Anxiety Therapy in Austin, TX

Your mind won't stop. It replays conversations, anticipates disasters, and analyzes threats that may never materialize. Even when things are objectively fine, there's a low background buzz of uneasiness that never quite goes away.

You've probably tried telling yourself to relax. It doesn't work. If logic could fix anxiety, you'd have solved this years ago.

Living with anxiety

Anxiety is exhausting in ways that are hard to explain to people who don't experience it. The mental energy spent on worry, on vigilance, on running through worst-case scenarios—it leaves less for everything else. You might appear calm on the outside while your internal experience is anything but.

Some signs that anxiety has become a problem:

• Persistent worry that feels difficult to control

• Restlessness or feeling keyed up

• Physical tension: tight shoulders, clenched jaw, stomach issues

• Difficulty sleeping because your mind won't turn off

• Avoiding situations that trigger anxiety, even when avoidance makes your life smaller

• Needing reassurance but finding that the relief never lasts

• Panic attacks: sudden overwhelming fear with physical symptoms like racing heart, shortness of breath, or feeling like you're dying

• Social anxiety that makes interactions come across as like performances you might fail

You might recognize yourself in one of these or several. Anxiety often shows up in clusters—generalized worry, social discomfort, alongside occasional panic. The common thread is a nervous system that's stuck in threat-detection mode.

Anxiety isn't a character flaw

If you're anxious, you're probably also self-critical about being anxious. You think you can handle this. You wonder why other people seem to move through life so easily.

But anxiety isn't about weakness or lack of willpower. It has roots in biology, temperament, and experience. Some people are wired with more reactive nervous systems. Many anxious adults learned early that the world wasn't safe—whether through explicit trauma or clear experiences of unpredictability and variability.

Your anxiety may have even served you at some point. Hypervigilance is adaptive if you grew up needing to read the room to stay safe. The problem is when these patterns persist long after the original danger has passed.

What helps with anxiety

The good news: anxiety responds well to treatment. Most people who engage seriously with therapy see meaningful improvement, often within months rather than years.

Effective anxiety treatment usually involves some combination of the following:

Understanding your patterns

Anxiety has a logic to it, even when it feels irrational. We'll look at the thoughts, physical sensations, and behaviors that feed your anxiety cycle. This isn't about judging your thoughts as "wrong"—it's about seeing them clearly enough to respond differently.

Changing your relationship with discomfort

Much of what keeps anxiety going is avoidance. You avoid situations that might trigger anxiety. You avoid sitting with uncomfortable feelings. You avoid uncertainty by trying to plan and control everything.

Paradoxically, avoidance makes anxiety stronger. Every time you escape a situation before your nervous system learns it can handle it, you reinforce the belief that you couldn't have coped.

Therapy involves gradually facing the things you've been avoiding—at a pace that's challenging but manageable. This isn't about white-knuckling through distress. It's about building genuine confidence that you can tolerate discomfort and survive.

Working with your body

Anxiety lives in the body as much as the mind. The racing heart, shallow breathing, muscle tension—these aren't just symptoms. They're part of the feedback loop that keeps anxiety going.

Learning to regulate your nervous system—through breathing, movement, grounding techniques—gives you practical tools for interrupting the anxiety spiral in real time.

Addressing what's underneath

Sometimes anxiety is the tip of the iceberg. Underneath might be unprocessed grief, unresolved trauma, relational wounds, or core beliefs about yourself and your worth. For some people, lasting change requires going deeper than symptom management.

Approaches I use

I draw from several evidence-based frameworks depending on what your anxiety needs:

• Cognitive-behavioral approaches that help identify and test anxious thoughts

• Exposure and response prevention for gradually facing avoided situations

• Acceptance-based strategies that emphasize willingness to experience discomfort rather than fighting it

• Somatic techniques for nervous system regulation

• Attachment and relational work when anxiety has roots in early experience

We'll figure out together what combination makes sense for you.

Anxiety in Austin's context

Austin's pace and culture create particular pressures. The startup mentality that celebrates constant hustle. The comparison trap is fueled by social media. The financial stress of a rapidly changing city. The pressure to appear successful and put-together.

If your anxiety is entangled with work stress, perfectionism, or imposter syndrome, we can address those patterns specifically.

Time for therapy?

Some people come when they've hit a wall. Others come because they're tired of managing on their own and ready to see if things could be different. If anxiety is limiting your life by keeping you from opportunities, relationships, or simply peace of mind, that's reason enough.