You Are Not Broken: Reclaiming Your Story from Anxiety through Emotionally Focused Therapy

Anxiety can make you feel like something is fundamentally wrong with you— that you're broken, unlovable, or too much. Your anxiety isn’t a flaw; it’s a signal. At Soothing Connections Counseling in St. Charles, IL, Sara Schramer, Licensed Clinical Professional Counselor, specializes in anxiety, helping clients see their anxiety as a nervous system cue, often a protector— an emotional part trying to shield you from pain. Emotionally Focused Therapy (EFT) helps you uncover the story your anxiety is trying to tell, and gently rewrite it with compassion, connection, and healing.

The Shame-Anxiety Loop
Anxiety often carries a hidden layer of shame. You might think:

• “Why can’t I handle this like everyone else?”

• “I shouldn’t need so much reassurance.”

• “I’m always ruining things with my overthinking.”
  

This internal narrative creates a feedback loop where anxiety fuels shame, and shame intensifies anxiety. EFT helps you step outside that loop by offering a new frame: Your anxiety is not evidence of brokenness— it’s evidence of how deeply you care.

Understanding the Emotional Roots of Anxiety
Rather than focusing only on cognitive strategies, EFT guides you into the emotional core of your experience. Often, beneath anxiety lies a tangle of deeper emotions:

• Fear of rejection or abandonment

• Grief over unmet needs

• Longing for connection

• Hurt from past experiences
  

EFT helps you connect to these primary emotions with compassion. You begin to see your anxiety not as a weakness, but as a response to a very human need: to be safe, loved, and seen.

Meeting Your Inner Parts with Compassion
In EFT, we often explore the different “parts” of yourself that show up in moments of distress. The anxious part may be loud and persistent, while a more vulnerable part remains hidden and afraid.

For example:

• The anxious part says: “Don’t mess up— you’ll be alone if you do.”

• The vulnerable part says: “I just want to be loved as I am.”
  

When you learn to recognize and comfort these parts instead of fighting them, something powerful happens— you begin to feel whole again.

Reclaiming the Narrative
Many clients describe their EFT therapy as a process of reclaiming their self and their story. Instead of defining themselves by their anxiety, they begin to understand the why behind it:

• “My anxiety makes sense, given my history.”

• “I developed this response to protect myself.”

• “That younger part of me did the best it could.”
  

From this place of understanding, you can write a new story— one where you are not broken, but brave. One where your emotional needs are valid, and your worth is not up for debate.

Healing in a Safe Relationship
One of the most transformative parts of EFT is the experience of being emotionally held by another. Whether you're in individual therapy or couples work, EFT creates space where your anxiety is met with attunement rather than judgment. This kind of emotional responsiveness rewires your internal world.

In the St. Charles office, Soothing Connections Counseling is a safe place clients can say: I feel heard, I feel understood, I feel cared for. That safety is the foundation for healing.

From Surviving to Thriving
As you reconnect with your emotions and begin to understand their origins, you develop a more secure attachment to yourself and others. This changes how you move through the world:

• Less self-blame, more self-kindness

• Less urgency to fix, more space to feel

• Less fear of disconnection, more capacity for intimacy
  

You move from surviving to thriving— not because anxiety disappears, but because it no longer controls the story.

You are not broken. You are human. Your anxiety is not the whole story. Through Emotionally Focused Therapy, you can uncover the deeper emotions your anxiety is protecting, rewrite the narrative with compassion, and reclaim your sense of self.

If you’re in St. Charles, IL, and ready to stop fighting your anxiety and start listening to it, I’m here.
Let’s begin the journey home to yourself.

Connect with Sara Schramer, MA LCPC, Emotionally Focused Couples Therapist in St. Charles, IL at Soothing Connections Counseling.
Couples Therapy and Individual Therapy available.

Let’s Soothe Well and Stay Connected!