Understanding Worry and Generalised Anxiety Disorder

Understanding worry and Generalised Anxiety Disorder (GAD)

We all worry and feel anxious from time to time. It is a normal human reaction to busy or stressful events happening in our life. Usually, this only happens for a short period of time.

People with excessive worry, known as Generalised Anxiety Disorder (GAD) worry more days than not, for many months, or even years. Sometimes they can recognise being a worrier most of their life. Having GAD impacts significantly upon the person’s day to day life. It stops them from doing things in life that they would otherwise do. When people have GAD they worry about everyday things like health, relationships, finances, work or your family - but to a degree that is out of proportion. Worrying can feel very hard to control and impacts negatively on day to day life. It can be hard to imagine not worrying. The anxiety and worry can get worse on the build up to a big life event or situation happening, such as planning to move home, having a baby or dealing with changes at work. People often describe feeling on edge or a sense of dread, as if something bad is about to happen. Situations in life that are unpredictable, uncertain or feel out of control can be particularly difficult to manage. Worrying and the anxiety experienced makes the person feel tense most of the time. They can experience more aches and pains, tension headaches, poor sleep or stomach problems as a result. Worrying takes up lots of time and energy, leaving little room for other things. It can lead to feeling irritable or struggling to concentrate. Worrying distracts the person from what is going on around them at that time. They become caught up in their internal world of worrying thoughts and symptoms of anxiety. People often describe feeling that they cannot fully enjoy or participate in things happening in their life as the worry and anxiety takes the focus away from it for them.

If you have symptoms of GAD, you may understandably begin to avoid things that make you feel more anxious. You may try to push the worrying thoughts out of your mind or do things to try and manage how you feel. You can take more time than usual to get things done, wanting them to be right. You may also over prepare for things or keep putting them off until later (procrastination). People with GAD can also try to avoid feeling anxious by trying to keep a sense of control, and only doing things that feel predictable and certain. In the short term these changes can give you some relief from how you are feeling. So, you keep doing them. In the longer term though it can keep you caught in a cycle of worry and anxiety. You get more worries, more physical symptoms and more anxiety. It restricts the enjoyment you can get from your life, where you can go and what you can do. Worrying itself becomes harder to control and feels more difficult to manage. You get caught in a vicious cycle of worry and anxiety. The good news is that there are treatments that can really help. The National Institute for Health and Care Excellence (NICE) suggests Cognitive Behavioural Therapy (CBT) as a treatment to help to manage worry and GAD as it has a large evidence base. This workbook helps you to use worry management CBT techniques to help to improve your anxiety in easy steps with support from a trained practitioner. Within the workbook you will find examples from two people who have used this treatment to help them to manage their worrying, Amelia and John. As well as sharing their own experiences with GAD and how it affected their lives; they also share their tips for using the techniques. While their personal situations may be different from your own, they both used worry management to feel better. There is no set way for you to use this booklet. You may want to read it all first and then come back to start the treatment, others prefer to begin section by section. Just go at a pace that suits you.