Best Gifts for Friends with Anxiety (25+ List)

This is an extensive list of gift ideas for friends with anxiety. If you are looking for the best gift for someone dealing with an anxiety disorder, you can try these options. Our list covers gifts that fall into four different categories.

What are the Best Gifts for Friends with Anxiety?

Here is a list of several things you can gift to your friends if they’re struggling with anxiety:

• Aromatherapy Heating Pad for Neck & Shoulders
• Aromatherapy Bath Bombs
• Essential Oils
• Incense
• Diffuser
• Candles
• Weighted Blanket
• Comforting Compression Socks
• Deep Tissue Massager
• Bath Kit
• Soothing Teas
• Relaxing Herbs
• Meditation Pillow
• Anxiety Workbook
• Don’t Sweat the Small Stuff by Richard Carlson
• Adult Coloring Books
• Therapy Sessions
• HemiSync
• Daylight Therapy Lamp & Clock
• Mindplace
• Healing Crystals
• Fidget Toys
• Honey Sticks
• Himalayan Pink Crystal Salt Lamp
• Muse
• Somnilight
• Motivational Prints
• White Noise Machine
• Bach Remedy Set
• Dammit Doll
• Stress Ball

Top Gift Ideas for Friends with Anxiety

Wondering what could be the best gift for your friend? Well, if your friend suffers on a daily basis due to anxiety, stress, or related issues, you’re at the right place. In this blog, we are going to describe more than 25 different gifts that will ease one’s anxiety.

Our list is split up into four categories: Aromatherapy, Instant Comfort, At-Home Therapy, and Calming Tools. Go through this list to find the best gift for your friend with anxiety:

Aromatherapy

Research shows that aromatherapy is a highly effective treatment for conditions like stress, anxiety, chronic pain, and sleep disturbances. If your friend has an anxiety disorder, it’s likely that they suffer from more than one of these conditions.

A wonderful gift idea for them is something that uses aromatherapy. We’ve collected a series of such gifts for you to choose from:

Aromatherapy Heating Pad for Neck & Shoulders

This wrap can be heated in the microwave or cooled in the fridge to suit your temperature needs. It relieves neck and shoulder tension, which are common pressure points for anxious people. Wearing this will soothe your muscles and help you feel more relaxed. 

The ultra-soft fabric feels good to the skin and can be a grounding tool. The filling contains lavender, which has a calming fragrance. Linalool is a compound found in lavender flowers that is an established anxiolytic.

Aromatherapy Bath Bombs

A bath bomb is a compacted mixture of wet and dry ingredients. It can be moulded into various shapes like the standard sphere or more fun rocket ships. When added to a bath, this will cause the water to effervesce at the surface.

Bathing with an aromatherapy bath bomb can lower stress, relieve pain, and reduce anxiety. Essential oils have shown sleep improving effects as confirmed by this 2020 publication. Gift your friend this set of relaxing bath bombs to help them feel better more often.

Essential Oils

This is a pack of four blends of essential oils pre-mixed and packaged in portable, convenient roll-on bottles. Dream is a mix that promotes better sleep, has a relaxing scent, and is made of calming ingredients. 

Fresh will lift your mood, reduce anxiety, and boost concentration. Shield will support your immune system, make your body defenses stronger, and is great for seasonal changes. Finally, Head Ease is a blend that targets the bodily symptoms of anxiety. It relieves pain, alleviates stress, and soothes sore muscles.

Incense

One of the most common techniques for aromatherapy is to use incense sticks. Here is a brilliant gift pack if you are thinking of introducing someone to aromatherapy. It comes with seven different scents meant for healing the seven chakras. 

Help someone calm their anxiety with the goodness of cedar, ylang ylang, lavender, lotus, jasmine, rose, and eucalyptus. These are all scents that either lower cortisol levels, release nervous tension, or induce sleep. This set also includes an incense stick holder.

Diffuser

Your friend will love this 5-in-1 function aromatherapy diffuser. Along with spreading therapeutic scents, it also works as a humidifier, night light, decorative item, and an oil diffuser. It has four built-in timer setting modes and seven soothing LED lights. 

The automatic power off setting makes it super convenient to use. Try it for spa treatment, yoga, work, sleep, or even for kids.

Candles

Scented candles are a quick and easy way to create a calming and romantic ambience. They usually come with stylish packaging so even when they’re unlit, they add beauty to the space they’re in. 

This is a 13-ounce decorative candle that’s available in multiple fragrances. While many of these choices are effective in reducing anxiety, we recommend the lavender vanilla scent. It will not only calm the person smelling it, but will also elevate their mood.

Instant Comfort

Gift your friend instant comfort using these effective products that help with anxiety. These are designed to make it easier for people to relax and let loose. Using them will allow your friend to take it easy for a change and forget about their immediate worries.

Try these anxiety-lowering gifts to make your friend feel calmer:

Weighted Blanket

A weighted blanket is like a regular blanket but heavier so that it can create a deep relaxing pressure. Putting on a weighted blanket can make body parts less restless and calm the person wearing it.

Mosaic is an American company that exclusively deals in weighted blankets. They offer a variety of categories for these calming blankets including cotton, washable, mink, and kid-friendly. Their range of ‘Grab Bag Weighted Lap Pads’ are ideal for such a gift.

Comforting Compression Socks

Compression socks create a gentle pressure to facilitate blood circulation and to make one feel more relaxed. These are made from premium-quality stitching and fit perfectly on your feet. You can choose between several size options and different colour combinations so that they match your taste. 

Wearing these will improve your blood flow, help you run faster, react quicker, and use less energy. These will prove quite useful for someone with chronic anxiety as they fight fatigue and assist recovery.

Deep Tissue Massager

Nothing relaxes the body quite like a deep tissue massage. Going to the spa since the pandemic started is not as easy as it once was. But you can gift your friend a massage at home using this effective massage gun. 

It is highly recommended by physiotherapists because of its high-quality performance and versatility. It comes with six different massage heads to give you just the right pressure and texture. It’s lightweight, portable, and has  an intuitive LED control.

Bath Kit

Another way to bring the spa home is this jumbo deluxe bath kit full of lavender-scented body products. It is complete with a bubble bath, bath bomb, bath salt, body scrub, shower gel, body lotion, eye mask, and a body mist. 

With this, you can gently nudge your friend to take many self-care sessions that can really help lower anxiety. All the different options tempt you to give yourself some much needed self-time. The lavender fragrance will promote relaxation and induce sleep.

Soothing Teas

Drinking a hot cup of tea can be a very relaxing experience whether you have anxiety or not. There’s something special about a hot beverage as the warmth spreads slowly throughout your body to make you feel better.

But if the tea is made of plant extracts that are known to have anxiety-busting effects, there’s nothing like it. Here is a kit of soothing herbal teas that make an excellent present.

Relaxing Herbs

There are plenty of natural herbal remedies for anxiety, stress, and sleep issues. These are over-the-counter medicines so you can actually gift them to someone who needs it. This is a set of two oral plant extracts that are non-GMO, gluten-free, and vegan. 

One of them is an anxiety-soother that contains kava and passionflower. The other helps you sleep better and is made of valerian root and passionflower. These three plants are known adaptogens and help reduce symptoms of anxiety.

Meditation Pillow

If your friend is open to trying yoga to fight chronic anxiety, this is the perfect gift for them. This meditation cushion comes with an ergonomic design that decreases back pain. Sitting on this improves posture and relaxes the mind. 

It is made of high quality, made-to-last materials with the best buckwheat hulls so the cushion will not flatten overtime. The outer layer is a removable cover that is machine washable. Use it as a floor pillow or for a chair.

At-Home Therapy

While going to a mental health professional is probably the most responsible thing you can do for mental health, there are other DIY methods too. These aren’t as effective as the real deal but can definitely help you get through the day.

When sessions seem too far down the week, turn to one of these for some at-home therapy. You can pick any of these for a good gift for someone dealing with anxiety:

Anxiety Workbook

This is the seventh edition of this book to celebrate 30 years as a classic in its field. It is a revised, updated, practical, and step-by-step guide to numerous coping techniques that lower anxiety. 

Learn how to use relaxation, exercise, nutrition, medication, and meditation to fight your anxiousness. This book also covers topics like overcoming panic, negative self-talk, mistaken beliefs, specific phobias, worry, and health-related anxiety. Dr. Bourne guides his readers on how to prevent relapses as well.

Don’t Sweat the Small Stuff by Richard Carlson

If your friend likes to read and doesn’t mind self-help books, this one will change their life. Reading this will show you how to bring changes in perspective and reduce stress or anxiety through small daily changes. 

Readers will be able to trust their intuition, something anxiety doesn’t let them do. It will guide you to shift from looking at situations as problematic to seeing them as opportunities.  You’ll learn ways to find the path to achieving your goals. 

Adult Coloring Books

Colouring books aren’t just meant for children to learn fine motor skills and develop aesthetic ability. Adults can use them too for mindfulness and recreation. The books meant for grown ups have more complex designs to fill with colour. 

They require more dexterity and finesse, which is why they take up concentration. By doing so, you lose focus of the things that were keeping you so worked up. In fact, research studies confirm that colouring books are effective in lowering anxiety.

Therapy Sessions

Did you know that you no longer have to visit the office of a therapist to get professional counselling? That’s right, therapy can now be accessed using a smart device. We’re not talking about speaking to a bot or trying fixed templates of therapy. 

These are actual human beings with the right qualifications who can be reached using therapy apps. Talkspace is one such app that connects you to professionals for therapy. You can gift your friend live video sessions or messages using video, audio, or text.

HemiSync

Hemi Sync is a large online collection of content that helps viewers relax, focus, meditate, sleep, and thrive. The content on this website is categorised based on the desired outcome. They can be guided meditation, ambient music, practical tools, and much more. Each item has a rating given by previous users from more than 50 years of service. 

These products are available in numerous European and Asian languages and cost between $10 – $100. There are some useful courses as well that can cost more than that. You can pick the ones that you think your friend will like and buy the subscription.

Daylight Therapy Lamp & Clock

Mental health professionals often recommend spending some time in daylight to improve sleep. A wake-up light alarm clock uses the same mechanism to promote healthy sleep cycles. This can be extremely useful for someone with anxiety as sleep disturbances are a common symptom.

Philips offers multiple models for wake-up light alarm clocks. Here, we’re talking about the HF3520/60, which has many smart features like tap snooze, dimmable display, and FM radio. There are 20 brightness settings and 5 natural alarm sounds.

Mindplace

MindPlace is a related product used to simulate meditation through audios and visuals. Their unique feature is the light and sound meditation that relaxes the mind and body while inducing sleep. 

The GanzFrame light glasses from MindPlace wrap your eyes in a spectrum of color spread evenly across inner space. LED lights and binaural beats create a conducive environment for you to sit back and calm your nerves. MindPlace also offers their customers a wide range of sessions and tutorials that let people optimise their meditation skills.

Side Note: I have tried and tested various products and services to help with my anxiety and depression. See my top recommendations here, as well as a full list of all products and services our team has tested for various mental health conditions and general wellness.

Calming Tools

There are a lot more objects that one can use to make themselves feel calmer. We’re going to talk about a few of those here. Try any of these to help you friend feel calmer more often:

Fidget Spinner

Fidget spinners are creative little toys that keep your anxious fingers busy. They can be a lot of fun and almost addictive because they build muscle memory. When we get better and faster at maneuvering these devices, the reward centres of the brain get activated. 

A feeling of pleasure instills in the mind and body, making it easier to overcome anxiety. This fidget spinner by Duomishu is different from the classic design and a lot more fun. Relax your anxious thought on your next flight by fidgeting with this spinner.

Muse

Muse is a brain-sensing headband meant for EEG-powered sleep tracking and meditation. The band contains receptors that record electroencephalogram waves to monitor your focus, sleep, and recovery. 

It gives you insights for sleep stage visualisation, sleep position tracking, and a personalised sleep efficiency score. It pairs with the Muse meditation app so you can take sessions and track your progress. 

Somnilight

SomniLight Light Therapy uses amber light to make it easier for the eyes to relax and sleep. In the form of glasses, amber light can block up to 99% of blue wavelengths. This in turn preserves your body’s natural levels of melatonin and allows you to sleep peacefully. 

SomniLight glasses are easy to wear, fashionable, and convenient for travel. These are available in many different designs and frames so you can pick one that matches your friend’s style.

Bach Remedy Set

Bach flower remedies were developed by Edward Bach, a homeopathic doctor from the UK. Recently, Siegler and others found that these remedies can help lower anxiety, elevate mood, and relax the mind. 

This goes to suggest that Bach remedies can be an awesome gift for someone with anxiety but further research is warranted. Here is a set with all the different flower remedies that you can give as a present.

Stress Ball

This is a pack of three balls that you can gift someone to squeeze away their stress. The unique thing about these balls is that each features a motivational message that will uplift your spirits. 

These inspirational quotes can serve as affirmations you turn to in times of duress. With every squeeze, you can look at the words to give yourself the necessary strength to deal with your challenges.

BetterHelp: A Better Alternative

Those who are seeking therapy online may also be interested in BetterHelp. BetterHelp offers plenty of formats of therapy, ranging from live chats, live audio sessions and live video sessions. In addition, unlimited messaging through texting, audio messages and even video messages are available here.

BetterHelp also offers couples therapy and therapy for teenagers in its platform. Furthermore, group sessions can also be found in this platform, covering more than twenty different topics related to mental health and mental illness. The pricing of BetterHelp is also pretty cost-effective, especially considering the fact that the platform offers financial aid to most users.

Conclusion

This was an extensive list of gift ideas for friends with anxiety. If you are looking for the best gift for someone dealing with an anxiety disorder, you can try these options. Our list covered gifts that fall into four different categories.

The first category is gifts that use aromatherapy to reduce symptoms of anxiety. Here, we talked about heating pads, bath bombs, essential oils, diffusers, and incense. Next, we described gifts of instant comfort. They included weighted blankets, compression socks, massagers, bath kits, soothing teas, relaxing herbs, and meditation pillows.

We also mentioned gifts that provide at-home therapy and various calming tools. Your friends can use these to better deal with stress, anxiety, and worry.

FAQs (Best Gifts for Friends with Anxiety)

Citations

• https://www.nimh.nih.gov/health/topics/anxiety-disorders/index.shtml