It’s normal to feel anxious. Students are naturally concerned about their grades, employees are concerned about their business performance, managers are concerned about their profit goals, and parents are naturally concerned about their children. Everyone is also generally concerned about medical issues, debt, death, and relationship issues.
However, if the anxious feelings do not go away, you constantly feel troubled and bothered, panic attacks occur, and the anxiety and anxiety worsen over time, then it is time to see a doctor. anxiety therapist. Pervasive, unrelenting feelings of agitation may indicate an anxiety disorder.
If you have an anxiety disorder, it is essential to consult a professional. They will diagnose your condition and prescribe a combination of medications, therapies, or strategies to help you feel better.
What is an anxiety disorder?
The American Psychiatric Association states that an anxiety disorder is age-inappropriate or disproportionate anxiety or fear that interferes with a person’s ability to function normally.
There are several types of anxiety disorders. They include:
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Generalized Anxiety Disorder: Generalized anxiety disorder (GAD) refers to constant and excessive worrying. Anxiety can center around anything from work, family, relationships, health issues, and more. However, anxiety is disproportionate, persistent, pervasive, persistent (and may intensify over time), and interferes with daily life.
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Social Anxiety Disorder: An intense and disproportionate fear of being humiliated, embarrassed, looked down upon, or rejected is social anxiety disorder (SAD). As a result, people with social anxiety avoid social situations where they might experience these things.
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Panic disorder: Panic disorder refers to experiencing frequent panic attacks that manifest as an intense fear of death or loss of control and physical symptoms such as palpitations, chills, hot flashes, cold sweats, shortness of breath, suffocation, and chest pain. Masu.
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Phobias: Phobias refer to anxiety caused by specific triggers. Examples include acrophobia (fear of heights), aerophobia (fear of flying), agoraphobia (fear of being overwhelmed with no escape), and trypophobia (fear of repetitive patterns or small holes). fear of gatherings).
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Separation Anxiety Disorder: Separation anxiety disorder is an exaggerated, age-appropriate fear of separation from someone to whom you feel overly attached.
Treatment of anxiety disorders
Anxiety disorders are one of the most common mental health conditions in the world, affecting an estimated 4% of the world’s population, and women are more susceptible to anxiety disorders than men. Unfortunately, only one in four people diagnosed with the disease receive treatment.
The good news is that there are highly effective treatments for anxiety disorders. These treatments include:
psychotherapy
Psychotherapy is a mainstream management strategy for mental disorders, including anxiety disorders. This is called talk therapy because the patient speaks with a psychologist, psychiatrist, or other licensed psychotherapy provider.
Cognitive behavioral therapy is an example of talk therapy used to manage anxiety disorders. The underlying premise is that how people learn, think, and store information directly influences how they feel and behave. Therefore, the anxiety that is the effect may be resolved by addressing the perspectives and assumptions that are the cause.
After uncovering how you view and process information and events, you and your therapist can work together to address deficiencies in your cognitive framework. Ultimately, this changes your attitude, behavior, behavior, and response to stimuli.
Additionally, your therapist may introduce you to techniques that you can use as a coping mechanism. These are breathing and relaxation exercises you can do whenever you feel a panic attack.
medicine
Medication may also be used in conjunction with treatment. They primarily work by reducing the sensation of intensity or keeping the symptoms caused by anxiety tolerable or under control.
Benzodiazepines are effective in relieving anxiety relatively quickly. However, people can build up a tolerance to them, which can make them less effective over time. It can also lead to addiction, which can lead to many other problems.
Beta blockers are another option. Physical symptoms of anxiety (palpitations, tremors, tremors, etc.) can be resolved. These will not only provide immediate symptom relief, but also, in your case, the onset of uncontrollable anxiety symptoms in situations that typically trigger anxiety symptoms (e.g., speaking in public, riding public transport, etc.) Prevent.
Neurofeedback therapy for anxiety
Neurofeedback therapy is another potential strategy for managing anxiety. It’s called brain training therapy. This involves training the brain to suppress unwanted brainwave patterns, including those associated with anxiety disorders.
What is neurofeedback therapy?
Neurofeedback therapy is a biofeedback technique. This involves actively monitoring and tracking your brain waves and providing your brain with instant feedback about this brain activity.
The underlying assumption is that the brain has sufficient power to self-regulate. So, if it is recognized that you are exhibiting undesirable brainwave patterns (e.g. those associated with anxiety), you can actively manage and control these patterns and change them to more desirable ones (e.g. those associated with calmness and relaxation). brain waves).
This is why neurofeedback therapy requires multiple sessions. Continuous and regular practice strengthens the brain’s self-regulatory ability.
How does it work?
Brain mapping is done first. This creates a baseline and tags and records your brain waves to identify potential problems. After your brain mapping session, your therapist will schedule a neurofeedback session.
For a neurofeedback session, you put on your headphones and sit in a comfortable chair in front of the television. The movie or show will play on the TV.
Electroencephalogram (EEG) electrodes are attached to the scalp. These EEG electrodes send brain activity data to a computer program that instantly “reads” it. Negative brain waves recorded by your computer cause a decrease in the audio-video quality of the movies and shows you are watching. When the brain waves return to good or neutral, audio-video quality is restored.
Therefore, neurofeedback therapy simply tells the brain when negative brain activity is occurring and vice versa. Repeated cycles of audio-video quality degradation and recovery allow the brain to distinguish between desirable and undesirable brainwave phases, allowing the brain to become more aware of its own activity, and eventually They are trained to control themselves.
Over time, after multiple neurofeedback sessions, the brain learns to react faster and control its activity better. Ultimately, this will make you feel less anxious and your anxiety attacks will be less frequent and less symptomatic.
Anxiety disorders are treatable
Anxiety disorders are common, but about three-quarters of people diagnosed with them go untreated. This is unfortunate because anxiety can be treated with psychotherapy, medication, and neurofeedback therapy, and its symptoms can also be managed.
