What is Anxiety? Understanding Anxiety and How it Works

Now imagine a very different scene. It's the dead of night, you are walking alone down a dimly-lit alley. There are doorways on either side – who knows what's hiding in them, waiting to pounce?

You are scared and all your senses are heightened. Your sight and hearing have become more sensitive, able to pinpoint the slightest movement or sound. Breathing and heartbeat are now rapid, you feel light-headed and dizzy, want to go to the toilet or throw up. Your limbs feel shaky and your whole body is now charged with energy, full of anxiety, ready to fight or flee, possibly for your life.

These two scenes represent either end of the anxiety scale. In the first we feel warm, secure and safe, we are fully relaxed. In the second we are really anxious, prepared for danger – highly alert and scared.

Anxiety protects us in 2 main ways:-

1. It helps to prepare our body for action, making us more alert and ready to fight or flee from any imminent threat to our survival. This is responsible for the direct physical sensations (such as rapid heartbeat, fast breathing, being jittery and on-edge, trembling etc.) that we feel when anxious. In real danger we can go from being totally relaxed to extremely anxious in an instant which is panic.

This aspect of anxiety makes us feel physically scared, particularly when our heart speeds up. Indeed, some research shows that heartbeat rate may be one of the main indicators of anxiousness. In one experiment, what distinguished those bomb disposal volunteers (all heroes) that had been decorated for gallantry from those that had not was the rate of their heartbeat. The ones that received medals maintained a lower cardiac rate when making stressful decisions.(1)

This physical aspect of anxiety plays a key role in problems such as general nervousness, social phobias (in fact, almost all phobias) and panic disorder.

2. It causes us to plan ahead for any potential dangers and how to deal with them – an excellent survival strategy (it's better to deal with a danger or avoid it before we get into the situation) but an unfortunate effect of this is that we can get anxious / nervous just thinking about situations.

This aspect of anxiety leads to being mentally scared and apprehensive and involves vague thoughts that something bad may happen. A main ingredient in many anxiety problems, this relates to symptoms such as excessive and obsessive thinking, planning and worrying. It underlies anxiety disorders such as obsessive compulsive disorder (OCD) and generalized anxiety disorder (GAD) and also plays a major role in severe depression.

The preparation to avoid danger completely or deal with it by fighting or fleeing is associated with a multitude of symptoms.

Symptoms Associated with Anxiety

Anxiety can cause a large range of symptoms that affect our body, mind and behaviour.

Body:

Our heartbeat speeds up and breathing becomes faster and more shallow. This may lead to feelings of tightness across the chest.

We start to feel shaky, dizzy and light-headed; our legs feel like jelly and we often start to sweat.

The mouth feels dry and it becomes hard to swallow.

We might feel sick, our stomach churning.

And need the toilet more often.

ANXIETY SYMPTOMS AND 'FIGHT OR FLEE'

Physical anxiety symptoms result from the body re-directing resources to the major muscle groups (legs / arms / chest) to provide them with an energy boost to prepare us for action (ultimately to fight or flee).

* Our breathing becomes more rapid to get more oxygen for these muscles into the blood.
* Our heartbeat speeds up to get the blood to the muscles quicker.
* Blood is diverted from the brain (making us light-headed and dizzy) and the stomach (causing 'butterflies').
* Energy cannot be wasted processing any half-digested food in our system so we need to get rid of it quickly - either through the mouth (feelings of nausea) or the other end (wanting to go to the toilet).
* Other 'energy-wasting ' systems (unnecessary in time of danger) are shut down eg. saliva production, giving us a dry mouth and difficulty swallowing.
* We sweat more to cool down all this energy production.
* The energy boost to the muscles makes them 'jumpy'/ 'jittery'/ 'jelly-like'/ on-edge ready for action.

.
Mind:

We may feel frightened (for no apparent reason) and begin to worry about things more and more.

Or start to believe that we are physically ill, having a heart attack or stroke, or going mad.

We may feel that other people are looking at us more.

And worry that we may lose control or make a fool of ourselves in front of others.

Often there is an overwhelming urge to escape and get to a safe place.

Behaviour:

Depending on what we find stressful...

We may begin to make excuses to avoid going out or doing certain things.

And rush out of places or situations where we feel anxious.

Often we start to avoid things and situations that make us feel anxious.

And may have a drink or take a tablet before doing something we find stressful.

Everybody has anxiety; it is a part of being alive. Although we may not realise it, it is with us all at varying strengths throughout our lives:-

› Without anxiety (over the fear of being knocked down) we wouldn't be careful when we crossed the road.
› Without anxiety (over not having food and shelter) we wouldn't go to work each day.
› Without anxiety over failure and humiliation the performances of athletes, entertainers, executives, students etc. would be nowhere near as good.

Anxiety and Self-Protection:-

nervousness-anxiety-panic

Mild threat or danger makes us nervous and slightly anxious. In times of real danger, anxiety comes to us more quickly and much stronger for we need to take action. When the threat is imminent it becomes panic and all of the symptoms (racing heart, fast breathing, trembling etc.) happen almost instantly... this is anxiety, this is how it works.

.	Now imagine a very different scene. It's the dead of night, you are walking alone down a dimly-lit alley. There are doorways on either side – who knows what's hiding in them, waiting to pounce? You are scared and all your senses are heightened. Your sight and hearing have become more sensitive, able to pinpoint the slightest movement or sound. Breathing and heartbeat are now rapid, you feel light-headed and dizzy, want to go to the toilet or throw up. Your limbs feel shaky and your whole body is now charged with energy, full of anxiety, ready to fight or flee, possibly for your life. These two scenes represent either end of the anxiety scale. In the first we feel warm, secure and safe, we are fully relaxed. In the second we are really anxious, prepared for danger – highly alert and scared. Anxiety protects us in 2 main ways:- 1. It helps to prepare our body for action, making us more alert and ready to fight or flee from any imminent threat to our survival. This is responsible for the direct physical sensations (such as rapid heartbeat, fast breathing, being jittery and on-edge, trembling etc.) that we feel when anxious. In real danger we can go from being totally relaxed to extremely anxious in an instant which is panic. This aspect of anxiety makes us feel physically scared, particularly when our heart speeds up. Indeed, some research shows that heartbeat rate may be one of the main indicators of anxiousness. In one experiment, what distinguished those bomb disposal volunteers (all heroes) that had been decorated for gallantry from those that had not was the rate of their heartbeat. The ones that received medals maintained a lower cardiac rate when making stressful decisions.(1) This physical aspect of anxiety plays a key role in problems such as general nervousness, social phobias (in fact, almost all phobias) and panic disorder. 2. It causes us to plan ahead for any potential dangers and how to deal with them – an excellent survival strategy (it's better to deal with a danger or avoid it before we get into the situation) but an unfortunate effect of this is that we can get anxious / nervous just thinking about situations. This aspect of anxiety leads to being mentally scared and apprehensive and involves vague thoughts that something bad may happen. A main ingredient in many anxiety problems, this relates to symptoms such as excessive and obsessive thinking, planning and worrying. It underlies anxiety disorders such as obsessive compulsive disorder (OCD) and generalized anxiety disorder (GAD) and also plays a major role in severe depression. The preparation to avoid danger completely or deal with it by fighting or fleeing is associated with a multitude of symptoms. Symptoms Associated with Anxiety Anxiety can cause a large range of symptoms that affect our body, mind and behaviour. Body: Our heartbeat speeds up and breathing becomes faster and more shallow. This may lead to feelings of tightness across the chest. We start to feel shaky, dizzy and light-headed; our legs feel like jelly and we often start to sweat. The mouth feels dry and it becomes hard to swallow. We might feel sick, our stomach churning. And need the toilet more often. ANXIETY SYMPTOMS AND 'FIGHT OR FLEE' Physical anxiety symptoms result from the body re-directing resources to the major muscle groups (legs / arms / chest) to provide them with an energy boost to prepare us for action (ultimately to fight or flee). * Our breathing becomes more rapid to get more oxygen for these muscles into the blood. * Our heartbeat speeds up to get the blood to the muscles quicker. * Blood is diverted from the brain (making us light-headed and dizzy) and the stomach (causing 'butterflies'). * Energy cannot be wasted processing any half-digested food in our system so we need to get rid of it quickly - either through the mouth (feelings of nausea) or the other end (wanting to go to the toilet). * Other 'energy-wasting ' systems (unnecessary in time of danger) are shut down eg. saliva production, giving us a dry mouth and difficulty swallowing. * We sweat more to cool down all this energy production. * The energy boost to the muscles makes them 'jumpy'/ 'jittery'/ 'jelly-like'/ on-edge ready for action. (I-Explorer +/-) . Mind: We may feel frightened (for no apparent reason) and begin to worry about things more and more. Or start to believe that we are physically ill, having a heart attack or stroke, or going mad. We may feel that other people are looking at us more. And worry that we may lose control or make a fool of ourselves in front of others. Often there is an overwhelming urge to escape and get to a safe place. Behaviour: Depending on what we find stressful... We may begin to make excuses to avoid going out or doing certain things. And rush out of places or situations where we feel anxious. Often we start to avoid things and situations that make us feel anxious. And may have a drink or take a tablet before doing something we find stressful. Everybody has anxiety; it is a part of being alive. Although we may not realise it, it is with us all at varying strengths throughout our lives:- › Without anxiety (over the fear of being knocked down) we wouldn't be careful when we crossed the road. › Without anxiety (over not having food and shelter) we wouldn't go to work each day. › Without anxiety over failure and humiliation the performances of athletes, entertainers, executives, students etc. would be nowhere near as good. Anxiety and Self-Protection:- Mild threat or danger makes us nervous and slightly anxious. In times of real danger, anxiety comes to us more quickly and much stronger for we need to take action. When the threat is imminent it becomes panic and all of the symptoms (racing heart, fast breathing, trembling etc.) happen almost instantly... this is anxiety, this is how it works.	.
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