Overcoming Anxiety For Dummies
For Dummies (Verlag)
978-0-470-57441-6 (ISBN)
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Now with 25% new and revised content, Overcoming Anxiety For Dummies, 2nd Edition explores all of the most common triggers for anxiety, recent developments in medications, newly emerging biologically oriented approaches for treating anxiety, and the most up-to-date advancements in psychotherapies.
Understand why you?re anxious and pinpoint your triggers
Get trusted advice on whether you can overcome anxiety on your own or seek professional help
Covers anxiety in teens, young adults, and veterans
The practical information in Overcoming Anxiety For Dummies, 2nd Edition is your first step toward getting your life back and winning the war against your worries!
Charles H. Elliott, PhD, and Laura L. Smith, PhD, are clinical psychol-ogists who specialize in the treatment of anxiety and mood disorders. They are the authors of several For Dummies books, including Borderline Personality Disorder For Dummies and Obsessive-Compulsive Disorder For Dummies.
Introduction 1
About This Book 2
An Important Message to Our Readers 2
Conventions Used in This Book 3
What You’re Not to Read 3
Foolish Assumptions 3
How This Book is Organized 4
Part I: Detecting and Exposing Anxiety 4
Part II: Battling Anxiety 4
Part III: Letting Go of the Battle 4
Part IV: Zeroing in on Specific Worries 5
Part V: Helping Others with Anxiety 5
Part VI: The Part of Tens 5
Icons Used in This Book 5
Where to Go from Here 6
Part I: Detecting and Exposing Anxiety 7
Chapter 1: Analyzing and Attacking Anxiety 9
Anxiety: Everybody’s Doing It 9
Tabulating the Costs of Anxiety 10
What does anxiety cost you? 11
Adding up the cost to society 12
Recognizing the Symptoms of Anxiety 12
Thinking anxiously 12
Behaving anxiously 14
Finding anxiety in your body 14
Seeking Help for Your Anxiety 15
Matching symptoms and therapies 15
Choosing where to start 17
Finding the right help 18
Chapter 2: Examining Anxiety: What’s Normal, What’s Not 21
Knowing When Anxiety is a Help and When It’s a Hindrance 22
Presenting the Seven Types of Anxiety 23
Generalized anxiety disorder: The common cold of anxiety 23
Social phobia: Avoiding people 24
Panic disorder: Way beyond everyday anxiety 26
Agoraphobia: Panic’s companion 28
Specific phobias: Spiders, snakes, airplanes, and other scary things 29
Post-traumatic stress disorder: Feeling the aftermath 31
Obsessive-compulsive disorder: Over and over and over again 33
Seeing How Anxiety Differs from Other Disorders 35
Chapter 3: Sorting Through the Brain and Biology 37
Examining the Anxious Brain 37
Seeing how the brain’s circuits are connected 38
Communicating chemicals 38
Preparing to Fight or Flee 39
Mimicking Anxiety: Drugs, Diet, and Diseases 42
Exploring anxiety-mimicking drugs 42
Ingesting anxiety from your diet 44
Investigating medical anxiety imposters 46
Chapter 4: Clearing the Roadblocks to Change 47
Digging Out the Roots of Anxiety 47
It’s in my genes! 48
It’s how I was raised! 49
It’s the world’s fault! 50
Finding Self-Acceptance 51
Having Second Thoughts about Change 53
Deciding to Get the Show on the Road 54
Arguing with your arguments 55
Taking baby steps 56
Watching Worries Come and Go 58
Following your fears 58
Writing about your worries 59
Getting Help from Others 61
Seeking the right therapies 61
Seeking the right therapist 62
Part II: Battling Anxiety 63
Chapter 5: Becoming a Thought Detective 65
Distinguishing Thoughts from Feelings 66
Blocking the blues 66
Getting in touch with your feelings 67
Getting in touch with your thoughts 69
Tracking Your Thoughts, Triggers, and Feelings 73
Tackling Your Thoughts: Thought Therapy 74
Weighing the evidence: Thought court 74
Rethinking risk 76
Deconstructing worrisome scenarios 78
Cultivating Calm Thinking 84
Considering a “friend’s” perspective 84
Creating calm 85
Affirming affirmations? 87
Chapter 6: Watching Out for Worry Words 89
Stacking Sticks into Bonfires of Anxiety 89
Encountering extremist words 90
Misrepresenting with all-or-none, black-or-white words 91
Running into judging words 92
Turning to victim words 93
Tracking Your Worry Words 94
Refuting and Replacing Your Worry Words 95
Exorcising your extremist words 96
Disputing all-or-none 97
Judging the judge 97
Vanquishing victim words 98
Chapter 7: Busting Up Your Agitating Assumptions 101
Understanding Agitating Assumptions 102
Sizing Up Anxious Schemas 103
Recognizing schemas 103
Assessing your agitating assumptions 104
Coming Down with a Case of Anxious Schemas 105
Acquiring assumptions in childhood 106
Shattering your reasonable assumptions 107
Challenging Those Nasty Assumptions: Running a Cost/Benefit Analysis 108
Analyzing perfection 109
Tabulating approval 112
Reviewing vulnerability 112
Counting up control 113
Debating dependency 114
Challenging your own anxious schemas 115
Designing Calm, Balanced Assumptions 116
Tempering perfectionist tendencies 117
Balancing an approval addict 118
Balancing vulnerability 119
Relaxing control 120
Diminishing dependency 120
Above All: Be Kind to Yourself! 121
Chapter 8: Facing Fear One Step at a Time 123
Exposure: Coming to Grips with Your Fears 123
Getting ready by relaxing 124
Understanding your fears 125
Constructing a staircase of fear 127
Imagining the worst 129
Facing your fears (gulp) 130
Conquering All Types of Fears 131
Waging war on worry: GAD 132
Fighting specifi c and social phobias 133
Pushing through panic and agoraphobia 135
Taking on post-traumatic stress disorder 137
Overriding an obsessive-compulsive disorder 139
Expecting the Impossible 143
Chapter 9: Considering Medications and Other Physical Treatment Options 145
Making Up Your Mind About Medications 145
The downside of medications 146
The upside of medications 147
Understanding Medication Options 147
Antidepressants 148
Benzodiazepines 153
Miscellaneous tranquilizers 154
Beta blockers 155
Atypical antipsychotics 155
Mood stabilizers 157
A few intriguing medication options 157
Searching for Supplements 158
Viva vitamins! 161
Sifting through the slew of supplements 161
Stimulating the Brain 162
Vagus nerve stimulation (VNS) 162
Deep brain stimulation (DBS) 163
Transcranial magnetic stimulation (TMS) 163
Part III: Letting Go of the Battle 165
Chapter 10: Looking at Lifestyle 167
Friends and Family — Can’t Live with ’em, Can’t Live without ’em 167
Staying connected to others 168
Delegating for extra time 169
Just saying “no” 169
Ready Exorcise! 170
Don’t wait for willpower — Just do it! 171
Working in your workout 173
The ABCs of Getting Your Zs 174
Creating a sleep haven 174
Following a few relaxing routines 175
What to do when sleep just won’t come 177
Designing Calm Diets 178
Enjoying small, frequent portions 178
Following nutritional common sense 179
Chapter 11: Relaxation: The Five-Minute Solution 181
Blowing Anxiety Away 182
Discovering your natural breathing pattern 183
Breathing like a baby 183
Using panic breathing in high-stress situations 185
Relaxing Your Whole Body 186
Knowing what to expect 186
Discovering the progressive muscle technique 187
Applying Relaxation in Tense Situations 189
Relaxing through Your Senses 190
Sounds to soothe the savage beast 190
Only the nose knows for sure 191
Massaging away stress 192
Chapter 12: Creating Calm in Your Imagination 193
Letting Your Imagination Roam 194
Imagining touch 195
Recalling sounds 196
Remembering tastes 197
Conjuring up smells 198
Painting pictures in your mind 199
Full Sensory Imaging 200
Relaxing at the beach 200
A forest fantasy 201
Customizing Your Own Images 202
Chapter 13: Mindful Acceptance 203
Accepting Anxiety? Hey, That’s a Switch! 203
Taking a calm, dispassionate view 204
Tolerating uncertainty 205
Being patient with yourself 206
Letting Go of Ego 207
Inflating and deflating the self-esteem balloon 208
Appreciating your imperfections 209
Connecting with the Here and Now 211
Making contact with the present 213
Putting worries about the future to rest 214
Mindfully meditating 215
Accepting Mindfulness into Your Life 217
Savoring Spirituality 217
Part IV: Zeroing in on Specific Worries 219
Chapter 14: Facing a Career Crisis and Financial Woes 221
Meeting Job Worries Head-On 221
Shoring up your resume 222
Finding fl exibility in your career view 223
Considering careers with stability 224
Keeping the right focus 225
Taking Stock of Your Resources 226
Tallying up your fi nancial balance sheet 226
Knowing your personal assets and liabilities 227
Committing to a New Game Plan 228
Setting short-term goals 228
Planning for the long haul 230
Chapter 15: Keeping Steady When the World is Shaking 231
Assessing Your Risks 232
Looking at the likelihood of dying from a natural disaster 232
Tabulating your personal risks 233
Preparing a Plan for Realistic Worries 234
Imagining and Dealing with the Worst 237
Rethinking uncertainty and anxiety 237
Rethinking your ability to cope 238
Going right at your worries 239
Doing Your Part to Improve the World 241
Helping the environment 241
Volunteering in disasters 242
Chapter 16: Staying Healthy 243
Figuring Out the Connection between Worry and Health 243
Recalculating the Costs and Benefi ts of Health Worry 245
Tabulating Risks of the Modern World 247
Examining the evolving realities of diseases and treatments 247
Weighing local versus global health risks 248
Watching out for exaggerated claims 250
Taking an Inventory of Your Personal Health 250
Checking out your lifestyle 250
Accepting your genetic risks 251
Designing a Health Action Plan 252
Chapter 17: Keeping Out of Danger 253
Evaluating Your Actual, Personal Risks 253
Maximizing Your Preparedness 254
Taking charge of personal safety 254
Avoiding unnecessary risks 255
Dealing with Trauma 256
Thinking through what happened 257
Exposing yourself to the incident 258
Accepting a Certain Degree of Uncertainty 258
Choosing to put yourself in high-risk situations 259
Experiencing danger in everyday places 259
Part V: Helping Others with Anxiety 263
Chapter 18: When a Family Member or Friend Suffers from Anxiety 265
Discovering Whether Your Loved One Suffers from Anxiety 266
Talking Together about Anxiety 268
Helping without owning the albatross 268
Avoiding blame 269
When help turns into harm 269
Guiding the Way 271
Coaching the right way 272
Looking at a coach in action 274
Teaming Up against Anxiety 276
Accepting Anxiety with Love 277
Chapter 19: Recognizing Anxiety in Kids 279
Separating Normal from Abnormal 279
Inspecting the Most Common Childhood Anxiety Disorders 282
Leaving parents: Separation anxiety disorder 282
Worrying all the time: Generalized anxiety disorder 284
Focusing on phobias: Specifi c phobias 285
Connecting with others: Social phobia 285
Anxious repetition: Obsessive-compulsive disorder 285
Rare anxieties among children 286
Chapter 20: Helping Kids Conquer Anxiety 287
Nipping Anxiety in the Bud 287
Early mastery experiences 288
Fine-tuning emotions 289
Inoculating against anxiety 290
Taking precautions via parenting style 290
Helping Already Anxious Children 293
Helping yourself fi rst 293
Modeling mellow 293
Leading children through anxiety 294
Relaxing to reduce anxiety 296
Exorcizing anxiety through exercise 299
Getting Help from Others 300
Who to get help from 300
What to expect at the fi rst session 301
What happens in therapy? 302
Part VI: The Part of Tens 303
Chapter 21: Ten Ways to Stop Anxiety Quickly 305
Breathing Out Your Anxiety 305
Talking with a Friend 305
Exercising Aerobically 306
Soothing the Body 306
Drinking Tea 306
Challenging Your Anxious Thinking 307
Listening to Music 307
Finding Distractions 307
Having Sex 308
Staying with the Moment 308
Chapter 22: Ten Ways to Deal with Relapse 309
Expecting Anxiety 309
Counting the Swallows 309
Checking Out Why Anxiety Returned 310
Seeing a Doctor 310
Revisiting What Worked Before 310
Doing Something Different 311
Getting Support 311
Considering Booster Sessions 311
Looking at the Stages of Change 312
Accepting Anxiety 312
Chapter 23: Ten Signs That You Need Professional Help 313
Having Suicidal Thoughts or Plans 313
Feeling Hopeless 314
Handling Anxiety and Depression 314
Trying to No Avail 314
Struggling at Home 315
Dealing with Major Problems at Work 315
Suffering from Severe Obsessions or Compulsions 315
Understanding Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder 316
Going through Sleepless Nights 316
Getting High 316
Finding Help 317
Appendix: Resources for You 319
Self-Help Books 319
Resources to Help Children 320
Accessing Web Sites to Discover More about Anxiety 321
Index 323
| Erscheint lt. Verlag | 17.8.2010 |
|---|---|
| Sprache | englisch |
| Maße | 188 x 234 mm |
| Gewicht | 476 g |
| Themenwelt | Sachbuch/Ratgeber ► Gesundheit / Leben / Psychologie ► Psychologie |
| Geisteswissenschaften ► Psychologie ► Angst / Depression / Zwang | |
| ISBN-10 | 0-470-57441-0 / 0470574410 |
| ISBN-13 | 978-0-470-57441-6 / 9780470574416 |
| Zustand | Neuware |
| Informationen gemäß Produktsicherheitsverordnung (GPSR) | |
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