Anxiety Counselling: What Is It, What Happens and How Does It Help?

The goal of anxiety counselling is to help you understand and manage your anxiety. It is a collaborative process between you and your therapist, and there is no one approach or solution that fits everyone.

As your counsellor I would ask you to talk about all the things which are making you feel anxious. I would not judge any of the things you tell me about. Often just talking to me about your concerns, unloading, can make you feel better. As an integrative therapist I will pick one of the many tools I have in my extensive toolbox of different talking therapies etc to suit you and your particular anxiety.

I will work with you to help you change the way you think about and view things. We will look at different ways of updating your perspective and I will also suggest making some changes to the things you do and the way you do them.

Together, we will create a personalised plan to help you manage and alleviate your anxiety and feel more in control of your thoughts and emotions. Ultimately, the aim is to help you live a happier, more fulfilling, more successful life. How does that sound?

What happens in anxiety counselling?

What happens in anxiety counselling is quite simple really. You just talk to me about all your current worries, concerns, difficulties, problems and hang-ups. I will not judge you no matter what they are. We will look at some tools to help you and we will also go a bit deeper trying to understand where these anxieties have come from. So there will be two parts to the work. These are looking at your worries in the present and trying to change them and looking at where they come from.

I might also suggest some books to read or podcasts to listen to. We can get a little bit creative in the therapy. Another thing we can look at is mindfulness, which is a great way to help with anxiety. We can also look at your diet and if there are any physical things you can be doing to help your anxiety - general self-care, exercise and having support from family and friends etc. We will look at all of that as well. The therapy will be guided by you. It will be client-led. So you will be writing the agenda for what we talk about. However, I might be prompting you and giving you some direction on what I think might be useful for you.

Overall, the goal is to help you find ways to manage and reduce your anxiety. And that will be done through understanding it, acknowledging your emotions, managing your thoughts, challenging them and understanding them. We might look at any of your physical symptoms of anxiety and help with those too.

How does counselling help anxiety?

Counselling helps anxiety because just the very simple act of just talking about things to someone who is impartial and non-judgemental, in other words just simply offloading, can make you feel better. But of course, that’s not all that happens in counselling for anxiety. We would look at where these concerns have come from and we will also look at how they can be improved by thinking about them differently, taking another perspective and changing some of the things you do and how you do them.

Additionally, counselling helps anxiety by providing a safe and supportive environment for individuals to express their feelings and fears. This can help reduce anxiety as well as providing validation and empathy from the therapist. Overall, counselling helps anxiety by providing individuals with a safe space in which to talk about and explore their anxiety and gives them the support and tools needed to understand manage their anxiety effectively. It can help peoples gain self-awareness and develop a more positive and balanced outlook on life.

How many counselling sessions for anxiety?

Some people feel an immediate improvement after only one session of counselling for anxiety. For other people counselling for anxiety can take 6, 12, 20 or 24 sessions. For some people more time is needed to really get to the bottom of when, why and how the anxiety has arisen. It is therefore important for clients and therapist to discuss and review progress on a regular basis and for the client to communicate if they feel it’s going. Some people may also benefit from ongoing sessions to really ground the progress made after initial treatment.

If you are struggling with anxiety, it is important to seek the support of a qualified, experienced therapist. The number of counselling sessions needed for anxiety can vary, but it is recommended to have an initial commitment of at least six sessions to assess and establish a treatment plan. Don't hesitate to reach out for help and know that with the right support, you can manage and overcome your anxiety.