How often do we worry? Worry about our family, performance at school, being punctual, about our health, about small repairs etc?
Quite often. I said ‘we’, as we all do. Worry is one of the feeling we all experience.
One between happiness, sadness, fear, excitement, anger, love, etc. Just one of many.
However, if these continuous feelings of anxiety affect your life, means - when you worry even if the things go well - you could have an anxiety disorder. This is the time to ask for help.
Anxiety starts to control your life when:
- You are starting to avoid situations which may cause you to fell anxious
- You cannot control those feelings and those feelings make you feel unwell
- When it becomes too difficult to enjoy your life because of it
- When you start to feel anxious regularly
Sooner you realise you have an anxiety disorder, than better. Anxiety will not go away itself. It may get worse, when not treated. However, if you manage to control it, you can be successful in getting rid of it totally.
YOU ARE IN CONTROL…
It’s good to know what the symptoms are.
You can experience physical symptoms, like sweating, shaking, tummy ache, headache, dizziness, fainting, dry mouth, or mental symptoms, like uncontrollable overthinking, constant ‘what if’ question on your mind, problems with sleeping, changes of appetite, feeling that you need to escape from uncomfortable situation.
This all can affect your life very much. After time, you will not enjoy activities you used to enjoy, you will avoid new situations, this all can affect your relationship with others, affect your job or make going to school very difficult etc.
Remember, that there is many types of anxiety disorder, including phobias (fear of spiders or germs etc), social anxiety disorder (social phobia), panic disorder (with regular panic attacks), agoraphobia (fear of being in situations where escape might be difficult), OCD (have obsession, compulsion or both), dermatillomania (skin picking), trichotillomania (hair pulling), body dysmorphic disorder (upsetting thoughts about the way you look), or the most common – Generalised Anxiety Disorder (GAD)
Where to get help?
The therapy is an answer. Therapist will help you to find a link between your feelings and behaviour. Music therapy with cognitive therapy will help.
Don’t forget about power of music. Music can slow down our heartbeat, lower our blood pressure. If we connect it with breathing exercises, relaxation and every day techniques showing you of how to control your anxiety, you will win. Yes, it takes time to fight it, but it is possible.
Music, usually was made by emotions (great composers wrote great pieces of music while being upset, going to the war, being in love or extremely
happy etc.) and music also touches and awakes the part in our brain responsible for the emotions, so it works both ways.
This is nothing new, as music has been used for hundreds of years to treat illnesses and restore harmony between mind and body. Music has power.
Statistics says that 3 million people in the UK live with depression or anxiety. 25% of those are currently receiving treatment for it. How many people live with anxiety in Northampton? How many do not realise that they have anxiety? How many are not diagnosed?
Anxiety is often not visible for the neighbour, shopkeeper, postman, who see you only for a few minutes a day. People often don’t know what you are going through and how you act when you go back home.
Sometimes you don’t realise that you have a problem.
Remember, there are people around you who will help. You are in control and you are not on your own.