Anxiety Disorders Generalised Anxiety Disorder

Frequent and intense stress can negatively impact the quality of life. Trauma can lead to General Anxiety Disorder (GAD), which is characterized by excessive worry, tension, panic attacks, and difficulty completing tasks. GAD is often accompanied by symptoms like depression, restlessness, difficulty concentrating, muscle tension, and insomnia. If you experience these symptoms, it's important to see a doctor for an evaluation.

Social Coping Strategies for GAD

Social support is an essential part of dealing with a mental health condition like generalized anxiety disorder. For some people, social coping strategies can help manage symptoms, overcome fear, and even improve social life for an overall better quality of life. Effective options include the following.

If you have General Anxiety Disorder (GAD), Hypnotherapy can be used as an effective complement to conventional treatments involving psychotherapy.

Generalized anxiety disorder (GAD) is a chronic state of severe worry and tension, often without provocation. Those with GAD regularly anticipate disaster, often worrying excessively about health, money, family, or work. Merely getting through the day brings on anxiety.

People with GAD can't shake their concerns, even though they usually realize that much of their anxiety is unwarranted. People with GAD may be unable to relax and often have trouble falling or staying asleep. Their worries are accompanied by physical symptoms such as trembling, twitching, muscle tension, headaches, irritability, sweating, hot flashes, and feeling lightheaded or out of breath.

Many individuals with GAD startle easily. They tend to feel tired, have trouble concentrating, and may suffer from depression. GAD may involve nausea, frequent trips to the bathroom, or feeling like there is a lump in the throat.

When their anxiety level is mild, people with GAD can function socially and hold down a job, but may have difficulty carrying out the simplest of daily activities if their anxiety is severe.

GAD affects about 6.8 million American adults; women are twice as likely as men to be afflicted. The disorder can begin at any point in the life cycle but usually develops between childhood and middle age. The prevalence of the diagnosis peaks in middle age and decreases across the later years of life.

Other anxiety disorders, depression, or substance use disorder often accompany GAD. GAD is commonly treated with cognitive-behavioural therapy, but co-occurring conditions must also be treated using the appropriate therapies.

Causes of Anxiety

• Over activity in certain areas of the brain

• Imbalance in brain chemistry

• Genetics

• Traumatic experiences or dealing with death or life changes

• Long-term health conditions and chronic pain

• Substance abuse and addictions

Generalised Anxiety Disorder Symptoms

Not everyone will experience the same symptoms but generally symptoms of anxiety can include the following.

• Feeling restless

• Panic or worry

• Feeling the need to escape

• Difficulty concentrating

• Irritability

• Avoiding social contact and work

• Low self-esteem

Anxiety Triggers

The triggers of anxiety will be different from person to person. Some people will experience anxiety almost constantly, whilst others will have more defined anxiety attacks. Some people may know what their triggers are, especially if the anxiety is linked to a specific event or phobia. Whereas other people will experience anxiety attacks seemingly at random.

Anxiety treatments may be able to help you pinpoint your triggers, understand the causes or desensitise you to them so you can live your live more freely.

Anxiety Attacks

The term anxiety attack is difficult to define and can be used for a burst of anxiety symptoms, or as another term for a panic attack. Panic attacks are a symptom of panic disorder and can be very severe.

Anxiety and Depression

Depression and anxiety commonly occur together. Anxiety can occur as a symptom of depression or depression can be triggered by the hopelessness of an anxiety disorder. Many anxiety treatment options will also be effective for depression. Both conditions may also have the same underlying causes.

Anxiety and Sleep

It’s almost impossible to sleep when you are anxious. The physical state of anxiety is designed to help you escape a perceived danger and going to sleep would be in direct contradiction to this. Sleep deprivation inevitably makes anxiety worse, starting a negative cycle of anxiety and sleep disorders.

Anxiety and Phobias

Anxiety is often a symptom of a phobia. If you feel like you know what triggers your anxiety it may be that you have a phobia around that situation or object. Even if you aren’t sure of the triggers, it may be that there’s an underlying phobia you aren’t fully aware of.

Social Anxiety

Social anxiety disorder or social phobias are becoming more and more common. They involve fear and anxiety surrounding social situations. It’s more than feeling shy or experiencing blushing, it can have a huge impact on your relationships, friendships, work life and general wellbeing.

Getting Help For Generalised Anxiety Disorder

It is important to get help for anxiety if you feel like it is becoming a problem. Anxiety is supposed to be a short-term state for the body. It is designed to help us get through a high-pressure situation. But this ‘fight, flight or freeze’ response isn’t designed to go on long term. It’s too much for the body to handle.

Using a variety of therapeutic techniques with the integration of hypnotherapy and psychotherapy offers a successful way to identify and understand anxiety fear response patterns and behavioural traits that might be causing and maintaining the client's anxious thought process. Cognitive Hypnotherapy identify negative thinking patterns and providing important management tools and skills. Through hypnotherapy, we can help you manage unhelpful patterns and stressful situations more calmly. We work with an integrative approach to change automatic responses from phobia triggers, to thinking, feeling and behaving differently so that you remain relaxed in situations that would typically trigger fear.