Hi, I’m Ilia Jones, Licensed Professional Counselor in Suwanee, Georgia, and I wanted to talk to you about anxiety and why it can feel so bad. Anxiety itself is actually a normal human emotion that everyone experiences; it is your body’s way of trying to keep you safe by alerting you to possible danger. The problem is that anxiety can start to feel overwhelming or miserable when it shows up too often, too intensely, or in situations that are not truly dangerous.

Anxiety can affect your body with symptoms like a racing heart, tense muscles, sweating, upset stomach, or trouble sleeping, and those physical sensations can make you think something is really wrong with you. It can also affect your thoughts, leading to worry, “what if” thinking, and imagining worst‑case scenarios, which often makes the anxiety even stronger. Over time, this can interfere with daily life, work, school, relationships, and the ability to relax or enjoy things that used to be pleasant.

One of the biggest ways anxiety becomes a problem is when it starts to control your behavior. You might begin avoiding people, places, or activities that make you nervous, which can shrink your world and make life feel smaller and lonelier. This avoidance can accidentally teach your brain that those situations are dangerous, which keeps the anxiety going instead of letting it come down naturally.

The good news is that anxiety is very treatable, and therapy can help you understand what your anxiety is trying to tell you without letting it run your life. Approaches like cognitive behavioral therapy focus on noticing and challenging unhelpful thoughts, learning coping skills, and gradually facing feared situations in manageable steps. With practice, many people find that anxiety becomes less intense and less frequent, and they can get back to doing the things that matter to them.