Anxiety Counseling

Anxiety is exhausting. Not the kind of tired you can fix with sleep, but the kind that comes from a brain that won’t stop scanning for threats, replaying conversations, and catastrophizing about things that haven’t happened yet (my mother called this “borrowing trouble.” It is a great term I still use!).

If anxiety is running the show in your life, keeping you awake, making decisions feel impossible, pulling you out of moments you should be enjoying, or shrinking your world to avoid the things that trigger it, you’re not broken. Your brain’s alarm system is doing exactly what it was designed to do. It’s just misfiring.

How Anxiety Works in the Brain

Anxiety isn’t a character flaw or a sign of weakness. It’s rooted in the brain’s threat detection system, primarily the amygdala, which is responsible for processing fear and triggering your fight-or-flight response. When this system works correctly, it keeps you safe. When it’s overactive, it treats everyday situations (a meeting, a social gathering, an uncertain outcome) as genuine dangers.

The good news is that your brain is changeable. The same neuroplasticity that allowed anxiety to become a habit allows therapy to reshape those patterns. You can retrain the way your brain responds to uncertainty and perceived threat.

Types of Anxiety I Work With

Generalized Anxiety. Persistent worry that touches everything: work, relationships, health, finances, the future. You might know your worry is disproportionate, but knowing that doesn’t make it stop. Generalized anxiety often shows up as difficulty relaxing, muscle tension, trouble sleeping, irritability, and a mind that won’t quiet down.

Social Anxiety. Fear of being judged, embarrassed, or rejected in social situations. This isn’t shyness. It’s a deeply uncomfortable experience that can lead to avoidance of work events, social gatherings, and even phone calls. The neuroscience behind social anxiety involves an overactive amygdala interpreting social cues as threats.

Performance Anxiety. High-stakes situations, whether it’s a presentation, a performance, an athletic competition, or a critical conversation, trigger a level of anxiety that interferes with your ability to do the thing you’re actually good at. This is common among professionals, executives, performers, musicians, and athletes. Some of the most accomplished public figures in the world, people like Michael Phelps, Simone Biles, Naomi Osaka, Dwayne “The Rock” Johnson, and DeMar DeRozan, have all spoken publicly about their experiences with anxiety, depression, and the value of professional help. DeRozan’s book, Above the Noise: My Story of Chasing Calm, and his “Dinners with DeMar” conversation series have been particularly influential in normalizing the idea that success and mental health struggles coexist. These are people performing at the highest levels of public visibility, and they’ve been clear: getting help wasn’t a sign of weakness. It was the thing that made everything else sustainable. If people at that level benefit from professional support, the rest of us certainly can too.

Health Anxiety. Persistent worry about illness, symptoms, or medical outcomes. Often involves excessive checking, reassurance-seeking, and difficulty tolerating physical sensations that most people would dismiss.

Panic Attacks. Sudden, intense surges of fear accompanied by physical symptoms: racing heart, shortness of breath, dizziness, chest tightness. Panic attacks can feel like a heart attack or a loss of control, and the fear of having another one can become its own source of anxiety.

Relationship Anxiety. Fear of abandonment, rejection, or not being enough for your partner. This often shows up as overthinking, jealousy, constant reassurance-seeking, or avoiding intimacy to protect yourself from potential hurt.

Trauma-Related Anxiety. When anxiety is rooted in past trauma, the brain’s threat response isn’t just overactive; it’s been shaped by real danger. Trauma-informed approaches are essential here, because standard anxiety techniques alone may not reach the source. If your anxiety is connected to past experiences of abuse, violence, or other trauma, we’ll address that with the care and safety it requires, and I may coordinate with your crisis and PTSD counseling needs as part of the work.

My Approach to Anxiety Counseling

Solution-Focused Therapy is the foundation of my work and is grounded in direct training and clinical supervision under its co-founder, Insoo Kim Berg. We start with what you want your life to look like when anxiety isn’t running the show, and we build toward that. This isn’t about analyzing your anxiety endlessly. It’s about creating change.

Cognitive Behavioral Therapy (CBT) gives you practical tools to identify and restructure the thought patterns that fuel anxiety. It helps you recognize when your brain is catastrophizing, overgeneralizing, or treating a possibility as a certainty, and teaches you to respond differently.

Dialectical Behavior Therapy (DBT) adds skills in emotional regulation, distress tolerance, and mindfulness that are particularly useful when anxiety feels physically overwhelming. DBT helps you ride the wave of an anxious moment without being swept away by it.

Mindfulness-Based Cognitive Therapy (MBCT) teaches you to observe anxious thoughts without being controlled by them. Instead of fighting anxiety or trying to think your way out of it, you learn to notice it, name it, and choose how to respond.

All of my work is trauma-informed, meaning that if your anxiety has roots in past experiences, we’ll work with that awareness rather than treating your symptoms in isolation.

A Note About Online Information

Tools like ChatGPT, Gemini, Claude, Google, and mental health websites can be useful for understanding symptoms and learning about anxiety. But they can’t read tone, context, or the things you’re not saying. They’ll never ask the follow-up question that changes everything. Knowing when general information isn’t enough and when personalized professional support is needed is an important skill. If you’ve been researching anxiety on your own and you’re still stuck, that’s often a signal that it’s time to talk to someone who can work with your specific situation. You can explore what the American Psychological Association says about anxiety treatment, but reading about solutions isn’t the same as working through them with a trained professional.

Virtual Anxiety Counseling Across Texas

All sessions are available via secure, HIPAA-compliant video or telephone for anyone in Texas. Many clients find that virtual sessions are actually preferable for anxiety counseling: you’re in a comfortable, familiar environment rather than navigating a new office.

Ready to start? Schedule a consultation or call (512) 771-7621.

Related Articles

• Understanding Social Anxiety
• Romantic Anxiety and the Fear of Connection
• Emotional Confirmation Bias: How Anxiety Distorts What You See