Cycle Breaker and Change Maker | Introduction to Anticipatory Fear and Anxiety

This episode features an introduction to anticipatory fear - also referred to as fear of what is going to happen next or dreading the future and anticipatory anxiety, 

If you have ever experienced worry about something that has not happened yet you have experienced anticipatory fear or anxiety.  As a primal need to feel safe in the future, this fear makes complete sense.  However, for some, this fear becomes debilitating and feels uncontrollable.  In today's episode I will be discussing an introduction to anticipatory fear as it relates to unhealed trauma and the negative trauma cycle.   

Transcript

Episode 8 - Introduction To Anticipatory fear - also referred to as fear of what is going to happen next or dreading the future and anticipatory anxiety, 

If you have ever experienced worry about something that has not happened yet you have experienced anticipatory fear or anxiety.  As a primal need to feel safe in the future, this fear makes complete sense.  However, for some, this fear becomes debilitating and feels uncontrollable.  In today's episode I will be discussing an introduction to anticipatory fear as it relates to unhealed trauma and the negative trauma cycle.  

 So what exactly is anticipatory fear?

Anticipatory fear or anxiety is worrying about the future or dreading the future with a fear that bad things might happen.  It is an excessive worry and it includes being fearful about an imagined future situation for an extended period of time.  It is the anxiety that may be felt when anticipating a difficult decision, natural disaster or scheduled event such as a social even or an interview.  This type of anxiety can also happen when there is fear of a relationship breakdown, death of a loved one , a new job or a perceived threat.

You may experience the following anxiety symptoms if you are experiencing anticipatory fear:

• jumpiness or restlessness
• muscle tension and pain
• being watchful for signs of danger
• hypervigilance
• pounding or racing heart and shortness of breath
• headaches, fatigue, and insomnia
• nausea and appetite loss
• difficulty concentrating
• trouble managing emotions and mood
• emotional numbness
• loss of interest in your usual hobbies
• sleep problems
• feelings of apprehension or dread
• anticipating the worst
• sweating, tremors, and twitches
• Increased frequency need for the washroom

Why do people experience anticipatory fears after traumatic events and how does this create a negative cycle?

If you have experienced a traumatic event you may be susceptible to triggers which I covered in episode 6.  Anything that looks like, feels like, smells like or holds resemblance to your trauma in any way may activate your fears.  When this happens your body may have a primal response to try to keep you safe.  This of course makes sense - in the past humans had to keep safe from predators and dangerous weather. These fears remain within us and are not always appropriate for or reflective of the situation we are presently in.  When dealing with a traumatic event from the past that is triggered in the present it is completely understandable to want to feel safe.  The challenging aspect is that the anticipatory response can be overly intense, last too long and become unhelpful.  Anticipatory anxiety can look like trying to anticipate every possible scenario so that you can control the outcome, catastrophic predictions, spending a large amount of time thinking and being fearful of the future and avoiding the anxiety inducing event all together.

My story and how anticipatory anxiety has impacted me as an adult:

Due to my turbulent childhood which was filled with unpredictable and aggressive anger outbursts from a caregiver I developed an anticipatory fear of making people angry.  I would avoid conflict as if it would cause the end of the world.  As soon as a voice raised, or there was a signal of irritability in another person signified either by body language or an irritated tone in their voice it would start - my heart would race, my mind would run wildly into feelings of terror, my palms would sweat, I would feel nauseous and so on.   This went on for years and years, I didn’t understand how or why as a fully capable adult the slightest movement or sound could make me feel like a tiny helpless child so quickly.   I had become completely afraid of anger and did not even understand how to have a feeling of anger in a safe way myself.  It wasn’t until I finally opened up about this to a doctor that my association with anger changed.  That doctor explained that anger could be a very helpful emotion - she shared a story about how through anger she did something that ended up saving lives.  Then it clicked for me - anger and conflict could be used for good.

What have I done to break the cycle of anticipatory fear impacting my life?

Step 1:
Acknowledging that it was holding me back and had become paralyzing  Something that is universal as humans is if we don’t have awareness we cannot address a or move on from a problem .  That is why the first step in my podcast has a common theme - acknowledging what is actually happening, admitting to it and seeing it sometimes for the first time.

Step 2:
Take a real look at those negative thoughts and hold them with curiosity.   Is the worst case scenario you have imagined actually likely to happen?  Is it really a realistic scenario?  Usually it is not.  If the worst case scenario you imagined does happen, is it actually that bad?  Working with your thoughts and questioning or challenging them is incredibly helpful - this allows your mind to evaluate if what you are imagining is realistic or not and it is exercising a new muscle that helps your mind stop going to the worst case scenario about the future. 

Step 3:
Belly breaths and taking action.  Breath, I really mean this breath.  Take 10 deep breaths in and out, the kind that make your belly rise, not your chest.  A doctor once explained to me that your body cannot be in fight and flight and taking the action of deep breathing at the same time so this is an excellent way to stop the derailing train of thoughts.   Take action.  One of the worst feelings is helplessness because it can leave you both sad and scared.  Taking action is highly effective - if you are worried about a job interview - start preparing for it.  If you are worried about a move, start planning it.   The more you can take concrete actions, the safer you will feel.

My experience - how implementing the steps outlined above led to a positive outcome:

I had a big life change coming up once and I knew that the move I was making was not going to be right for me or emotionally safe for me, but I was so afraid that I was going to do it anyway.  I know that sounds almost unbelievable however that is how strong my anticipatory fear of anger had become.  The anticipatory fear started as usual, the repeated thoughts, the dread, the fixation on the upcoming event and the fear of upsetting anyone.  The thoughts kept coming and would not stop. It was becoming very hard to manage.  What was different this time than previous times was I acknowledged the thought and that it was becoming a problem and I took it a step further and mentioned it to a doctor.  This was a good move to take, it was out there and I had somehow known I needed some help to tackle this fear.

One of the things I did was break the problem down. If I angered the other person, yet made things better for myself in the end, was it really that bad? By saying “no” was I causing them harm?  What was the worst they could do to me?

So, no - it actually wasn’t that bad to prioritize myself, in fact it was the opposite. It was good. 

And no, I wasn’t hurting anyone at all by saying no -  I was just taking someone who was used to getting their way and doing things for their own convenience and saying “no”.

And truly, what was the worst they could do to me?  This person had hurt me in unimaginable ways when I was a child, now I was an adult - they could not actually hurt me.

So finally, I did a lot of grounding which was really hard and took repeated practice and I started to vocalize that no, I was not going to move ahead with the original plan and I started to take action to make a new one.  I faced the biggest fears I have ever had during this event, and I came out on the other side confident.  I also learned to embrace anger, including my own and to this day, I use it for good.