I have severe anxiety and CBT was pointless for me. I had 3 sessions of it before the person doing it was like, yeah this isn't helping, and then they referred me to someone else for a different treatment instead...which also wasn't helpful and they discharge me after a few weeks and just told me to go back if I got better enough for it >.<

That's insane.. Did you at least get given any medication or anything for it? I looked it up, and I know that if the "talking" help doesn't help, they can give you that, right? :/

I've tried a bunch and they didn't work so my doctor has given up on me too. And since I'm not in therapy, my benefits are going to stop and I can't work because I can't leave my house alone so I'm not going to have any money and my parents can't afford to pay the extra rent that there will be if I'm not on benefits so I'm going to be homeless! Life is kinda sucky isn't it :/ (Sorry to be a bummer and ranting a little to you, I haven't really spoken to anyone about this) :o

It depends on the person. I had CBT and it made me worse, though that's thanks to my issues being anchored in the past and my inability to let them go.
I have a friend who had CBT while being medicated for dealing with narcolepsy, and he swears by it. It really helped him as his problem was routed in how he feels about the present.
You've done a lot of reading - if, while reading, it hasn't clicked as a method you like, ask for something else. You have to go in with the want and belief that your issue can be changed and helped. If you don't have that, it's not likely to do too much for you.

I gotta say, I'm like you... I could already figure out my triggers, and it didn't really help in that regard.
If you have free access to it, it couldn't hurt. If you're gunna have to pay for the service, I'm not sure I'd personally bother.

Sorry I can't help on this... I was thinking of a totally different CBT when I saw the journal title!

Same! I have no idea what CBT she's talking about :/

Cognitive Behavioral Therapy, likely.

I've had CBT for PTSD and it has helped a great deal. Took a lot of work from both the therapist and myself, but the results have been worth it. But as with all things, YMMV.

If by CBT you mean cognitive behavioral therapy, I'd say it's been proven to work for a healthy amount of people. Don't have those statistics, but I'm sure you can find it online. What they don't tell you is that you have to be open to it helping for it to help. You can't go into it with a mental block, thinking it won't help at all. That's usually what happens. For some people they have to have CBT + medication.

It's not magical. It's a lot of work. It takes a really long time when the anxiety is a full-on disorder.
It does work though. People just generally don't let it. Some psychologists/therapists are really fucking bad at it and bad at working with patients and some are really good. But that's the thing. CBT is hardly something you can just do on your own unless you understand how to work with people, psychologically to be able to work with yourself that way.

You usually need a professional, and you usually need to be in the mindset to help yourself or get help in the first place. Otherwise, why even bother?

I suffer from a few anxiety disorders, including PTSD, and it's been a really slow annoying, really painful process but you really have to just force yourself through it. Since the chemicals in our brain are working against us, we have to find ways to cope. That's essentially CBT - coping mechanisms worked through with you with a professional.

If it doesn't work on its own, you could work with a psychiatrist AND a psychotherapist and work on coping mechanisms while on stabilizing medications. That's usually the preferred method, anyway.

Well I mean.. I'm not unwilling, I WANT it to help. and I'm not looking at it from a skeptical standpoint at all, I took psychology in College :P
Just from past experiences with therapists, "talking" hasn't helped.
And I'm already well aware that the way I'm thinking is irrational and unhelpful - that doesn't stop the anxiety still being there though. 50% of the time there's not even a trigger :s
And from the research I've done, I don't see/understand how being told what I already know will help - That's the thing

Being aware is like 10% of the process xD
I'm aware of most of my triggers, but as you said, that isn't exactly the final solution.
And with anxiety disorders (I took psychology too, love researching it, it's one of my favourite subjects so yay!), the only trigger sometimes is just an imbalance of chemicals.

It's not enough to be aware of anything (though telling yourself that the way you're thinking is irrational and unhelpful doesn't help - it isn't something you chose to do, you really aren't responsible for it), you have to be aware and you have to thought police yourself. And be consistent about it. It's hard but effective.

Venting about my issues doesn't really help me much, so I have to really explicitly ask my psychologist what to do. How do I help myself? What can I do? I've tried seemingly everything.

If they don't know, I move on to someone else. Try to find someone who specializes in anxiety disorders and actual CBT instead of just talking through it.

Venting doesn't help me much either, If there's a trigger for it - It tends to be rooted in my own insecurities, and as I've been cheated on before by past partners, my conviction that I'm going to be "left", and talking about it, and getting reassurance from my partner helps that, but aside from that the only real help is distractions.

Thing is, it all started last year when I'd finally had enough of being unable to talk to strangers, like people who work in banks when I needed to sort out my finances, for example.
I was almost scared of talking to people. Still am tbh, and I tried getting help, I asked if over the phone sessions could work and she said, as she thought I had "social anxiety" or whatever, that she thought it would, yes, but after like.. 3 phonecalls, she kept trying to get me to come in. and like.. I have a FEAR of talking to people I don't know, going places I don't know, doing things for the first time by myself, I literally CAN'T come in, and it got to a point where she just wasn't listening, so I stopped having sessions. Just wasn't helping. Since then the talking to people thing, if anything has gotten a tiiiiny bit better, I've been trying to push myself more and my partner's been supportive as hell.

But that same feeling's now bled into just regular daily life, and I worry that if I go back, they're just going to try and do the same shit, and it's not going to help. And then because I still have that fear of people and situations I'm unfamiliar with, I'd be too scared to tell anyone what to do with me - If that makes any sense?

It's like you say, I can't help feeling the way I'm feeling, and talking about it with people I *know* doesn't help, talking about it with a stranger certainly bloody won't - You know?