The following are some of the more common types of anxiety conditions:
- Generalized (24/7) anxiety
- Panic attacks
- Social anxiety
- Depersonalization
- Obsessive compulsive disorder (OCD)
- Health anxiety
- Phobias
- Behavioral, e.g. blushing, sweating, tics
All of these have the same underlying thought patterns, and so will respond to application of the Acceptance Method. This approach to recovery changes the way we think about and react to anxiety through acceptance. It doesn’t matter which of these types of anxiety we experience. To recover, the same approach applies to all of them.
Generalized (24/7) Anxiety
When we suffer from generalized anxiety, we experience almost constant and exaggerated worry that is often not linked to anything specific. We tend to anticipate disaster in situations without any obvious reason to do so. We react with exaggerated anxiety to everyday events.
Our bodies are in an almost constant state of alert. They pump out steady amounts of adrenaline to keep us ready to deal with the imagined impending disaster. Feeling anxious has become a habit, to the extent that ironically we can be uncomfortable when we are feeling peaceful.
We can maintain this state of generalized anxiousness almost indefinitely (I did it for over 30 years), but it is exhausting and makes us prone to depression. It can cause memory and concentration issues, and can lead to health worries, digestive issues, sleep problems etc.
Panic Attacks
Panic attacks follow the same pattern as generalized anxiety, except that we react to the anxiety symptoms with much greater levels of fear. This triggers a very high adrenaline release, which causes even stronger symptoms and more intense fear. This has the effect of further ramping up the adrenaline release, causing more fear, more adrenaline, more fear, more adrenaline etc. This happens very quickly (in seconds) and our anxiety spirals out of control leading quickly to extreme panic (a classic panic attack).
Physical symptoms can include feeling faint, dizzy, shaking, short of breath, heart palpitations. these may be accompanied by feeling dissociated from reality, fearing impending disaster, and thinking we are going to have a heart attack, a stroke, lose complete control, go crazy, or die.
These symptoms are at peak intensity for usually no more than a few minutes, though the after-effects can linger for a while. They diminish because the body cannot manufacture adrenaline at the rate required to keep a panic attack going, so it uses up it’s store of adrenaline, and then the attack fades.
While certain situations may be more likely to trigger a panic attack, they can happen seemingly out of the blue. The intensity and unpleasantness of the attack can cause a mortal fear of the next one, and this can lead to generalized anxiety and avoidance behavior.
We may fear driving on freeways, traveling beyond a certain range from home, going in elevators etc., where help might not be readily available. We may prefer to have a “safe” person with us, and always need to know where the nearest help is, and that we can get to a hospital quickly if necessary. Alternatively we may become fearful of groups of people because we fear having a panic attack and losing control in front of others. In the extreme we may become confined to our home, bedroom or even our bed in an effort to feel safe.
Social Anxiety
Social anxiety is very common indeed. To most non-sufferers it can seem a very trivial issue, and may be only annoying to those that have mild social anxiety. When severe, however, it can become an all-consuming issue, drastically diminishing the quality of our life,. It can also be experienced in conjunction with other anxiety types.
The primary mechanism behind social anxiety is shame and low self esteem. We feel so ashamed of ourselves, believing we fall so far short of being “normal” that we fear showing our true selves to others. We have bought in to the idea that we are broken, flawed or inadequate, and beat ourselves up for it regularly.
To cope with this anxiety we avoid social situations, or go through them full of tension, fearful of becoming the center of attention. We may try to stay in the background, hoping to get through without any embarrassing incidents. When we do have to interact with others we struggle because of our anxiety, possibly blushing or sweating, and then beat ourselves up afterwards for being socially awkward. This reinforces our shame, causing a cycle of anger, sadness and despair (grieving). The experience increases our fear of the next social situation.
We cannot completely avoid social interactions, especially if we work. We suffer from anticipation anxiety whenever faced with an upcoming social interaction. Then we suffer with the acute anxiety of the situation itself, followed by the self recriminations (beating ourselves up), self hatred, shame, sadness and despair.
All our efforts to control or manage our social anxiety ultimately fail. No matter how we prepare ourselves, when the time comes our reaction is so huge and outside of our control that it just seems to overwhelm us.
,The good news is that social anxiety responds to an acceptance based approach. I suffered with it my whole life (decades) and, despite how ingrained it was, I was able to fully recover from it. Now the thought of social anxiety or embarrassment doesn’t even come into my head any more. I am fully recovered. 🙂
Depersonalization
This is the feeling of being disconnected from one’s body. It is also called derealization or unreality. Sufferers of this anxiety type feel that they are “outside” of themselves, or observing themselves as though it were someone else in their body. Others may think of it as “living in a dream”. There can be an associated fear of losing control or going crazy, and possibly a fear of embarrassment from losing it in front of others.
Typical symptoms include:
- Feeling as though we are not in control of our speech or movements;
- Feeling as if we are floating in air above ourselves;
- Emotional numbness to the world around us; emotionally disconnected from friends and family;
- Distortions in our perception of our physical body, in our surroundings (colors, sizes, shapes etc.); distortions in time (e.g. the sense of how long ago an event happened);
- Surroundings that seem diminished, blurry or artificial, or that appear with a heightened intensity;
- Feeling fuzzy-headed;
- A sense that our memories may not be real.
When we feel persistent symptoms of depersonalization, it can be very disturbing and lead to even higher levels of anxiety, further increasing the feelings of detachment. This type of anxiety will also respond to the Acceptance Method.
Obsessive Compulsive Disorder (OCD)
This is a condition where we get caught in a cycle of obsessions and compulsions. Obsessions are unwanted, intrusive thoughts, images or urges that trigger intensely distressing feelings that cause us to perform repetitive behaviors. We do these in an attempt to reduce our distress or make the obsessions go away.
Even though we know the compulsive actions make no sense, we still do them. We are ashamed of them, so we don’t want to do them, and try desperately not to perform them. But the longer we resist the compulsions, the more intense the obsession to do them becomes. Our anxiety builds and builds until we can resist the compulsions no longer. We reluctantly perform them, and while this gives us some temporary relief from the anxiety, we then experience shame, sadness and despair afterwards.
The original feelings of anxiety result from our unwillingness to face thoughts and feelings that we find extremely unpleasant and disturbing. In the case of OCD this leads to powerful obsessive thoughts. These thoughts convince us if we perform certain ritual actions, this will relieve the anxious feelings. We find the feelings and the compulsive thoughts so unbearable that we give in to the compulsion to get some relief. The relief is only temporary, however, and the anxiety subsequently returns. The cycle starts over.
The Acceptance Method addresses this cycle and teaches us how to change it so that we may recover.
Health Anxiety
With health anxiety, we experience physical (or sometimes mental) symptoms that are particularly worrying to us. These may be heart palpitations, severe headaches, sore throat, itchy skin, dizziness, feelings of unreality, or something else. The variety of possible symptoms is almost endless. What is usually common is the fear that the symptom is an indication we have a serious or possibly fatal illness, or that we are about to have a heart attack or stroke, or that we are going crazy.
If we believe this fear, then we usually see the doctor to get it checked out (which is wise). Alternatively, if deep down we don’t believe it is serious, we may feel that hearing so from a doctor will reassure us, and the anxiety will go away.
The problem, however, is that any reassurance from the doctor is short-lived, and our fear of the symptom returns. Our anxiety tells us the doctor may have missed something. Even if we were tested, we may believe the results could be wrong.
Anxiety is very tricky, and does not want to let go. Even if we are able to accept a symptom, anxiety will often come up with a new symptom. It’s almost as though it is determined to make sure we continue to worry about our health. No matter how many times we get an all-clear from our doctor, we continue to worry about our health. We must break this anxiety cycle in order to recover, and this can be done with an acceptance-based approach.
Phobias
Phobias (fear of specific things) are very common for those of us that are already anxious. Our anxiety becomes associated with certain things or situations. We may fear riding in elevators, flying, driving on the highway, not getting enough air/oxygen, being in crowds of people etc. Alternatively, we may fear specific things like spiders, snakes, germs etc.
In reality, these fears become an issue when we fear the feelings that come up in response – when we fear the fear. This is not obvious to us when it is happening. We really believe it is the situation or the thing that we fear, but it is the “second fear”, the fear of the feelings of fear, that cause the anxiety to ramp up and up and spiral out of control. On top of this, we develop a mortal fear of encountering the situation or thing again. This anticipation fear keeps us anxious almost constantly.
To recover, it is necessary to interrupt this cycle and learn a new (healthier) way of responding to the anxiety. Once we are able to do this, our anxiety levels can return back to normal, and our phobias will fade away and no longer trouble us.
Behavioral
Anxiety can cause behavioral reactions like picking at our skin, biting our nails, bouncing our knee. But when it triggers behaviors such as blushing, sweating, tics etc. that cause anxiety themselves, then this can become a self-sustaining problem itself. These are characterized by the fact we cannot do them at will, or stop them when they happen.
At some point the behavior occurred and we reacted with anxiety and shame to it. From that point on, we anticipated it happening again and feared it happening again. Very quickly the behavior became entwined with our anxiety, and became the primary focus of our anxious worrying.
Blushing, sweating and tics are all associated with social anxiety and occur primarily in situations where we have to interact with others. The feelings of shame and low self worth that follow the behavior are extremely unpleasant, and are a key part of the cycle of emotions that keep the behavior in place. The anticipatory anxiety prior to social situations prompting a desire to withdraw and avoid interaction is also a key factor. It is necessary to address both aspects in order to recover.
I personally recovered from my lifelong social anxiety using the acceptance-based approach. I know exactly how it works and how to do it. The thought patterns behind tics are exactly the same, and will also respond to the method.
There are many other anxiety types not covered here, but be assured they are all caused by the same fundamental thought patterns.
Here are some myths and truths about anxiety.