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Looking for a Test for Anxiety Disorder?
"Curious if you might suffer from anxiety? Should you go see a doctor?"The most important test for anxiety disorder is the one you give yourself.What do I mean? Most people diagnose themselves when it comes to stress-related conditions like anxiety disorder or depression. “But Grady, I’m not a doctor! Don't I need a test for anxiety disorder from a professional? How can I diagnose myself?” Come on … you do it every time you get sick! Think about it … You wake up one morning feeling like crap. You take a mental note of your symptoms: bit of a headache, stuffy nose, etc. “Probably just a cold,” you say to yourself, “I’ll tough go to work and tough this one out.” So you head to work, maybe stopping by the pharmacy to pick up an over-the-counter decongestant, and go on with your day. And maybe you’ll get better. But maybe you don’t … maybe you go a few days and feel worse, now you’ve got a painful sinus headache and your stuffy nose has turned into a runny nose with a sore throat. You think to yourself, “Uh oh … maybe this is a sinus infection. I should go to a doctor and get an antibiotic to clear this up.” So you go to the doctor, who validates and confirms your own self-diagnosis, and prescribes you an antibiotic to blast the sinus infection. Most of the time people go to a doctor, they don’t go to figure out why they’re sick, they go to confirm or validate their own idea of what the problem is. The same is true in regards to taking a test for anxiety disorder. If you don’t believe me, next time you see your family doctor, ask him how many people come into his office and say “Hey Doc, I need an antibiotic (or a pain-killer) for this or that … you can just write me the prescription and I’ll get out of your hair.” Your doctor will laugh, I promise! People go through the same process when it comes to the psychological symptoms of chronic stress: anxiety & depression. First you learn that anxiety and depression are genuine medical conditions and are treated by medical professionals with different therapies and drugs. You would be surprised how many people don’t realize that they have anxiety disorder or are depressed until they learn that these are named medical conditions. Then you take stock of how you feel, compare yourself to the people around you, read up on anxiety disorder and depression, try to decide if you’re “happy” enough, etc. That’s when you decide whether or not you pass your own personal test for anxiety disorder – by predetermining what “anxiety disorder” is in your own mind, and then evaluating yourself based on that idea. If you fail this internal test for anxiety disorder, you will probably make an appointment with a shrink to have your own self-diagnosis validated by a professional. You then embark on the method of treatment that you and your doctor agree upon, be it meetings with a therapist, psychotropic drugs, lifestyle changes, what have you. The key point to realize is that from the perspective of HARDCORE Stress Management™ at the end of the day you are the one who gives yourself the test for anxiety disorder. You are the one who determines whether or not you suffer from anxiety, and to what degree. If you are suffering so badly from anxiety that you need to go see a doctor or a shrink, then go. Allow a professional 3rd party give you their test for anxiety disorder. I am the last person in the world who will tell you not to go see a doctor if you decide you need to see a doctor. You are the only person in the world qualified to make that decision. And if you go and see a professional, and the both of you agree that you need to start taking anti-anxiety medication, then that is what you should do. Keep in mind that I fundamentally disagree with the use of anti-anxiety and anti-depressant medication to treat the vast majority of stress-related illnesses. I believe they are drastically over-prescribed and that they often do more harm than good. That being said, there are some times when these drugs are helpful to certain people. Some people have a series of catastrophic events in their lives to stressful that immediate medication can help them transition through a particularly difficult time. Other people have a brain and body chemistry so disturbed (for whatever reason) that the benefits of the medication may arguably outweigh the side effects. If you are one of those people, only you and your doctor can decide whether anti-anxiety medication is right for you. There are entire industries devoted to the pharmaceutical and medical treatments for stress. My job is to provide you alternatives. Looking for a Test for Depression?
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