Insights into the Mind

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The men I know who struggle with anxiety in men rarely describe it as anxiety. They call it stress, irritability, being wired, being “a bit wound up lately” — anything but what it actually is. One friend told me he’d been “off his game” for months. Another said he was just “tired all the time.” Neither of them used the word anxiety. And I don’t think that’s a coincidence. I think it’s one of the most significant and consistently overlooked patterns in mental health.

This gap between experience and label matters more than people realise. Because when you can’t name what you’re going through, you can’t ask for help. And when the people around you don’t recognise it either, you just keep going — tightly wound, exhausted, quietly struggling — until something gives.

Why Anxiety in Men Looks So Different

Here’s something I’ve noticed, both from my own experience of anxiety and from the years I’ve spent reading about it: the textbook presentation of anxiety — the worry, the tearfulness, the avoidance, the verbalising of fear — tends to match the way anxiety shows up in women more often than in men. That’s not a generalisation pulled from thin air. Research consistently shows that men are more likely to externalise anxiety rather than internalise it.

What does that look like in practice? It can look like:

• Irritability or a short fuse — snapping at people over small things
• Restlessness or an inability to sit still
• Throwing themselves into work or exercise compulsively
• Increased alcohol use to “take the edge off”
• Physical symptoms — jaw tension, headaches, stomach issues — with no obvious cause
• Difficulty sleeping, racing thoughts at night
• Withdrawing socially, but framing it as just being “busy”

None of these scream anxiety in the way most people picture it. And that’s exactly the problem. A GP might see a man presenting with sleep issues and muscle tension and treat the symptoms without ever getting to the root. The man himself might not even think to mention that his mind races constantly, because that just feels like… being alive. Being a man who has stuff to deal with.

Studies have found that men are significantly less likely to seek help for anxiety and depression, and when they do, they’re more likely to present with physical complaints. A 2018 review published in the journal Social Psychiatry and Psychiatric Epidemiology highlighted that masculine norms around self-reliance and emotional stoicism act as real barriers to both recognition and help-seeking. This isn’t about weakness — it’s about a cultural script that runs very deep.

The “Man Up” Culture and Why It Keeps Men Stuck

I want to be honest here — I’m not a therapist or a psychologist. I have a psychology degree from the University of Leeds and a postgrad in Mental Health Communication, and I’m a certified Mental Health First Aider, but I’m writing this as someone who has lived through anxiety herself and spent a long time thinking about it. My own experience — panic attacks at 23, undiagnosed for two full years — taught me that one of the biggest obstacles isn’t the anxiety itself. It’s the story you’re telling yourself about what it means to have it.

For men, that story is often written by everyone around them from a very young age. Don’t cry. Toughen up. Sort it out. Be the strong one. These aren’t just playground messages — they get reinforced in workplaces, in friendships, in families. And when you’ve spent decades being rewarded for not showing vulnerability, admitting that you lie awake at 3am catastrophising about things you can’t control feels like a profound failure of character. It isn’t. But it feels that way.

Therapists often describe this as “alexithymia” in clinical terms — difficulty identifying and describing emotions. But I’d argue that for many men, it’s not that they can’t feel their emotions. It’s that they’ve learned not to name them. There’s a difference. And that difference matters enormously for recovery, because you can’t work through something you haven’t acknowledged.

If you’re supporting a man who seems “off” — whether that’s a partner, brother, friend, or colleague — sometimes the most useful thing isn’t asking “are you okay?” (the answer is almost always “yeah, fine”). It’s saying, “you seem really stressed lately — I’m here if you want to talk about it.” Specific, low-pressure, no expectation of an emotional download.

Practical Tools That Actually Help

One of the things I hear most often from men who do eventually recognise their anxiety is that they want something concrete to do. Not just “talk about your feelings” — something practical, structured, actionable. Which is part of why CBT (Cognitive Behavioural Therapy) tends to resonate so well. It’s skills-based. It gives you a framework. It treats anxiety like a problem to be worked on, not a flaw to be ashamed of.

If face-to-face therapy feels like a big leap (and for a lot of people it does — please do consider it when you’re ready, it genuinely makes a difference), a good starting point is a workbook you can use at home, privately, at your own pace. I often recommend Retrain Your Brain: Cognitive Behavioral Therapy in 7 Weeks — it’s structured, manageable, and walks you through CBT principles without requiring you to have any background knowledge. Similarly, The CBT Workbook for Mental Health is excellent for working through negative thought patterns in a really hands-on way. If there’s also an ADHD element in the mix — and anxiety and ADHD co-occur more than most people realise — The Complete CBT Workbook for Adults with ADHD is worth looking at specifically.

Journalling is another tool that gets dismissed as “not for men” — and I think that’s a real shame. You don’t have to write pages of feelings. Even five minutes a day noting what’s on your mind, what triggered stress, what helped — that’s useful data. The LIFTINSPIRE CO. FINDING BALANCE Mental Health Journal is a six-month guided journal with prompts, which takes away the blank-page panic entirely. Or if you want something simpler and less structured, this Mindfulness Journal for Calm, Clarity, and Daily Reflection is a clean, unpretentious notebook that does the job without feeling like a wellness lecture.

For moments when anxiety spikes and you need something tactile and grounding, the Allura & Arcia 52 Stress Less & Self Care Cards are genuinely useful — small, practical mindfulness prompts you can reach for without having to think too hard about what to do next. And on the supplement side, many people find magnesium glycinate supports both sleep and nervous system regulation. Two options I’d point you towards are Pure Encapsulations Magnesium Glycinate and this highly-rated Magnesium Glycinate 500mg supplement — always worth checking with your GP before starting anything new, but the research on magnesium and stress response is fairly solid.

If You’re a Man Reading This: You Don’t Have to Have It All Figured Out

Anxiety in men is real, it’s common, and it’s chronically under-recognised — both by the people experiencing it and by the systems meant to help. If anything in this post has made you think “that actually sounds a bit like me,” I’d gently encourage you to sit with that rather than dismiss it.

You don’t have to call it anxiety if that word doesn’t feel right yet. But if something has been off — if you’ve been short-tempered, not sleeping, grinding through the days rather than living them — that’s worth paying attention to. Talking to a GP is a good first step. Finding a therapist, even for just a few sessions, can shift things significantly. There’s no shame in it. The most grounded, capable people I know have done the work on themselves, and they’d be the first to tell you it was worth it.

You’re not broken. You’re just running on empty, and there are ways through.

Take good care of yourself — Lucy x