Anxiety is defined by the American Psychological Association (APA) as an emotional state characterized by feelings of tension, worried thoughts, and physical changes.
Anxiety is a feeling or sensation of fear that captures your mind whenever you are under stress or have an intuition of something bad happening. An anxiety attack takes place when there is something particular triggering the person. The majority of the times anxiety takes place due to some event or situation. Though, this is not the case always. An anxiety attack majorly hits a person due to fear of something bad happening in a particular situation. This means there is a specific subject that is creating a sense of fear in that person. It tends to develop gradually over time. It can be mild, moderate, or severe. There may be a sense that it can be over once that particular problem is solved. Even constant anxiety can worsen the situation and lead to panic attacks, which are severe and affect the patient a lot.
Nowadays cases of women having anxiety are on a rise. This is because a lot of women juggle between work, family, children, relationships, etc. Cases of anxiety disorders in women are rapidly increasing. According to the Anxiety and Depression Association of America (ADAA), women are twice as likely as men to develop an anxiety disorder.
Symptoms of Anxiety in women
Anxiety disorders are real medication conditions like asthma and high blood pressure are physical medical conditions that respond well to treatment. Proper medications and treatments can control Anxiety disorder. Often, women have anxiety disorders due to compromised quality of life. Since anxiety impacts more women than men, it’s vital to know the symptoms of anxiety disorders in women. But it is not compulsory that all women get the same symptoms. Some women face a group of particular symptoms. So it is very important to know all the symptoms that a woman with anxiety may identify.
- Stomach problems such as ongoing nausea, inability to eat much, and stomach pain
- Heart rate increases especially during stressful or triggering situations or events
- Feelings of tiredness, lethargy, or weakness
- Concentration and focus difficulties
- Sense of impending danger, doom, or panic
- Irritability, nervousness, or edginess
- Insomnia and other sleeping issues
- Trouble with rapid breathing, sweating, and shaking
These are some symptoms women with anxiety may face. But these can also be symptoms of substance use disorder (SUD). This disorder means when a person is addicted to a particular substance to consume, like drugs, alcohol, cigarettes. Anxiety disorder occurs due to stress-related to any situation in life. So it is important to figure out that what is putting you in trouble. Anxiety disorder can actually hamper daily life activities. It can be difficult for a person to perform normal basic daily life tasks. Hence repetitive anxiety is dangerous and shall be taken care of.
Also Read- Your Mental health is equally important as Physical health
Types of anxiety disorders
When small events start triggering your anxiety at a level that you feel things are getting out of control or when you feel anxious without any reason is where anxiety disorder stands.
Generalized anxiety
With this common anxiety disorder, a person worries excessively about many things. Any person with generalized anxiety may over worry about their health, career, school, family, or any other issue which doesn’t even require this much attention. They may think of the worst possibility for any situation or problem. Physical symptoms in people who have generalized anxiety are chest pain, headache, tiredness, tight muscles, stomachaches, or vomiting.
Obsessive compulsive disorder (OCD)
For a person with OCD, anxiety comes in the form of obsession and compulsion. Obsession of thought or something to happen whereas compulsion to things that relieve their anxiety.
Phobias
Intense fear of any particular thing or situation that is not actually dangerous is called as having phobias. People have phobias like phobia of heights, dogs, or flying in an airplane. Phobias usually cause people to avoid the things they are afraid of.
Social Phobia
It is also known as social anxiety. If intense anxiety triggers you while doing any social activity such as going to a party, speaking in front of others, etc, then you have social anxiety. In this, the person avoids social interactions as much as he can. An extreme form called selective mutism causes some kids and teens to be too fearful to talk at all in certain situations.
Panic Attack
Panic attacks have symptoms like anxiety attacks in a more intense form. A panic attack needs no triggering point to start. Though when a person is suffering from panic disorder, any small or big problematic situation or thing can trigger anxiety and that anxiety can easily lead to a panic attack. But even if the person is calm, he/she might get hit by a panic attack. A panic attack can happen without a warning and you can’t prevent it. A panic attack can occur even if the person feels calm, anxious, or even during sleep. In fact, according to the APA, the reaction is unrelated to the situation. A person might feel that he or she is going to die, faint, or losing control over themselves.
Posttraumatic stress disorder (PTSD)
A very famous quote states “some incidents pass on, but leaves the marks behind”. This type of anxiety order results from any tragedy or mishappening that happened in the past that left an impact on a person’s mind. Even a single flashback can trigger anxiety. Any bad incident in childhood triggers a lot of people their whole lifetime. Hence, it is very common to feel bad or being anxious about remembering something that you had a bad experience with.
Also Read : Depression – Symptoms, Causes, Treatment
Treatments for Anxiety in Women.
If you are experiencing any of the symptoms, the very first thing to know is that you are not alone. According to the NIMH, nearly 32% of adults in the United States will experience anxiety at some point in their lives.
In many cases, when women feel anxious, they start to self-medicate. Often they reach out for a glass of wine to calm down. But there is a huge difference in consuming something out of wish and need. When you start depending upon anything such as alcohol to calm your anxiety, you will end up having a habit as you will consider it as a medicine. This will push you into two mental health disorders together, anxiety disorder and substance use disorder.
Generally, people get treatment for anxiety disorder as a combination of counselling and medications. However if the woman is pregnant, medication should be within a limit so that it doesn’t affect the lady and the child. Medications treat the symptoms of anxiety in women and men but do not ‘cure’ anxiety disorders. Hence, counselling such as cognitive-behavioural therapy (CBT), support groups, and learning stress management techniques are essential.
It is very important for the other family members to take care that she is not burdened with lots of responsibilities. Help her out with households and children. It is very important for anxiety disorder patients to give themselves a break whenever they feel filled up with work or any other load. This will help you to work better afterwards. Anxiety may feel like a struck thing in your chest or as if something which can kill you, but It can’t. It can only give birth to this fear in your mind. And that’s what you have to fight with!
