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Anxiety
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By Barbara Hey
Who hasn’t felt it? Anxiety, that unremitting voice in your head warning that something is wrong—or will be wrong very soon. A voice that sets your nervous system aflutter.
The thoughts evoking such unease can be specific, from concerns over avian flu to rodents or finances, but the feeling commonly gets disconnected from the trigger and spirals away into a universe of its own making. When this happens you whirl into worry after worry after worry. For some, such anxiety comes and goes. But for others, this pernicious condition can cast a shadow over day-to-day activities, well being and, yes, even health. That’s when anxiety becomes a “disorder.”
There is no one-size-fits-all definition of anxiety disorder. However, all types of anxiety do appear to have a strong genetic component, exacerbated by life events, trauma and stress. Those with anxiety most likely suffer from several different manifestations and are also at increased risk of depression.
The different manifestations run the gamut from a generalized anxiety disorder (GAD, characterized by relentless, often unspecified worry) to social anxiety disorder (excessive self-consciousness and fear of social situations), phobias (an intense fear of something that, in fact, poses no danger), post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD, debilitating fear that arises after a terrifying event), obsessive-compulsive disorder (OCD, recurring, persistent thoughts, images and impulses that manifest in repetitive behaviors) and panic disorder (sudden overwhelming feelings of terror, accompanied by intense physical symptoms).
If you suffer from any of these or know someone who does, take heart. A variety of techniques, some simple and others more involved, can bring a greater sense of peace to your life.
It also may help to know you’re not alone. Statistics from the National Institute of Mental Health (NIMH) show some 19 million Americans suffer from anxiety disorders right along with you, making it the most prevalent psychiatric complaint, according to psychotherapist Jerilyn Ross, president of the Anxiety Disorders Association of America and director of The Ross Center for Anxiety and Related Disorders in Washington. Yet only a third of those who suffer seek treatment, she says. She adds that of the millions who wrestle with anxiety disorders, women outnumber men two-to-one, and 10 percent of sufferers are children.
When is worry worrisome?
How do you know you have an anxiety disorder? Give yourself six months. If, after this amount of time, you still regularly wrestle with such symptoms as excessive worry, undue panic, negative thinking or endless obsessing over the “what ifs” of life, or their possible dire outcomes, chances are you have an anxiety disorder. It doesn’t much matter what you worry about. It could be a specific problem, or it could just be an amorphous feeling—what you might call the free-floating variety. All this stress wreaks havoc by catapulting you into the ...
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