What You Can Do When Dealing with Low Self-Esteem & Anxiety
Anxiety and Low Self-Esteem
According to studies reported by Fullerton.edu, people who are diagnosed with generalized anxiety disorder (GAD) had a significantly lower self-esteem than those who aren’t diagnosed with GAD. For those who don’t know, GAD can be described as an excessive or unrealistic worry about aspects in life that can be accompanied by physical symptoms. The same can be said for those who experience panic attacks. Panic attacks are described as “acute and disabling anxiety”.
Anxiety and low self-esteem can be associated with a low quality of life and a report of feeling a sense of impairment in perspective. Some factors that contribute to quality of life are “personal autonomy, emotion, social, spiritual, cognitive, and preparatory” to name a few (McCaffrey et al., 2016). Speaking from a personal perspective, it’s felt as though my personal autonomy and my emotional and social wellbeing have been affected by anxiety.
Personal Connection/Story
In the sense of personal autonomy, I feel as though there’s a limit in what I find myself able to do in a day or a week. I went out very frequently last week, which is normally something I love, and ended up feeling exhausted and irritable throughout the week. It felt so conflicting to want to be able to go out every day and enjoy every minute, and yet also want a day to stay home and just rest. It felt like I couldn’t decide myself how I wanted to spend my day, but it was the emotional exhaustion from anxiety that determined it.
This is all connected to my social wellbeing. Last Monday, my partner and I went out with a mutual friend to go out for drinks. Both my partner and I were under the impression that it would be the type of situation where we go to a bar, have a few drinks, and just have conversation. It turned out that our mutual friend had the intention of taking us out to a club. Very shortly after we arrived to the area, my partner noticed how uncomfortable I felt and took a chance to get us alone in the car to ask me how I was feeling. The end result was that we went to a bar ourselves and went to a much nicer area. However, ever since that day, I felt exhausted and irritable.
Overall, I ended up feeling like I was a burden and felt horrible when it came to spending time with friends.
What Helps
Some of what can help with anxiety and self-esteem are the following:
- Therapy
Seeking professional help from a therapist or psychologist can help as they are trained professionals in assisting those with mental illness and mental health issues. - Challenge negative thoughts
Often enough, anxiety will show itself through negative thoughts commenting on your appearance or personality. It’s important to challenge these thoughts with something positive about yourself or focus on the reality of the situation rather than the perception that anxiety provides. - Learn to say no.
Learning to say no is one of the most important things for me. I’ve always believed that I couldn’t say no to others when they asked me of something. Otherwise, they would end up disliking me and I would have to deal with confrontation (which I hate!). In reality, it’s perfectly okay to say no to others when you want to take care of yourself first. It’s not selfish to want to say no for personal reasons. - Learn to be assertive.
Again, this is another important lesson for me. Learning to be assertive has to be one of the most vital things that has greatly affected my life and self-esteem. Being able to stand my ground on my opinion without putting someone else’s opinion down is a game changer! Assertive doesn’t mean being aggressive. It just means standing your ground and being communicative.
You’re not responsible for how others perceive or react to your anxiety or your emotions. You are only responsible for yourself.
