Generalized Anxiety Disorder – guest blog – Dr. David Adams, PhD, AABP

‘Second to the fear of death, many individuals have a fear of public speaking.’ Overcompensating for this fear makes some of our best lecturers, comedians or debaters.

The fear of eating, talking and other social activities is referred to as a Social Anxiety Disorder or Social Phobia. The inability to speak in some situations but not in others is referred to as Selective Mutism.

Panic Disorder is an abrupt surge in several anxiety symptoms with a range of upsetting physical symptoms such as sweating, trembling, chest pain, nausea, dizziness, feelings of detachment and/or feelings that things have become unreal.

Agoraphobia is an anxiety disorder with which many are familiar. It involves the fear of being away from home, being in a crowd alone, being in public transportation, being in open spaces or confining spaces. The fear is based partially upon the concern that there will be no one there to help them, and the fear is out of proportion to the actual danger.

One group of anxiety disorders are Specific Phobias. The variety of specific phobias is seemingly endless. What distinguishes this from brief moments of anxiety?  The specific phobia controls behavior and limits a person’s choices, activities and quality of relationships and career.

Generalized Anxiety Disorder – uncontrollable worry, apprehension and negative expectation. The person is restless, irritable, tense, cannot relax, cannot concentrate and sleeps poorly.

The person with Generalized Anxiety Disorder will anticipate the worst and are difficult to reassure. Threats or injury makes them miserable and simply erodes the quality of life.