EMERGENCY ACTION PLANNING > Blog > Disaster Stress > How to Manage and Overcome Anxiety or Depression
How to Manage and Overcome Anxiety or Depression
Disclaimer;
The medical information provided in this material is, at best, of a general nature and cannot substitute for the advice of a medical professional i.e. a qualified doctor/ physician, psychiatrist, nurse, pharmacist, or such. Emergency action planning is not a doctor.
Anxiety or Depression is not something that can be managed with limited resources or with a Four-minute hack.
From my own personal experience, anxiety and depression have been related to external events that I had very little to no control over.
And I was fearful, as long as I was in denial of my personal responsibility to correct whatever the issue was. I let those fears needlessly swim around in my brain creating more anxiety and depression causing more stress.
I was a mess.
You can’t always control what goes on outside, but you can always control what goes on inside. – Wayne Dyer
Once I accepted the responsibility that was happening inside my head was because I was letting it happen (my feelings about it), I looked outside to see what I could do to correct the situation.
I made a plan of action. And ultimately my anxiety my depression and my stress left me.
This is very similar to what we do with the emergency action planning process.
We create a plan that will help relieve us of any fears, stress, depression, or anxiety during emergencies or disasters, and we follow that plan.
Depression Anxiety and stress all hit us because we have a problem. That problem creates fear. Relieving that fear is a simple problem-solving process.
Number one, identify the problem.
Number two, find the root cause of that problem.
Number three, determine a solution.
Number four, work toward that solution.
Yes, it is that simple but is it really that simple.
It can be argued by many that when we’re going under an anxiety attack or we are depressed or we are exhibiting stress behavior, we are not of our right minds.
And because of that, it might be hard for us, the person undergoing the stressors to identify how to fix it.
Image by Pete Linforth from Pixabay
Quite possibly this is the place where a professional needs to step in, assess the situation, and find a way to address it.
If you feel compelled to assist somebody who is going under an anxiety attack, or are depressed and stressed. You should keep a couple of things in mind.
You can’t talk them out of it. But you can talk to them.
Do not try to explain it away.
Do not tell them that they are lucky it’s not worse.
Do not take their anger, or outbursts personally
Additional information on Disaster Stress Management can be found here;
Learning Objective #6; Stress and the Benefits of Having a Plan 16-minute informational video.
Till next time
“Be Safe”
P.S. respond with your questions or concerns to me at daniel@emergencyactionplanning.com