Anxiety disorders are mental illnesses which prevent individuals from leading a normal life.
If you are suffering from an anxiety disorder you may not be able to perform your routine activities in a well-adjusted manner. It can eventually end up making your life really troubled if left untreated for a long time.
Some of the most common signs and symptoms of this mental illness include unrelenting worries, panic attacks, and obsessive thoughts – which create enormous problems in your life.
In short, if you are suffering from severe distress for a long time now, perhaps you are suffering from an anxiety disorder.
Psychotherapy Versus Medications
Both psychotherapy and medications can be effective with anxiety disorders, but in different ways.
Psychotherapy works to change negative thought patterns, and teaches you how to cope with those thoughts in your day-to-day life. It is a long-term solution.
Medications for anxiety come in two broad categories: short-term and long-term. The short-term medications are intended to give you relief for your symptoms immediately. Unfortunately, some drugs in this category are very addictive, and most doctors will not prescribe them for more than a few weeks.
Long-term medications are designed to relieve symptoms for a longer time period. They are particularly useful to maintain your equilibrium as you go about your daily life.
In our society, we are bombarded with advertisements for “quick cures.” We take a pill for a headache and it goes away without going to the doctor. Take another pill for heartburn and it goes away without medical help, too. Many people look at medications for anxiety disorders in the same way. They want a drug that will relieve all their symptoms instantly, and are very disappointed when they find out that options are limited for this sort of medication.
The very best way to deal with anxiety disorders is with a combination of both psychotherapy and medication. Your psychiatrist can prescribe short-term drugs that will give you some help right away, during which time you can start seeing a psychologist for longer-term relief. According to the person – and each person is different – you may need to take a medication for the long term to help you maintain your life symptom-free.
The Ten Different Kinds of Anxiety Disorder
There are ten types of anxiety disorders that we cover here on Anxiety, Panic & Health:
- Acute Stress Disorder
- Adult Separation Anxiety Disorder
- Agoraphobia
- Generalized Anxiety Disorder (GAD)
- Obsessive-Compulsive Disorder (OCD)
- Panic Attacks
- Panic Disorder
- Post Traumatic Stress Disorder (PTSD)
- Social Anxiety Disorder (SAD)
- Specific Phobias
For a good overview of anxiety disorder in general, see our “About Anxiety” article.
To learn more about the range of anxiety disorders, click on and pull down the “Anxiety Reference” tab in the menu on every page. There are reference articles there that cover each of the anxiety disorders listed above. You may also search all our articles with the search bar in the sidebar. Other good ways to find articles are the category lists and the tag cloud, also in the sidebar.
Significance of the Treatments For Anxiety Disorder
If you fail to treat your mental illness at the right time, it can have grave consequences for your overall health and well-being. For example, if you are suffering from panic disorder in which you are always frightened about facing a panic attack again, it can ruin your professional and personal life. And when you are not able to perform effectively on the job, there is a significant chance of you losing it. That can have a drastic impact on your personal life, because you won’t be able to fulfill your financial commitments.
Let’s take a look at some of the important treatment options for anxiety disorder:
Cognitive Behavioral Therapy
One of the most important ways to treat different types of anxiety disorders is Cognitive Behavioral Therapy, also called CBT. According to HelpGuide, Cognitive Behavioral Therapy helps in treating social anxiety disorder, panic disorder, and phobias. CBT is also crucial when it comes to treating generalized anxiety disorder.
CBT helps in dealing with a person’s negative thoughts
CBT helps in dealing with a person’s negative thoughts which are accountable for bringing all sorts of problems into their lives. It’s a therapy that treats an individual’s negative thoughts, so that they can live a peaceful life. In cognitive behavioral therapy, a therapist tries to figure out how a person’s negative thoughts are contributing to their problem.
When you work one-on-one with a certified therapist, you get to understand that the problem you are facing is all because of your thoughts and hence you try to deal with them effectively. In other words, once you realize that your own thoughts are accountable for creating problems in your life, you try to take the advice given by your therapist to deal with your mental illness. As a person suffering from such a mental disorder, you try to learn how to challenge your negative thoughts in order to overcome your mental illness.
Behavioral techniques are used to deal with an individual’s mental condition and they prove to be really helpful. An individual starts changing his behavior when they work closely with their therapist. For example, if you have become a drug or alcohol addict because of the consequences of your mental illness, CBT helps in making you aware of your mental illness and its further consequences.
Family & Group Psychotherapy
When it comes to treating mental illnesses, working with a licensed psychologist proves to be highly important for patients. They can easily diagnose what kind of anxiety disorder you are suffering from after talking to you. Both family therapy and group psychotherapy prove to be really helpful when it comes to treating anxiety disorders.
When you go for psychotherapy, your therapist will talk to you in detail about your problem. They may ask several important questions related to your day to day life and you have to give appropriate answers for that. If you fail to cooperate with your therapist, you may not be able to recover from your problem easily, hence it’s better to deal give honest answers to your therapist.
Therapy sessions are tailored to meet your specific requirements and perhaps that’s the reason you can end up dealing with your illness quite fast. In other words, different types of treatment plans are developed for different patients, because each patient reacts differently.
During the therapy sessions, your therapist tries to figure out whether the treatment plan developed for you is working effectively or not. If the treatment plan requires certain changes, they are made immediately so that the patient can recover quickly.
Martin Kelvin is a professional health blogger. He focuses his research on all the views of mental health, physical therapy and wellness, treating anxiety disorders. Through his writing, he loves to share his valuable thoughts aimed at enhancing the quality of life for people.
