Worry and Panic
Feeling worried or anxious is something we all experience from time to time. Worry is the natural response to stress or danger, but becomes a problem when the worry is exaggerated or out of proportion to the situation.
When worry becomes a problem, there are different ways that it can affect us. You may feel tired and tense. You may begin to avoid certain situations or find that you have problems with sleep. You may also notice that your appetite changes and you may eat more or less than you used to.
Different Types of Worry
Generalised Anxiety Disorder (GAD)
excessive and exaggerated worry about events in everyday life. If your thinking is dominated by worry and your worries are not realistic or appropriate to the situations you are in, you may be experiencing GAD.
Obsessive Compulsive Disorder (OCD)
obsessive thoughts and compulsive actions which can impact significantly on your ability to function in everyday life. People who experience OCD are often fearful of what will happen if they don't carry out their compulsive behaviours.
Shyness-Social Anxiety
a powerful fear of social situations such as meeting new people or giving a presentation at work, where you might experience feelings of embarrassment or humiliation
Panic and Panic attacks
Panic is the natural consequence of extreme anxiety, stress or fear.
Panic attacks can start without warning signs, at anytime of day, during any type of activity. The symptoms can be intense and they can include: rapid breathing, racing heart, sweating, weakness in the limbs and exhaustion, feeling sick and dry mouth. These symptoms can be very frightening. When you experience them you may think that you are loosing control, going mad or that you might die.
Self Help Strategies
One way that you may be able to help yourself overcome your worry or panic is by identifying and challenging your thoughts.
Start by writing down the thoughts that most often go through your mind when you are feeling anxious or panicky. Try to identify which of these thoughts makes you feel worse.
Once you have done this it is helpful if you try to gather evidence for and against this thought being true. When people do this they often find that they have identified more evidence against the truth of the thought. This can then help you to come up with an alternative way of thinking about an anxiety provoking situation and in turn reduce the distressing feelings you may experience at those times.
Altering the way you think can take time. It is helpful to try and remember that although your thoughts may seem very real, actually thoughts are thoughts not facts.
Another way that you may be able to help yourself begin to feel better is by facing and staying in the situations that most often cause you to feel anxious or panicky. This is called exposure. When you do this your anxiety levels will peak and then drop. By doing this you will begin to understand that nothing awful is going to happen and that anxiety will not harm you. Situations that you used to feel anxious in will no longer seem scary to you.