Dear Richard,
I can relate to your story. I suffered severe anxiety, horrendous panic attacks and PTSD for many years. I tried all the usual therapies (CBT, medication, analysis, diet, exercise, acupuncture, vitamins, group therapy etc.).
Frankly, nothing really worked until I discovered - and applied - the somatic (body) techniques espoused by people like Bessel van der Kolk, and other luminaries such as Peter Levine, Pat Ogden, and Eugene Gendlin. It took me a long time to understand – and accept – their message that the anxiety/panic response resides in the more ancient (reptilian) part of the brain where talk-therapies just can't reach, let alone affect.
The only way to ‘communicate’ with this pre-verbal system is through the body, which can signal to the brain stem that it is OK to begin the process of unfreezing the emotional paralysis that has plagued us for decades. So much depends on our willingness and capacity to feel and experience what is going on inside us - not just think about it.
Of course, it is also important to understand what is going on at a cognitive level in order to make sense of things. So there is certainly a role for traditional talk therapy, but it is not the main game. By combining a bottom-up (somatic) and a top-down (cognitive) approach, as van der Kolk suggests, it is possible to move towards genuine healing - not just a suppression of symptoms. This is not theoretical for me. I have experienced it.
I urge you to take a look at van der Kolk's latest book, The Body Keeps the Score' - it will revolutionise how you think about your anxiety. The other truly great work on this subject is Peter Levine’s ‘In an Unspoken Voice’, which explains his ‘somatic experiencing’ (SE) therapy. Levine’s book is arguably narrower in scope than van der Kolk’s, but his writing has such a poetic quality that it communicates more than the words themselves. The first time I read Levine’s book I felt my body respond to his truths at a visceral level. It is a deeply healing and magical work.
