I have been falling into over exercise to cope with anxiety which is hindering my anorexia recovery. How do I cope w/ anxiety without over exercising? I need to gain wght but the exercise is contradictive. What're hlthy ways to cope with anxiety.

ajmcc91...anxiety is a very hard thing to deal with. I know from personal experience! Some things that helped me were journaling, listening to music, and talking to people about things that were interesting to me. The thing that helped me the most was forcing myself to sit with the anxiety. I sometimes thought I would explode before I got through it, but I didn't! Anxiety won't kill you. It can only go so high. I learned that by accepting that I am an anxious person, instead of trying to make it 'go away', it actually made me less anxious! Different things work for everybody, so perhaps you can come up with your own list of distractions? Good luck!!

http://freefromexpectations.blogspot.com/

I too, struggle with anxiety and if I were in a phase of being underweight some of my methods of coping would not be helpful. I think journaling about your anxiety with a timer set so that you are limited as to how long you focus on it is one less strenuous way of dealing as opposed to exercise or jiggling your foot or constant movement which only increase calorie burning. One thing I read about, as I am over 40 now, is that anxiety and stress can actually contribute to a lower metabolic rate and that the real cure was to reduce my anxiety and stress with cognitive therapy - a therapy that assists you in recognizing the anxiety and the thoughts that go with the feelings and coming up with alternative thoughts and confronting belief systems at play so that new thoughts can be used to counteract the anxious thoughts. It is a specific type of journaling that I do that includes writing down what I think the anxiety is about, how I feel, what I think caused me to get particularly anxious right now, what I believe about the situation, how I can either change the situation or ways to change my beliefs about the situation with a plan or steps to take and how that could possibly cause me to feel more calm and more in control of the situation rather than anxious or worried. IT is a written process of the serenity prayer - accepting what you can not change, changing what you can and the wisdom or courage to know the difference. Writing is one of my better techniques but sometimes I had to do some very slow, exaggerated breathing, stretches that were yoga like in a slow fashion or a very slow walk around the house - conscious of speed and breathing.