The 0–100 scale
The SUDS scale, tracked against the thing that caused it
SUDS stands for Subjective Units of Distress: a 0 to 100 rating of how bad you feel right now, on a scale you set. It’s one of the oldest and simplest tools in anxiety work, and it’s still mostly handed out on paper.
What the numbers mean
There’s no official wording for each point, and that’s on purpose. SUDS is subjective by design: a 70 means whatever 70 means to you. It only has to stay consistent with your other numbers. These anchors are a starting point, not a rulebook.
- 0
Completely calm
No distress at all. Most people only hit this asleep or genuinely absorbed in something.
- 25
Mild, manageable
You notice it. It isn't changing what you do, and you could still concentrate if you needed to.
- 50
Uncomfortable
Clearly there. Your attention keeps drifting back to it, and it's starting to shape your choices.
- 75
Very distressed
Hard to think about much else. Your body is in it now: heart rate, stomach, shallow breathing.
- 100
The worst you can imagine
Your personal ceiling. It's meant to be your own worst, not a universal one.
Why one rating is almost useless
One SUDS score is a thermometer reading with no chart. It says today was a 60. It can’t say whether 60 is high for you, whether the thing you dreaded came in under what you expected, or whether the same situation is getting easier over months.
What makes the scale worth anything is the series: same person, same scale, same kind of situation, over time. That’s exactly what paper is worst at. Sheets go missing, get filled in from memory days later, and never add up to a line you can look at.
Recall is the specific problem
Rating a Tuesday meeting on Friday isn’t a measurement of Tuesday. It’s a measurement of how Tuesday feels to remember, which is a different and usually calmer thing. Ratings taken close to the moment are the only ones worth plotting, so the tool has to live somewhere you already are.
Three ratings, one event
Meloa attaches SUDS to real, dated things on your calendar, not a floating daily prompt. It asks at three points:
T−1
Before
How bad you expect it to be, rated while the dread is actually there, not in hindsight.
T0
During
An in-the-moment reading, if you want one. Optional, and skipping it costs nothing.
T+1
After
How it actually went, once it's over. This is the half almost nobody does, and it's the half that makes the record mean something.
Because the before and after belong to the same event, you can compare them. Do it a few times and you get something one score never gives you: how far your own guess runs from your own outcome. The gap is yours to see, in your own numbers. More on why that gap exists.
If you’re working with a therapist
Each check-in can optionally split into four parts, 0–25 each: your body, your thoughts, the anticipation, and your nervous system. That way a flat 70 can be read as a body-led 70 or a rumination-led 70. Short baseline check-ins, adapted from the GAD-7 and PHQ-9 or written for Meloa, sit alongside them. Each one can be skipped, and a skipped one is recorded as not taken, never as a zero. A question you didn’t answer can’t be read back as your calmest day.
None of it is visible to anyone but you unless you export it. To bring it to a session, you make a PDF and hand it over. What that report contains.
What this is not
Meloa records what you tell it. It doesn’t diagnose, doesn’t treat, isn’t a medical device, and isn’t exposure therapy. SUDS is used in therapies like that, but on its own the scale is just a way to write down how you feel. If you’re using this alongside treatment, your clinician decides what the numbers mean.
Start a SUDS record that adds up to something.
Free to use, every day — no card, ever.
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