Anxiety Facts Not Myths
Wednesday, October 7th, 2009Sometimes people can feel anxious about their everyday lives and certain events. There are different kinds of anxiety disorders that people can get. Panic disorders are episodes of fear that strike often and sometimes without any warning.
If you are suffering from shortness of breath, chest pains, dizziness and have a ongoing fear of death and levels of distress that are higher than your friends or associates then there is a good chance you are having a anxiety attack. The best known anxiety disorder is post traumatic stress disorder, it used to be solely associated with soldiers who have returned home from war, that is changing over time.
Do you flush your toilet 10 times in a row? Or maybe you have to get up every hour to check that your windows and doors are still locked? If you recognize either of these behaviors or maybe you do something similar then there is a good chance that you suffer from Obsessive compulsive disorder.
Phobias and anxiety often come hand in hand, you could be suffering from either a social phobia or a specific phobia. Social phobia is harder to deal with, when you have specific phobia you are phobic of one thing , spiders for example, so you avoid them. Social phobia can cause you to avoid every social situation.
You probably don’t even take any notice of most things in your daily routine, if you suffered from a generalized anxiety disorder every change in your routine would upset you. You would worry about every step of your day and that anxiety would show itself as fatigue, tension, nausea and probably headaches as well.
People with anxiety will often wait months before going to see their Dr and when they do see a Dr the first step is often medication. A mixture of therapy and medication will usually be offered as a solution by your Dr.
Antidepressants and benzodiazepines are two of the most commonly prescribed drugs for anyone who suffers from anxiety. Your Dr will try one then the other, make sure you let him know about any other medications you may be on before you start any medication.
When we talk about using therapy to treat anxiety we normally mean either behavioral therapy or cognitive behavior therapy, they focus on changing your actions and will try and stop the behaviors that are unwanted from happening.
Understanding your thinking and why you act in certain ways will help you change the way you think and act in certain situations. That is exactly what behavioral therapy does for you.