Are there some anxiety symptoms that won’t ever go away?

Anxious behavior, such as worry, activates the stress response, which prepares the body for immediate emergency action.

This survival reaction is often referred to as the fight or flight response, the emergency response, the fight, flight, or freeze response (some people freeze when they are afraid, like a “deer caught in headlights”), or the fight, flight, freeze, or faint response (since some people faint when they are afraid).

Visit our “Stress Response” article for more information about the many body-wide changes caused by the stress response.

The higher the degree of the stress response, the more dramatic the changes.

Since stress responses push the body beyond its internal balance (homeostasis), stress responses stress the body. As such, anxiety stresses the body.

Consequently, anxiety symptoms are symptoms of stress. They are called anxiety symptoms because anxious behavior is the main source of stress that stresses the body, causing it to become symptomatic.

Since anxious behavior creates stress and stress creates symptoms, addressing your anxious behavior and reducing stress will eliminate ALL anxiety symptoms in time.

So, to answer your question, if you do the right work, you should be able to eliminate ALL anxiety symptoms.

If you still have some anxiety symptoms, that means:

1. You haven’t sufficiently addressed your anxious behavior.
2. You haven’t sufficiently reduced stress.
3. You haven’t sufficiently reduced stress for long enough.
4. You still have some unaddressed underlying factors creating stress.

Remember, it can take a very long time for the body to recover from hyperstimulation and much longer than most people expect. This is why we recommend faithfully practicing your recovery strategies and being patient as the body returns to normal, non-hyperstimulated health.

If you still have symptoms, one or a combination of the above factors is the reason.

Unidentified and unaddressed underlying factors (Level Two recovery work) are one of the most common reasons why recovery remains incomplete, and symptoms linger.

Completing Level Two recovery work will eliminate that barrier to complete recovery.

Working with an experienced anxiety disorder therapist is the most effective way to address Level Two recovery.