up adding other things that helped paint a full picture.
On relapses
In August 2025, I relapsed into a higher state of anxiety at around 6-7/10. It was triggered by a brief but intense relationship ending and, in hind sight, I should have signed up for therapy right after that to nip it. The anxiety about having anxiety again is very frustrating. However, I accept it. Instead of fighting it, I am trying to look at it from a different lens, gather new information. I’ll always hear “recovery is not linear”, yet when you’re relapsing, it feels like all progress is wiped out and the state will last “forever” - it wasn’t and doesn’t.
[add in Dr Weekes paragraph on waking up feeling like shit one morning and tie to apple watch data]
On polyvagal theory
The day I pleaded with a higher power to help me find answers, my good friend Camille happened to share her new website that talks about her healing journey. Her mind-body connection writing sparked a huge realization for me: sometimes we target anxiety as coming only from “up there” in the brain, but maybe, just maybe, it’s a byproduct of an overall unregulated nervous system. This has started a new chapter of my Main Quest of researching nervous system regulation, polyvagal theory, somatic practices, and so on. Her incredible post made me tear up and filled me with hope and new ideas:
“It wasn’t that I “fixed” anxiety separately. It was that by teaching my nervous system to feel safe again, the anxiety no longer had a reason to exist.”
On self-love
“If you truly loved yourself, you wouldn’t have anxiety!” What bullshit. What the heck does it mean to love myself more? What does it mean to “just raise self-esteem”? How do I love and accept myself when the self-loathing, pain, shame I feel when a relationship or job doesn’t work out when my anxiety played a role? I’m supposed to accept this?
The fact that you have read this far is proof of how much you love yourself because you are trying to heal. That you keep trying again and again is the evidence of your self-love. Have peace knowing that you do love yourself and that love has always been in you, not found anywhere externally. It’s just harder to access right now with the noise of a dysregulated nervous system.
I believe this is where a pure cognitive approach like CBT, positive affirmations and journaling doesn't translate to more self-love so less anxiety. Self love will come as a natural result of the work you do on anxiety. When you see the progress you make in overcoming this debilitating illness, I guarantee the love and respect you gain for yourself overflows with ease. Love is not something you can force, with yourself or anyone else.
I like to think the YouTube guided meditations on self-love were not for nothing, they stored themselves somewhere. But the pride and joy I felt overcoming anxiety after having the balls to say “No. I am not living with this, I am eliminating this, this is not me”, tapping into love of a higher power, realizing that I myself am an infinite source of joy and love - that is self-love.
On positive thinking
“Just think positive thoughts! Just replace the negative thoughts with positive ones!” No shit, Sherlock. Also bullshit when you you have a dysregulated nervous system.
Growing up, I was effortlessly positive. I saw the silver lining in anything and everything. I didn’t understand anyone who was Sad or Anxious. Then after about the age of 22, cracks started to show and fill up with anxiety. This state that slowly progressed to be worse and worse over the years bewildered me, all without a key Traumatic Event to pinpoint it all to.
I read self-help book after self-help book and felt devasted that I had “lost” my positivity. Was I permanently changed? Is this what growing up is like? My efforts to force myself into positivity as I went through depression and anxiety discouraged me even more.
What I am trying to say to you, is that forcing positive thinking and self-love are cognitive techniques that may not be fully expressed when you have a dysregulated nervous system. Positive thinking comes more and more effortlessly when you regulate your nervous system.
On a hormonal imbalance
Was it just me, or did it feel like every wellness influencer was talking about regulating hormones at some point? Drink this tea, do this lympatic drainage massage. My personal belief is that this is again tied to a… you guessed it…dysregulated nervous system!
Connecting again with polyvagal theory, our vagus nerve touches every organ - and hormone producing gland - in our bodies, which means that as our nervous system overactivates, its tentacles touching the organs / hormones naturally overstimule them, too. This I think can over/underproduce certain hormones as our poor, well-intentioned body try to balance out our system.
So unless you have a wildly off-balanced hormonal system as seen in your blood tests, if you’re not getting answers from the hormone experts you’re paying an arm and a leg too, your hormonal issues may just naturally balance out as your nervous system tentacles stop tickling the glands less. Major disclaimer that this is my own theory.
On talk therapy
I tried several therapists but could not find one that truly helped me. Until, I looked into somatic therapy and found the glorious Kali [link].
On Burnout
On attachment theory
Resources
EFT Tapping Videos
I <3 Brad Yates, he is my favourite.
Happiness beyond belief (better if you’re feeling good)
Letting go of the past and moving on (Julie Schiffman)
Befriend anxiety and fear (and it will disappear) (Julie Schiffman)