Generalized Anxiety Disorder

What is Generalized Anxiety Disorder?
Generalized anxiety disorder is a disorder that is characterized by persistent feelings of
anxiety and worry. The worry is typically out of proportion to the actual circumstances, it
exists through most areas of a person’s day-to-day life, and is experienced as difficult to
control. The anxiety and worry is described as generalized, as the content of the worry
can cover a number of different events or circumstances, and the physical symptoms of
anxiety are not specific and are part of a normal response to threat.
Individuals with generalized anxiety disorder describe themselves as sensitive by nature
and their tendency to worry has usually existed since childhood or early adolescence.
The symptoms of anxiety typically experienced by individuals with generalized anxiety
disorder are
· feeling restless, keyed up, or on edge
· being easily tired
· having difficulty concentrating, or having your mind going blank
· feeling irritable
· having tense, tight or sore muscles
· having difficulty sleeping; either difficulty falling or staying asleep, or restless
unsatisfying sleep.
Generalized anxiety disorder is one of the more common anxiety disorders in the
community. A recent Australian survey has suggested that, in a 12 month period, 3 in 100
people will have a generalized anxiety disorder.
Generalized anxiety disorder and everyday worry.
Everybody worries or gets anxious at some time in their lives. The worry in generalized
anxiety disorder is identical in nature to that experienced by anybody else, but it tends to
be out of proportion, pervasive, and difficult to control, unlike the worry most people
experience. Hence it significantly interferes with an individual’s functioning. The
constant anxiety-provoking thinking and the accompanying physical symptoms of
anxiety can be disabling, particularly if experienced over a long period of time.
Another feature of generalized anxiety disorder is that it has usually been present for
much of an individual’s life. From time to time, people may become unusually stressed,
because of a physical illness or a life event such as divorce, bereavement, or loss (or
threat of loss) of employment. During these times people may worry and become
significantly more anxious, but after the stress resolves, the person can usually return to
their usual functioning. This is not generalized anxiety disorder, but a temporary period
of difficulty adjusting to stress.
Medication
You may be taking medication to help you cope with anxiety. If you are taking
medication, you may need to talk about the issues discussed below with your therapist.
Antidepressant medication
Many of the medications that are useful to treat a depressive disorder are also useful to
help control anxiety. If your doctor has prescribed you this type of medication,
particularly if you have been depressed, it is important that you continue to take the
medication for several months, and only stop taking it in consultation with your doctor.
This medication typically has few side-effects, it is safe, and will not cause you to build
up tolerance or become dependent.
When you are ready to stop this medication (usually after you have been feeling calm and
in control for a number of months), it is very unlikely that you will experience a relapse
of your anxiety if you have been able to learn and put into practice the strategies taught
on this programme.
Sedatives, tranquilizers and sleeping pills.
This class of medication is the benzodiazepines. They dampen the feelings of anxiety
very effectively, but also produce the following problems:
· they can interfere with thinking and your ability to remember new information;
· they can make you feel drowsy and sleepy;
· they can interfere with your natural sleep cycle and rhythms;
· they can produce tolerance, so that you might need bigger and bigger doses for the
same effect;
· they can produce dependence, so that you come to rely on them and experience an
increase in anxiety without them;