# Anxiety Disorders > Social Anxiety Disorder >  >  Over-thinking

## Nightingale

Any help for over-thinking strategies? 

The first hearing for my case is coming up at the end of the week, the pretrial hearing. I don't know what to expect and yesterday I made myself miserable trying to think through every possible moment. I googled pretrial, to try to get a feel of how it will go, but the information wasn't very helpful. My attorney is busy with getting everything ready, and I don't want to bug him. When I went to therapy yesterday, I was like a manic person talking non-stop about everything I'd been thinking that morning. She held up her hands like, "STAPH..." 

It's not as bad today, but these things have a way of creeping up on me. I just need a calm week leading up to the day. 

Help?

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## QuietCalamity

I can totally relate to overthinking. The only thing that helps me is to write the thoughts down like in a journal and then put it away somewhere. Then go do something for you, ya know? Hope that helps.

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## Monowheat

I call my brain "the runaway train" sometimes. If you don't catch the thoughts it speeds off and there's no stopping it. 

Wish I could help you but I can't stop mine. Hopefully knowing you're not alone is useful somehow. :/

Pointless post is pointless, sorry.

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## nothing

Ohh my GOD, over thinking is my #1 problem. Obsessively over thinking every little thing in life, it's SO exhausting. That's why I get frustrated and turn to benzos and alcohol sometimes, just to shut my insane mind up. Not a good solution though. 

Please forgive me if this is stupid, but my therapist gave me copies of some pages from a book about refocusing. They're a little too hokey for me, but maybe someone could benefit. I scanned them and I'll attach them here.

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## Nightingale

Hey....I have that same handout from one of my former therapists. They must share a lot of information.  :O_O:   :;):  Thanks for the scan, anyway  ::): 

The stupid hearing was postponed because the judge hasn't ruled on one last motion from opposing counsel. Lame. Now it's back to sit and wait. 

But that's ok, I decided. It cranks down my anxiety levels, knowing we're not going to court this week, and, leaning on my therapy yesterday, I reframed the whole situation to feel better about things. They want to keep dragging this out? Fiiiiiine. I have all the time in the world. 

Following that, (and so I wouldn't sit in one spot like a sad gargoyle and grate on every single detail) I threw myself into making a complicated recipe, and unraveling some technology issues I've been putting off. I will fight Massive Losers On the Other Side with stuffed pork tenderloin and movies streaming to our main television.

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## nothing

Yeah, I guess therapists like to recycle the same information about. That didn't help me at all, but hopefully it'll help at least ONE person on Earth at some point...

I hope you find a way to stop the over-thinking, please, if you do, let us all know because I'm sure us anxiety sufferers all over think most things.

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## Nightingale

One strategy used in dealing with a spouse's affair when obsessing about what happened is imagining a vivid red stop sign and concentrating on the image. It worked pretty well for me at the time. 

Of course, that's easy to say today when I'm doing alright and staying on top of things.

Tomorrow, on the other hand, may be a huge suckfest.

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## coleiscold

I over think all the time and it gets me into lots of emotional trouble and other problems. But ya its really a problem for me.

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## Otherside

Yeah, its a problem. I'd reallt say it's a big problem at the mo.

I don't know what to say really. I just don't know how to stop it. I'm sorry.

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## Inscrutable Banana

I over-think a lot of things, but I especially tend to obsessively worry about my interactions with people (which people notice and feel put off by). I wish I could stop it, because it helps to keep me miserable.

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## coleiscold

^inscrutable banana u just described my life too! O n 
@Otherside
 how do u fix it?

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## coleiscold

@Otherside
 sorry misread that! My apologies! But i understand! I do really!

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