What is Anxiety?
I am sure you have heard from many people and may have also read up on it and gone through umpteen articles about what anxiety is! Ok, let’s find out what exactly it is!
Anxiety is a human emotion, well we can also say that its not only just a human emotion but it is a very common one too and we all experience it. If we do not have anxiety then we will be one emotion short.
Anxiety is a normal reaction to many different kinds of events and situations in our lives. Anxiety basically is one of our internal warning systems that alerts us to danger or other threats and prepares our bodies to fight back or get out of a dangerous situation. (Scientists call this the ‘fight, flight, or freeze’ response.)
A manageable amount of anxiety from time to time can be helpful. For example, it can motivate you to prepare for a test at school or finish a task at work. Even happy events like moving to a new home or celebrating an important milestone can bring up anxiety—all of this is just part of being human. Now let’s look at what anxiety disorder means and what exactly it is!
What is anxiety disorder?
For most people, getting anxious from time to time is just a normal and even adaptive occurrence. A normal degree of anxiety is part of the everyday human experience, as we discussed before. Unfortunately, some people may experience anxiety to such a heightened degree that it causes them a great deal of distress. Sadly, this level of anxiety can interfere with people's ability to function well. It may affect many important areas of their lives such as work, school, relationships, and so on. When anxiety reaches this level of distress, and results in impaired functioning, where you cannot function as a normal human being, we begin to speak of an anxiety disorder.
Anxiety disorder isn’t a medical term and shouldn’t be misunderstood as a medical diagnosis or disease. Anxiety disorder is a label used to describe when anxiety becomes problematic.
Each person experiences this emotion in a kind of unique way. Let’s look at the difference between Normal Anxiety and Anxiety Disorder.
Normal anxiety...
· Is related to a specific situation or problem
It could be related to a deadline at work or public speaking etc. When situation is over, the anxiety disappears.
· Lasts only as long as the situation or problem lasts
You may feel it before the event but after that it goes away and you may not feel as anxious the next time while performing the same task or when you are in the same situation
· Is proportional to the situation or problem
You may feel anxious but not to the extent where you lose control over yourself
· Is a realistic response to a realistic problem or situation
There is a real situation in the normal anxiety such as meeting the deadline, in other words it is not imaginative.
When someone experiences an anxiety disorder...
· Anxiety may come up unexpectedly, for seemingly no reason
· The anxiety response to a situation or problem may be much stronger that one would expect
· Someone may experience a lot of unrealistic anxiety, such as fear of a situation which may never happen
· Anxiety may last for a long time, even when the situation or problem has been resolved
· Anxiety may feel impossible to control or manage
· They may avoid situations or things that they believe to trigger anxiety symptoms
Yug Pal
Comments