Reddit mentions of Managing Anxiety with CBT For Dummies

{How old is Ares?}

We have a quick suggestion before knowing more. You need to train yourselves on cognitive behavioural therapy - and I mean really train yourselves in the basics. Whether you have a counsellor or not. A good counsellor would train you anyway with CBT homework.

Why?

Because at the minimum you and your tulpa need the skillset to tackle the thought part of the cycle that you get into.

This is a simplification, a big one, but useful: thoughts affect neurochemistry and neurochemistry affects your thoughts. It's a cycle that can be virtuous or vicious.

So teach yourselves how to influence the thinking that you do first. Not a magic bullet, of course not, but it has empiric evidence (CBT) and is something that I believe you should certainly teach yourself well and also I'd encourage Ares to do so as well.

{Ok, so my own concern is you creating a tulpa to help with your problems. It's not that it's a problem to do this however please realise that he is a person OR will certainly become one. An individual. It is likely he'll help but he is as human as you and will not automatically know anything more about how to help other than be a second viewpoint at best in the early days.

Whether you agree with specific therapy ideas or not, Ares deserves full exposure to as many evidence based ways of working with these issues as you can practically manage.

By doing this for him you maximise his own ability to use the knowledge in your brain and that he gains to help you.

He's not going to know how to fight with the reduced resources of depression. He won't know how to kick you out of bed and get you to just exercise, even if you are doing it zombie fashion.
He's not going to know he's gotta get you out and connecting to anyone you can call on for some support.
And he's not going to know how to get you to re examine your thinking about the past and future.

I'll tell him this - he's got to intervene in rumination: over examining and "Why" questions regarding the past or indeed the future.

Nope, we aren't offering a full silver bullet but I'm certainly hoping he's mature enough to take the hints here. He's not learnt anything like enough yet and if he's managed to intervene with anxiety, then he's done brilliantly.

YOU have got to be a serious help to Ares now, no matter your feelings and deliberately arm him with as much materials and knowledge as possible.

Does that help?}

She's right mate.

Have a look at some of this stuff as a quick start:
https://psychologytools.com/anxiety.html

Then have a look here. I've chosen the Dummies ones because I've used the second one myself and contains all the basics, plus there's little time wasted in getting theoretical.

https://www.amazon.co.uk/Managing-Anxiety-Dummies-Graham-Davey/dp/1118366069/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1521495223&sr=8-1&keywords=cbt+for+dummies

https://www.amazon.co.uk/Cognitive-Behavioural-Therapy-Dummies-Branch/dp/0470665416/ref=sr_1_3?ie=UTF8&qid=1521495223&sr=8-3&keywords=cbt+for+dummies

We are not claiming this is all that's required. Like a balanced diet, these skills are an essential part.

The other parts, you probably already know.

Our point is: your tulpa sounds fearfully young for handling serious adult problems, so put your heart and soul into helping him learn how to help you EVEN if you don't always think the therapy ideas can be of help.

And also be dead honest with yourself - I'm biased towards CBT/Hypnotherapy mixed with CBT stuff for this - however, have you seen a professional whom you trust for possible medication support?

Don't discount it without seeing someone if your depressive symptoms are that strong.

Finally, for me, a good vitamin b complex AND vitamin D plus exercise was another major element. Again, not claiming it's a silver bullet but you need these vitamins anyway and they are on the list of the few supplements worth taking. Can back this one up with research links if wanted.

Hope this gives you guys a start.

Oh really last thing: when thinking stuff about yourself, when self examining yourself, avoid the use of the WHY questions. Not kidding. There is a TED talk on it.

Use WHAT and maybe HOW. Don't bother with WHY:

https://ideas.ted.com/the-right-way-to-be-introspective-yes-theres-a-wrong-way/

the thoughts were absolutely over the top and irrational to the point of suicidal over things others see as very minor in the grand scheme of things. The distorted magnifying glass of depression just made everything seem overwhelming or a disaster. I mentioned these books in another post, I did a search on CBT and anxiety on the library database and found there were quite a few helpful ones. I couldnt really focus well and retain the information, but I think reading them through each a couple of times it kind of subconsiously entered my brain. I read some not very good ones, but for CBT and thought and anxiety control the below ones I would definitely recommend and I found helpful:

http://www.amazon.com/Managing-Anxiety-Dummies-Graham-Davey/dp/1118366069/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1419408745&sr=8-1&keywords=Managing+Anxiety+with+CBT+for+dummies

http://www.amazon.com/Overcoming-Your-Workplace-Stress-CBT-based/dp/0415671787/ref=sr_1_2?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1419408931&sr=1-2&keywords=CBT+workplace

http://www.amazon.com/Learned-Optimism-Change-Your-Mind/dp/1400078393/ref=sr_1_1?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1419408825&sr=1-1&keywords=learned+optimism