Anxiety counselling in Adelaide
Anxiety can make your world feel smaller.
You might spend a lot of time worrying, overthinking, anticipating what could go wrong or trying to make sure everything is just right. You may feel constantly on edge, have difficulty switching off, or find yourself avoiding things because anxiety feels too difficult to manage.
Anxiety can also show up physically
through a racing heart, tight chest, nausea, dizziness, tension or a feeling that you need to get away.
Sometimes anxiety has a clear connection to past experiences. Sometimes it doesn't. You might be dealing with panic attacks, a particular phobia, health anxiety or a general sense that your nervous system is always switched on.
I work with adults experiencing anxiety, persistent worry, panic and specific phobias. EMDR is one of the main approaches I use in my work with anxiety, alongside Acceptance and Commitment Therapy (ACT), cognitive and behavioural strategies, interpersonal therapy and nervous-system regulation.
Together, we can work towards feeling less overwhelmed by anxiety, understanding what is driving it and finding ways to respond differently when it shows up.
I offer anxiety counselling in North Adelaide and online across Australia.
What can anxiety look like?
Anxiety doesn't always look like obvious fear. It can show up in your thoughts, your body, your behaviour and the choices you make.
You might notice:
persistent worry or overthinking
difficulty switching off or relaxing
constantly anticipating problems or worst-case scenarios
needing reassurance or certainty before you can move forward
feeling on edge or unable to settle
racing thoughts or difficulty concentrating
physical symptoms such as a racing heart, tight chest, nausea, dizziness or muscle tension
panic attacks or fear of having another panic attack
avoiding situations that make you anxious
perfectionism or feeling that you need to get things right
second-guessing yourself or worrying about how others see you
social anxiety or fear of being judged
health or safety fears
an intense fear of a particular object, situation or activity
You don't need to have a diagnosis to seek support. If anxiety is affecting your choices, relationships, work, daily life or sense of freedom, it is worth exploring.
Why can anxiety be so difficult to change?
Anxiety is often trying to protect you.
Your brain and body are designed to notice potential danger and respond quickly. Sometimes that response becomes overactive, or your body continues to respond to situations as though they are dangerous even when you are safe now.
You may also have developed ways of managing anxiety that make sense in the short term but keep the cycle going over time.
This might include avoiding situations, seeking reassurance, over-preparing, checking, trying to control uncertainty, staying busy or constantly thinking through possible problems.
Therapy can help you understand these patterns, including what triggers anxiety, what happens in your body and what you do to manage it. From there, we can work towards changing patterns that are no longer helping.
How I work with anxiety
There isn't one type of anxiety and there isn't one approach that works for everyone.
I start by understanding what anxiety looks like for you, what tends to trigger it, how you experience it in your body and what you currently do to manage it. We can then consider which therapeutic approaches are likely to be most useful.
EMDR for anxiety
You might associate EMDR with trauma or PTSD, but EMDR is also one of the main approaches I use when working with anxiety.
Anxiety can develop in different ways. Sometimes there is a clear distressing experience behind a fear. Sometimes a number of experiences have contributed to a strong sense of danger, uncertainty or not being safe. At other times, a fear can become strongly associated with a particular situation or experience.
Where EMDR therapy is appropriate, we can work with the memories, emotions, beliefs and body responses connected with the anxiety or fear.
EMDR has a strong evidence base for PTSD and has also been studied across other presentations, including phobias. The evidence varies between different anxiety presentations, so whether EMDR is appropriate depends on the type of anxiety you are experiencing and what appears to be contributing to it.
EMDR therapy isn't something we automatically start with. We first understand your history, your current circumstances and your readiness for processing. If we do use EMDR, we work at a pace that allows you to remain within a manageable window of tolerance.
Acceptance and Commitment Therapy
ACT can help you develop a different relationship with anxious thoughts and feelings.
Rather than spending all your energy trying to control your thoughts or gain certainty, we can explore how to respond when difficult thoughts and feelings show up, and how to keep moving towards what matters to you.
Cognitive and behavioural strategies
We can look at patterns of thinking and behaviour that may be maintaining anxiety, including avoidance, reassurance seeking, over-preparing, perfectionism and cycles of worry.
This can help you notice what anxiety is asking you to do and consider whether that response is actually helping in the longer term.
Alongside deeper therapeutic work, we can also develop practical strategies to help you manage anxiety when it shows up in everyday life.
Nervous-system regulation
Anxiety isn't just something that happens in your thoughts.
We can also pay attention to what happens in your body when anxiety builds and develop practical ways to recognise and manage activation. This might include grounding, noticing early body cues and building your capacity to stay present when difficult emotions arise.
Depending on what you are experiencing, I may also draw on interpersonal and schema-informed approaches to understand patterns that have developed over time.
FAQs
What happens in anxiety counselling?
We'll start by understanding what you are experiencing, how anxiety affects your life and what might be contributing to it. From there, we can work out which approaches are likely to be useful, whether that involves practical strategies, ACT, EMDR or other therapeutic approaches.
Can EMDR help with anxiety?
EMDR can be helpful for some people experiencing anxiety, particularly when distressing memories, experiences, beliefs or learned fear responses are contributing to the anxiety. EMDR has a strong evidence base for PTSD and is also supported by research for some other presentations. Whether it is appropriate depends on what is happening for you.
Can EMDR help with phobias?
EMDR may be appropriate for some specific phobias, particularly when the fear is connected with a distressing experience or memory. Exposure-based approaches have the strongest research support for specific phobias, so we can consider what approach best fits your particular fear.
Do I need to know why I'm anxious before I start therapy?
No. We can begin with what is happening now and gradually build an understanding of the patterns, triggers and experiences that may be contributing to your anxiety.
Can therapy help if I keep avoiding things?
Avoidance can reduce anxiety in the short term but can also keep fears going over time. Therapy can help you understand the role avoidance is playing and work out what changes might be helpful and manageable for you.
Take the first step
Reach out to Warming Light Counselling for anxiety counselling
If anxiety, panic or a specific fear is affecting the way you live, we can start by making sense of what is happening and working out what might help. I offer anxiety counselling from my North Adelaide practice and online across Australia.