Do I have an anxiety disorder?

Question

For about two years now, most of my days are consumed by worry. I constantly worry about everything from school, to friends, to boyfriends, to family, everything. I'm always worried about what other people think of me and it distracts me from things I should be doing. I have been anorexic and I've been struggling with it for a while now. I have trouble breathing when I'm worried and get hot flashes and start sweating when I'm nervous. I have constant headaches and now my eyes are very sensitive to light which give me headaches, although I think that is from the lack of sleep. I'll start shaking if I get upset, which is very easily. Also, I'm worried about talking to my mom and asking her is she thinks I have an anxiety disorder (she's a nurse). Maybe it is something else but I would like some input before I ask my parents to take me to a doctor.

Answer 1

Fortunately, there are strategies that you can learn and practice that can be useful for reducing worry. But because worrying is a habit that has been well practiced, you should realize that it will take frequent practice of other courses of action, ones that are incompatible with worry, to reduce the habit of worrying.

The more the methods are practiced, the stronger the new habit becomes and the weaker the old habit of worry becomes. This will take some effort in the beginning.

There is one other useful piece of information that you can gather. During your worry period each day:

Write down every event that you’re worrying about and list next to it the possible outcomes, good and bad, that might happen.

Keep that list until the event actually happens and see which outcome occurred.

Do this for every outcome that comes along and keep track of how often things actually turned out good, bad, or indifferent and whether you handled the outcome well, or not.


Over time, you will be able to collect your own evidence about your worries and your ability to cope with events that you worried about.

It is very likely that you will find that few things really turn out badly or that, even when they do, you are capable of handling them quite well. Such evidence will increase your confidence in yourself and your trust that, whatever the future holds, you will be ready for it

Answer 2

I absolutely think you not only need to talk to your Mom about this but you need to talk to your doctor about it for sure. Now, you need to let your family doctor refer you to a mental health expert. You have issues about your appearance, with the anorexia, you are at a dangerous level. I don't know how old you are, and it really doesn't matter. You are in a great need of someones attention. Get help, don't be ashamed. It is absolutely nothing to be ashamed about. We all have problems, and each of us reacts differently to them. I suggest some could talk therapy, if that doesn't help you then maybe you need medication to help you. I don't like to just immediately say take meds, I think a lot of the medications like Prozac, Zoloft and some of the others just aggravate the problem rather that treat it. You will come along way with a good therapist, trust me.
Best of luck to you and I hope you will talk with your mom and get the help you need.
Take care!

Answer 3

It sounds like maybe panic attacks, with the breathing issue and sweating. I think you need to tell a dr all about this. My guess is that they'll start you on zoloft or lexapro, but if the dr sees it serious enough, maybe counciling or something, as well. The best thing is to get to a dr so this can be addressed. Good luck, it'll get better from here. xoxo

Answer 4

This is a very good blog, a beginner’s guide to abnormal psychology.
Short, clear and simple; and you can even post your question and contact the author regarding particular subject you are interested in

http://sensitive-psychoworld.blogspot.com/

Answer 5

i would suggest you go see a counselor you have more than just anxiety hun you also have an eating disorder