man hiding because of anxiety
For people who suffer from anxiety disorders, fear is often a part of symptoms as well. It is not uncommon for people with anxiety to suffer from irrational fears. Learning that these fears have no basis is crucial, but can be difficult to achieve, especially for people who feel that they are not controlling their thoughts. What follows are some common fears experienced by people with anxiety disorders.
Common Fears
- Having a heart attack
- Having a serious illness
- Dying prematurely or suddenly
- The sudden loss of a loved one
- Going insane
- Losing control
- Snapping
- Harming yourself or a loved one
- Being embarrassed
- Fainting
- Losing your grip on reality
- Being alone
- Suffocating
- Not being able to breathe properly
An Important Note about Anxiety Symptoms
As you can see, there are a large number of symptoms that can be attributed to anxiety. One thing that medical professionals often forget to tell patients is that anxiety symptoms can be present even when a patient is not feeling anxious or having a panic attack. Even when you feel calm it is possible to experience symptoms related to your anxiety disorder, including headaches, upset stomach, pains or twitches, tingling, and even many emotional symptoms. Sometimes simply knowing this can alleviate the anxiety that can be caused when you experience these symptoms for what seems like no reason at all.
What Causes Anxiety and Anxiety Disorders?
For most people who experience severe anxiety, it can feel as though it comes out of nowhere. Anxiety can have a variety of causes, and identifying them can often be part of finding a cure or solution. In addition to root causes, anxiety also commonly has triggers. It is important to understand the difference between these two things when looking to treat an anxiety disorder. For example, while planes may trigger a fear of flying, there is often a root cause, such as the loss of a loved one in a crash or even residual emotion following in the aftermath of September 11th that causes the problem in the first place. This is actually a very common scenario for many Americans.
Essentially, there are three main causes of anxiety. These are not to be confused with triggers, of which there can be thousands. The three main causes of anxiety are brain chemistry, heredity, and life experience.
Brain Chemistry
Most psychiatric conditions are labeled as a chemical imbalance within the brain, and anxiety is no different. For many people, neurotransmitters within the brain that send out signals that control thoughts and feelings experience problems with transmission. For people with anxiety, it is often the neurotransmitters that control dopamine and serotonin. Problems with adrenaline can also create symptoms of panic and anxiety as well, and people with anxiety often demonstrate chemical imbalances with these particular chemicals.
Heredity
family
While it is certainly possible for people to experience anxiety disorders even when there are no known family members to share the diagnosis, research certainly indicates that a family history of anxiety can increase one’s predisposition to developing these disorders. There is some argument as to whether the link is purely genetic or related to being raised in an environment where role models display fear and anxiety, but there is sufficient evidence to show that, at least to some degree, genetics plays a role in the likelihood of developing an anxiety disorder.
Life Experience
There is no doubt that life experience can increase one’s likelihood of developing an anxiety disorder. People who have experienced severe emotional or physical trauma are at a much higher risk of developing panic and anxiety disorders. The same is true for people who use or abuse certain substances, including caffeine, amphetamines, alcohol, and cocaine. Exposure to prolonged or severe stress or even being raised in an environment where the display of emotions is frowned upon or not allowed can increase the chances of developing problems with anxiety and panic.
The Combination Factor
For many people, it is a combination of these factors that leads to the development of anxiety or panic. Doctors and researchers still have much more research to do in order to determine if stress and trauma creates chemical imbalance or if such imbalance simply exacerbates stress reactions, but there is no doubt that a combination of these factors can greatly increase the chances of developing anxiety problems.
What About Age and Gender?
When looking at many health and psychological conditions, it is easy to determine who is most at risk of developing the condition. For example, sickle cell anemia is a disease affecting only people of African descent, while breast cancer is certainly most common among women. Alzheimer’s disease primarily affects the aged. So what about anxiety disorders? Does age or gender play a role in the development of these conditions? Not as much as you might think. In fact, anxiety can and does affect anyone.
Determining the likelihood of anxiety based on gender is especially difficult in America due to the differences in how children are raised. For decades, males were primarily raised to show little emotion and to “be tough”. This has on one hand led to prolonged internalizing of stress, which can be a major cause of anxiety, but it has also led to a decreased willingness to seek help, which can greatly skew the diagnostic rate.
In terms of age, anxiety symptoms are spread across the board. The number of children being diagnosed with anxiety disorders is alarmingly high compared to even a few decades ago, but the rate is in line with diagnoses for adults and the elderly as well. Instead, this simply points to a greater willingness to seek help and more defined diagnostic criteria and greater awareness on the part of doctors and psychiatrists. More defined criteria make the conditions easier to recognize, diagnose, and treat at any age.
Determining the average age of diagnosis and the risk of developing an anxiety disorder based on age depends greatly on the anxiety disorder in question. Some disorders are most common among young adults, while others tend to manifest in childhood or adolescence. In the chapters that follow, we will look at the average age of onset as well as how often the disease presents in children.
Summary
Anxiety can be hard to fit into a tiny definition, as it has many symptoms and effects. Understanding how anxiety affects you means understanding the specific form of it that you have. In the next few chapters, we will examine the many forms that anxiety can take and the many anxiety disorders that can be diagnosed.