Anxiety is a normal emotional response that we all feel when we are faced with stress, danger, or difficulty. However, if anxiety is excessive, persistent, or unreasonable, it may affect our quality of life and health. At this time, we may suffer from anxiety disorders.
Anxiety disorder is a mental illness that comes in many different types and manifestations. According to statistics in the United States, 28% of people will experience some form of anxiety disorder in their lifetime, which means that almost one in three people will suffer from anxiety disorder. So, what are the types of anxiety disorders? What are their symptoms? Let’s take a look.
1. Generalized Anxiety Disorder
This is the most common form of anxiety disorder, which is characterized by excessive worry and tension about various things in daily life, such as family, work, money, etc. Patients often cannot control their worries and cannot correctly assess the severity of the situation.
The main symptoms of generalized anxiety disorder are:
- Feeling constantly worried or scared
- Shortness of breath or wheezing
- Difficulty sleeping or insomnia
- Difficulty concentrating or memory loss
- Stomach upset or indigestion
Generalized anxiety disorder makes people feel disoriented and unable to relax.
2. Social Anxiety Disorder
This is another common anxiety disorder, also called social phobia. It is characterized by extreme fear and nervousness about social situations or public performance, and worry about being judged, ridiculed, or rejected by others. Severe social anxiety disorder can lead to panic attacks.
The main symptoms of social anxiety disorder are:
- Rapid heartbeat or palpitation
- Nausea or vomiting
- Sweating or shivering
Social anxiety disorder makes people feel low self-esteem and isolated.
3. Obsessive-compulsive disorder
This is a special type of anxiety disorder characterized by recurring obsessive thoughts or behaviors. Obsessive thoughts refer to meaningless, irrational, or disturbing thoughts, such as worries that you will be harmed, contaminated, or offended by others. Compulsive behavior refers to some repetitive, stereotyped or useless actions taken to relieve the anxiety caused by obsessive thoughts, such as repeatedly checking, cleaning or organizing.
The main symptoms of obsessive-compulsive disorder are:
- Inability to escape or control obsessive thoughts
- Engaging in compulsive behaviors to relieve anxiety
- Compulsive behaviors take up a lot of time and energy
- Compulsive behavior does not solve problems or bring satisfaction
Obsessive-compulsive disorder makes people feel troubled and helpless.
4. Post-traumatic stress disorder
This is an anxiety disorder caused by experiencing or witnessing extremely frightening or dangerous events, such as natural disasters, serious accidents, violent attacks, war, death of a loved one, etc. These events can cause profound psychological trauma and lead to various abnormal reactions in patients afterwards.
The main symptoms of post-traumatic stress disorder are:
- Repeated recall or re-experience of traumatic events, such as nightmares, flashbacks or emotional triggers, etc.
- Avoidance or aversion to people, places, objects or situations related to traumatic events, such as unwillingness to talk about, think about or come into contact with, etc.
- Becoming overly sensitive or alert to external circumstances, such as difficulty sleeping, concentrating, mood swings, or irritability, etc.
Post-traumatic stress disorder leaves people feeling miserable and helpless.
In addition to the above four types, there are also some specific phobias, which refer to irrational fear and avoidance of certain objects or situations, such as fear of heights, fear of flying, fear of insects, etc. Although these phobias are not life-threatening, they can seriously affect daily life and work.
There are certain reasons for the occurrence of these anxiety disorders, which may be related to genetic, personality, psychological, social and other factors. Different types of anxiety disorders also vary in severity and duration. Some severe anxiety disorders require medication to control abnormal activity in the nervous system and thereby reduce anxiety.
Do you suffer from anxiety?
If you’re wondering whether you have an anxiety disorder, the Anxiety and Depression Association of America has a chart (see chart below) that can help you differentiate between normal anxiety and clinical anxiety (anxiety disorder).
| Daily Anxiety | Anxiety Disorder |
|---|---|
| Worry about some difficulties or setbacks you may encounter in life, such as not being able to pay bills, not being able to find a job, breaking up, etc. | Continuous worry about some unfounded or irrational things seriously affects the quality of life and health. |
| Feeling uncomfortable or embarrassed in social situations or in public. | Extreme fear or avoidance of social or public situations for fear of being criticized, ridiculed, or ostracized by others. |
| Feeling nervous or sweating before an important test, presentation, performance, or other stressful event. | Having a panic attack for no apparent reason, feeling extremely frightened or upset, and worrying about it happening again. |
| Feeling afraid of dangerous objects or situations. | Feeling irrational fear of some objects or situations that pose no or little danger, and trying to avoid contact with them. |
| After experiencing some traumatic event, there will be a period of time when you feel anxious, sad, or have insomnia. | After experiencing some traumatic events, they will repeatedly recall or re-experience the traumatic events for a long time, avoid or aversion to the people, places, objects or situations related to the trauma, and become overly sensitive or vigilant to the external environment. |
If you find that you have characteristics of an anxiety disorder listed in the table above, you may want to seek professional help. Anxiety disorders can be cured. As long as you identify and face your problems in a timely manner, and find appropriate treatments and support resources, you can get rid of anxiety disorders and regain happiness and confidence.
Of course, not everyone needs medication. Some people can improve their mood and behavior through psychological counseling, relaxation training, behavioral therapy, etc. You can also reduce your anxiety through some self-management methods, such as:
- Keep exercising. Exercise can release tension and stress in the body, and it can also enhance physical fitness and immunity.
- Maintain good sleep habits. Sleep is the foundation of physical and mental health. Lack of sleep can exacerbate anxiety and depression.
- Cultivating hobbies and doing things that make you feel happy and satisfied can divert your attention and improve your sense of self-worth.
- Establish good interpersonal relationships, communicate more with family, friends, colleagues, etc., seek their understanding and support, and provide them with help and care.
- Learn to think positively and face challenges and difficulties in life with a positive and optimistic attitude. Don’t worry too much about the future or regret the past, but live in the present and cherish every day.
Anxiety is an emotion that can be controlled and changed, just like our brain, which is amazingly malleable. Through learning and practice, we can make ourselves more effective in dealing with stress and difficulties, instead of being swayed by anxiety, but actively controlling anxiety.
**Do you want to know how anxious you are? **
If you want to test your anxiety level, you can click here to take a free mental health test: Self-Rating Mood Scale/Depression-Anxiety-Stress Scale (DASS-21) Online Assessment. This is a simple and scientific scale that can help you understand your level and type of anxiety, and can also serve as a reference for you to seek professional help.
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