hi everyone, can anyone suggest any coping mechanisms or tips or just anything really to help with anxiety around anxiety? ive recently been anxious about some unrelated things which triggered bad and constant anxiety, a knotting feeling of dread rather than actual worries. I started to get past that but had a bad night where my anxiety kept me up literally all night long, just the knotting feeling in my stomach and feeling spacey and weird. no actual worries other than 'oh fuck am i losing the plot/i need to get to sleep'. that was awful and ive had a lot of similar nights with disrupted sleep. now have anxiety constantly at any time of the day about the night and sleeping, and more so anxious about if I'm going to be able to and how bad I'll be tomorrow if I don't sleep etc.

 I'm also often anxious about these weird spaced out not-with-it feelings i get, I'm very aware of sensations in my body and I'm hypersensitive to sounds and the feeling of things and sometimes things look not quite right (they don't actually look different, almost like they're further away or something, it's like my perception is off or weird). sometimes textures feel weird or voices sound weird (i can't describe it, i figure it's all probably just anxiety and being hyperaware of everything but its horrible) and if i notice these things it also triggers severe anxiety. it makes me feel weird and out of control of my mind and that makes me incredibly anxious and is one of the big things I worry about. my anxiety is triggered by what I think is just caused by anxiety if that makes sense?

I'm pretty spaced out and anxious and just not doing great right now so sorry if this is rambley but I'd just appreciate any advice at all please. I've tried breathing exercises and changing to a cool temperature which would usually help with my anxiety and panic but this is like some sort of super strain of anxiety, they're not doing a thing, they're usually pretty solid grounding techniques but it doesn't do anything. my brain is too active and the breathing doesn't work, I think those not working is what's making me even more anxious. I'm scared I'm going to not sleep at all again, that my anxiety is going to get worse or not get better (i was doing really quite well up until this recent flare too), or that I'm going to have a breakdown or some sort of mental health crisis. I think the worry about going insane is probably irrational and is just because I feel so out of control at the moment but I don't know how to get past it, I've dealt with similar to this about 8 years ago but it wasn't quite as bad and i also used the cold and breathing techniques to get through it

thank you so much to anyone who's read this far. I've spoken to a councillor privately which wasn't really helpful and I know there is no reason to worry about the initial trigger, since my anxiety now is about my anxiety itself and also about not sleeping. I could speak to my gp but mental health referrals have months for waiting lists, I'm very reluctant to try medication as I'm scared of side effects and also don't want to be reliant on it, that's a last resort.

 I'm hoping if I can get a good night's sleep for a week somehow, that will help my anxiety and then if I can get through a week and be able to sleep I can try and show myself that I can get through it, and then hopefully the physical symptoms will ease off maybe especially when I'm not sleep deprived, and I'll stop worrying about the night as much and hopefully everything will just ease off. does anyone have any tips for stopping or coping with anxiety about anxiety symptoms like that? or any techniques to help with anxiety or knotting stomach or racing thoughts (not even anxious ones, my thoughts just race jumping from random image to another super fast and it stops me sleeping, I assume it's just a super active brain caused by the  high anxiety levels ive had recently). or any tips to help sleep when anxiety is severe or persistent? again, thank you so much for reading. i really am quite desperate here so appreciate any guidance, my life is completely on hold and I can't do this for much longer, I'm so unhappy and I don't want to live like this I don't enjoy anything as the constant dread and knotting is there in my stomach, and everything even things that normally I'd be just a bit anxious about, are triggering that awful dread feeling. I just want to be me again, I just want to be content