How ‘worry windows’ got me through one of my most stressful years

Last year, I endured a particularly tough stretch of time where everything that could go wrong did go wrong. A handful of my editors got laid off, which meant I was getting less work (and money). My dog developed pesky, hard-to-treat allergies; I moved to a new state; my health insurance refused to pay for some steep medical bills; and then a truck smashed into our car and took off in a classic hit-and-run (to name just a few terrors).

I was suddenly stressing out about something pretty much every second of the day. After a few months of this, my therapist suggested I create a “worry window,” or a scheduled chunk of time during which I could, well, chew over my problems. It felt unnatural at first—after all, my brain was accustomed to panicking at will—but within a couple of weeks, I was feeling way less unhinged and much more like myself.

Claudia Giolitti-Wright, MA, LMFT, the founder of Psychotherapy for Young Women in New York City, commonly recommends this technique to her clients who struggle with anxiety or find themselves, like me, perpetually overwhelmed. Why? “A worry window gives your anxious thoughts a seat at the table, but not the whole house, so you can acknowledge them without letting them take over your entire day,” says Giolitti-Wright. Here’s how it changed my life—and how it could help you too:

What happens when your worries run wild?

This probably won’t come as much of a shock, but worrying incessantly can wreak havoc on your physical and mental health. When you’re stressed out, your body pumps out stress hormones like cortisol and adrenaline (you might know this as the fight-or-flight response). While this physiological reaction energises you in the short-term so you can tackle whatever threat or problem is in front of you, excessive and long-term exposure to these stress hormones can trigger inflammation in your body and contribute to fatigue, difficulty sleeping, muscle tension, digestive issues, a weakened immune system and chronic diseases, according to Giolitti-Wright. “Constant worry really wears your body down,” she says.

Mentally, perpetually panicking about your problems can trigger feelings of anxiety or depression, irritability, and make it difficult to focus, pay attention and make decisions. It can also sour relationships, causing some people to isolate and withdraw and others to lash out at their loved ones. “Stress definitely impacts our ability to connect with others,” says Giolitti-Wright.

Why worry windows can be so helpful

When your worries don’t have any boundaries or limits, they can run the show, says Giolitti-Wright. I can attest to this—when everything was going wrong in my life, I spent every minute of my day puzzling over how to fix things. When I would be in a yoga class, for example, I was physically moving through the poses, but mentally, I was elsewhere, desperately trying to problem-solve.