What is Fear & Anxiety?

Fear and anxiety are everyday emotions for people. Almost everyone experiences them both at one point and time in their lives, depending upon key life events, changes and possible future experiences. But, when fear or anxiety develops beyond normal levels, it can turn into a disorder.

Fear

• Fear is a basic emotion that is a response to a person's perception of danger. It is usually brought on by a specific stimulus, such as pain or a situation where pain may happen. A soldier about to go into battle against insurmountable odds might experience a feeling of fear. Children about to receive a sharp needle into their skin may also have feelings of fear just as they pull up to the hospital.

Anxiety

• Anxiety is a set of feelings and behaviors associated with worry, especially for future events or events beyond personal control. It is typically a normal reaction to stress and can sometimes help a person focus and get through a stressful situation. Anxiety can also be related to positive future events, such as receiving a known promotion or minutes before getting married.

Generalized Anxiety Disorder

• Generalized anxiety disorder is diagnosed when those feelings of anxiety tend to persist beyond a normal threshold. Feelings and symptoms associated with those anxieties actually begin to interfere with normal life. For example, worrying about a promotion is a normal anxiety, as outlined earlier. The worry can become abnormal if it begins to explore unrelated worries and thoughts to the point in which the person can't sleep, loses concentration or becomes extremely fidgety--even after the promotion goes through. Those are just some of the symptoms that help define generalized anxiety disorder in the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual for Mental Disorders IV (DSM-IV).

Panic Disorder

• Panic disorder, a subtype of anxiety disorder, describes tremendous and irrational fears in a person not necessarily associated with a specific trigger or situation. These fears involve thoughts of impending doom, extreme loss of bodily function or even death. People with panic disorders tend to have panic attacks, where the body responds as if those fears were realized based on true events and situations, even though they aren't. Panic attacks have also been associated with phobias, specifically agoraphobia, which is the fear of having a panic attack in a public place.

Treatment

• Treatment for anxiety disorders can sometimes use medication designed to reduce brain chemicals prompted by anxiety and to increase chemicals that promote calmness. Talk therapy consists of teaching coping skills and the ability to avoid some situations that can bring on anxiety or panic attacks. One example would be specific breathing techniques and self-talk once the feelings of a panic attack start to come on.