The World Health Organization defines mental health as “a state of well-being in which the individual realizes his or her own abilities, can cope with the normal stresses of life, can work productively and fruitfully, and is able to make a contribution to his or her community”. So often in our society, we use the term “mental illness” to mean things like Schizophrenia and Schizoaffective Disorder. This is understandable, given that individuals that suffer from disorders like these are often very severely impaired — but this can lead to a problematically binary way of thinking about mental ill ..read more

Navigating Medical Care with Latrophobia Latrophobia is a psychological condition where someone has a strong and persistent fear of doctors that interferes with their life. Those who struggle with this condition are at great risk of illness and early death because they often fail to seek the appropriate preventative care and early medical interventions that play a crucial role in disease onset and progression. Navigating the medical system while struggling with latrophobia is profoundly challenging. Nothing about this condition is easy. However, there are some guidelines that can be useful to ..read more

Therapists Discuss Covid-19 Anxiety & Stress Management Note: This is part of an interview that Jennifer Yeh and Blake Thompson gave for local reporter Julie Muhlstein. Q1) Do you believe the stay-home and social distancing measures may have an unintended consequence of also raising people's anxiety (OCD, panic or agoraphobia) once they do begin to go out and resume more normal activities?  BT: Yes. Especially when it comes to Agoraphobia. For many clients, managing agoraphobia means engaging in the ongoing work of challenging themselves to be out in public.  Without exposure, it ..read more

A Letter to The Mayor and Seattle City Council Note: This is part of a letter we sent to Mayor Jenny Durkan and Seattle City Council in July of 2020. - Budgets are moral documents that reflect our values as a city. A bloated, militarized police budget (allocated at $400M+) isn’t what we need, but a safe and healthy community with access to affordable housing, mental health services and good jobs. We don't believe that it would make the community unsafe to scale policing back - what does make our community unsafe is lack of access to resources, services, and opportunities. We know that when po ..read more

Seattle Therapist Discusses Shame and Anti-Racism Work A guest post by Tina Alvarado, LMFT ABSTRACT We, as White people, need to work on building up our shame resilience as a way to continue to engage in dismantling White Supremacy. The lives of Black, Indigenous, and People of Color (BIPOC) depend on it. It is normal and okay to have hard feelings come up as you confront the White Supremacy you have internalized. Follow the steps explained below to increase your tolerance of these uncomfortable feelings so that you can remain steadfast in your anti-racism work. INTRODUCTION As a White Latina ..read more

New Online Therapy Group: Coping with Fear and Isolation During COVID-19 During the COVID19 lockdowns, many people found that it was helpful to remind themselves that this was only temporary, that in a matter of weeks or months they would be able to see friends and family again. Sadly, this is not true for everyone. For example, those with chronic illness face far more uncertainty because they are at higher risk of death or serious complications should they contract COVID19. This in turn, puts them at much higher risk of anxiety and depression. This is why we’ve designed a therapy group specif ..read more

Impact of COVID-19 on Stress in the Seattle Community Jennifer M. Ghahari, Ph.D. and Blake Thompson, LMHC Seattle Anxiety Specialists, PLLC This article is optimized for mobile. If you’re reading on a P.C., you can click here to download a pdf version. INTRODUCTION The Novel Coronavirus pandemic has led to unprecedented dismay regarding physical and mental health as well as economic crises.  Washington state, the first in the country to become impacted by COVID-19, has been most-greatly impacted in Seattle, King County.  Seattle Anxiety Specialists, PLLC, (SAS) has developed and c ..read more

We are excited to introduce you to COVID Coach, a free app designed to provide evidence based anti-anxiety tools and enhance emotional support during the coronavirus pandemic. This app is not a replacement for therapy or psychiatric treatment for anxiety, but it is still a great tool for those struggling with increased anxiety during this time. Developed by the licensed clinical psychologists at the National Center for PTSD at the VA, it joins other free, widely-used mental health apps like PTSD Coach and Mindfulness Coach. Although this is an app developed by the Department of Veterans Affai ..read more

Seattle Anxiety Specialists, PLLC is a private group therapy practice in Seattle specializing in treatments (such as CBT) for anxiety and anxiety disorders. We’re conducting this survey as a public service, to help individuals and organizations in the Seattle area get a better sense of the impacts of COVID-19 on the stress/anxiety/worry levels of our community. If you’re living in the Seattle area, please take a moment to fill out our Covid-19 Community Survey. Your honest feedback will be used as part of a research study and will help provide mental health resources for Seattle and surroundi ..read more

The Six Types of Anxiety Most of the information about anxiety that’s available online fails to distinguish between different types of anxiety. Because relevant distinctions aren’t being made, it’s easy to end up following advice that might have worked for someone else - but not for you. The aim of this post is to break down the six most common types of anxiety, as we understand them. This list is not exhaustive, there are certainly other ways of drawing these distinctions, and any one person will usually experience more than one type of anxiety. However, we believe that there is much to be ga ..read more