The Anxiety-Avoidance Cycle: Why Avoiding Anxiety Makes It Worse
For those who deal with anxiety, there is often a cycle that takes place when faced with difficult situations, and you may not even realize that it’s taking place.
During this cycle, the brain is highly engaged and processing the information it receives. It continuously assesses whether the situation is a real or perceived threat. It’s normal to avoid whatever feels intense or uncomfortable, but that only works for a while.
These stressors and/or triggers can then push you out of the window of tolerance and into a fight, flight, or freeze state. Your window of tolerance is your nervous system’s sweet spot, where you can manage your emotions, think clearly, and cope with challenges.
Over time, resisting difficult thoughts and emotions makes them worse and can rob you of meaningful life experiences. This anxiety trap is what we call the cycle of avoidance.
Cycle of Avoidance
1. Anxiety: a situation triggers an anxious response that includes thoughts, feelings, and physical symptoms
Thoughts: overthinking (rehearsal of worst-case scenarios), doubts, fight/flight/freeze state
Feelings: restlessness, dread/worry, defensiveness, projection
Physical symptoms: racing heart, sweating, shallow breathing, shaking
2. Avoidance: you avoid the trigger causing the anxiety to escape uncomfortable symptoms
You may procrastinate doing an important task (distraction/denial)
You cancel something due to fear (vacation due to flying, social outing, having to drive)
You use drugs/alcohol as a means to loosen up before meeting up with others
3. Relief: avoiding the trigger lessens the discomfort, but the relief is temporary and comes at a cost
You miss out on the vacation or friend meet-up
You now have to heavily rely on alcohol or drugs in order to be in social settings
An important task gets rushed and done poorly due to procrastination
4. Intensification: you begin to associate avoidance with feeling better. The next time you face a similar situation, the anxiety is worse, and it’s even more tempting to use this avoidance method.
You give up taking vacations altogether
Your performance suffers at work or school due to rushed projects, causing more procrastination and anxiety
You either avoid all socialization with others, or increase addictive tendencies
How can I break out of this cycle?!
There are a few ways to begin the journey of moving forward. I want to start by suggesting you extend yourself some self-compassion! Self-compassion is the ongoing practice of relating to yourself in a kind and fair fashion, understanding that you are a work in progress, with strengths and weaknesses, and that is okay. You may wonder what that even looks like.
Self-compassion has three core elements.
First, mindfulness (self-awareness of your mental, emotional, and physical state) and acknowledging momentary emotion or tension.
Second, treat yourself with kindness and understand your needs/wants. If you need to take a breather or step out of the room for a break, that is acceptable.
Third, remember that these experiences are normal. No one is perfect, and everyone has bad days.
Another key factor is identifying the stressor. Remember there are things that we can and cannot control. You can control your words, actions, values, and attitude. You cannot control how others think, feel, or act. The past is yet another factor. All you can do is learn from it, identify the lessons, and apply them going forward.
You don’t have to do this alone; a counselor can help you through the journey of:
Giving a name to what you may be avoiding: stressor/trigger
Examining your beliefs surrounding it: are these beliefs true or not
Walking through / identifying difficult situations that may bring up undesired thoughts, emotions, and sensations
Janet Henry, MA, LAC
Helping individuals heal and develop skills to find their purpose in life. Janet is available in Midland Park, Fort Lee and telehealth. Sessions are available in English and Spanish.
