🎙️ Episode 9: Anxiety About Having Anxiety (Yep, It’s a Thing)
Published: 4.10.25
Duration: 5 Minutes
Category: Mental Health, Anxiety, Meta-Anxiety
🎧 Listen Now
📝 Episode Summary
It starts with a worry, then suddenly you're worrying about the worry—and now you're panicking about the panic. Welcome to meta-anxiety: the loop of being afraid of your own anxious symptoms. In this episode, we talk about how this spiral forms, why it’s so common, and how to calm the fear of fear before it takes over.
✨ You’ll Learn:
What meta-anxiety is and how it hijacks your thoughts
How to gently interrupt the spiral before it builds
Techniques to re-ground in the present when your body feels unsafe
🧠 Try This After You Listen:
Next time you feel anxiety rising, pause and name the sensation: tight chest, fast heart, shallow breath. Remind yourself: This is anxiety, and it’s allowed to be here. Then return to your body with one regulating breath.
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today we’re talking about something super common but rarely named: meta-anxiety—a.k.a. anxiety about anxiety.
If you've ever thought, “Why am I anxious again?” or “Oh no, what if this feeling doesn’t go away?” or even “What’s wrong with me that I can’t stop spiraling?”—you’ve been here. And friend, you are not alone.
Anxiety about anxiety is what happens when your brain starts reacting not just to a perceived threat—but to your own emotional response. The fear becomes self-reinforcing. You feel anxious, which triggers more anxiety because now you’re worried about how long it’ll last, what it means, and whether it’ll spiral into something bigger. And it’s a loop. A loud, exhausting, full-body loop.
Here’s what that can look like: maybe you’re just going about your day, and suddenly you notice your heart beating a little faster. You feel slightly off. Then the thought hits—“Am I anxious right now?” Cue the scan. The checking. The overanalyzing. You try to figure out why you're anxious, and the fact that you can’t come up with a clear answer makes it worse. Now you’re anxious about being anxious for no reason, and your nervous system goes into full alert.
And here’s the kicker: that secondary anxiety often feels worse than whatever the original spark was. It’s the loop of judgment, shame, and fear of the feeling itself. And unfortunately, trying to logic your way out of it usually doesn’t help. That’s because anxiety isn’t just in your mind—it’s in your body. And once your nervous system is activated, your brain starts searching for danger to match the feeling.
This is where the polyvagal theory comes back into play. Your body is scanning for cues of safety or danger at all times—this is called neuroception. When you feel anxiety, your brain assumes something must be wrong and starts trying to locate the threat. And if the only thing it can find is... anxiety itself? That becomes the new target. The new threat.
So what can you actually do about it?
First, normalize the loop. Say to yourself, “This is just my brain reacting to my body. It makes sense I feel this way.” That simple reframe creates space. You’re not failing. You’re experiencing a very human feedback loop.
Second, interrupt the spiral with regulation, not reasoning. Your body needs to feel safe before your thoughts will follow. Try grounding—look around the room and name five neutral things. Put your feet on the floor. Rub your hands together. Hum. Breathe out longer than you breathe in. You’re telling your nervous system: “We’re not in danger.”
Third, name the fear underneath. Is it fear of losing control? Fear of judgment? Fear of getting stuck this way? Anxiety is rarely just about the sensation—it’s about what we believe it means. Name the belief, and you take away some of its power.
Fourth, practice allowing. Instead of pushing the feeling away, try saying, “Okay, I feel anxious. I don’t like it, but I can stay with it.” You’re not giving in. You’re making space for the feeling without letting it hijack your entire day.
And finally, remember that feelings pass. Every single time you’ve felt anxious before, it ended. Maybe not right away. Maybe not comfortably. But it ended. This one will too.
