I am having a bit of difficulty in developing my exposure plan. My goal is to be able to go back to work two half days per week. I have been off work now for two months because of my panic attacks. The difficulty I have is that the major trigger for my anxiety is when I have to speak with my boss. I think this is because most of my panic attacks took place when I was speaking with my boss in the past because he forced me to talk why I was so stressed out and took more of a disciplinary tone, which made me even more anxious, which lead to a panic attack each time I talked to him for months before I went off. So now I associate the two together.
So my difficulty in planning exposure work comes because speaking to my boss is necessary before I can even come back to work at all. When I return to work, I have to meet with my boss quite often so he can monitor how I'm doing and discuss a return to work plan. Unfortunately, this is my level 10 fear level and I'm supposed to start at one!!
One thing I have done is started coming in for coffee for 15 minutes with my coworkers, just to get used to coming to work, since I have mild anxiety around just that.
Anyone have any ideas??
