Understanding Anxiety Disorder Symptoms

Approximately 20% of the US population suffers from some type of mental illness. Anxiety disorder is one of the most common diagnosed mental illnesses. On top of that, millions of people globally, suffer from anxiety, stress and depression and may even have an anxiety attack as a result. Anxiety disorder can make you feel very fearful and make you worry about everything as well as having irrational thoughts and no piece of mind. These are common anxiety disorder symptoms. When this happens you cannot live a normal, happy, and stress free life and may require professional help.

The most commonly reported anxiety disorder symptoms are known as "panic attacks". Whilst having a panic attack, fear and worry takes over your mind and your body responds with physical symptoms. A panic attack can happen all of a sudden without any warning. They usually last around fifteen minutes in most cases.

It is normal to have fears and worries at some point in your life - just ask your doctor. He or she will tell you that worry, fear and stress on occasion is nothing to be concerned about. Having a proper anxiety disorder is when your fears and worries are very severe and last for a prolonged period of time. If this happens it may be best to see a doctor and have some tests.

Having an anxiety disorder will make your body react to fear and worry by producing various physical symptoms. Your body goes into what is known as fight or flight response - acting as if it were under attack. Hormones are then produced inside the body causing your heart, lungs and other organs to work much harder. The adrenaline created inside the body may cause some severe physical anxiety disorder symptoms.

Anxiety disorder produces many different physical symptoms including stomach pain, dry mouth, diarrhea, racing heart, chest pain/tightness in the chest, difficulty breathing, dizziness and difficulty in swallowing. These anxiety disorder symptoms can overwhelm you during a panic attack. Anxiety disorders can also cause mental and emotional symptoms like trouble sleeping, irritability, lack of concentration, irrational fears and worries like the fear of death or something horrible happening to you.

Anyone can be prone to having anxiety disorder and panic attacks - even famous people. One of the main reasons for the increase in cases of anxiety disorder could be the easy access to drugs and alcohol in our society. Living a normal life can be difficult for someone with anxiety but there are many ways in which anxiety can be treated.

You must take anxiety disorder symptoms seriously. People who have anxiety attack problems think they can deal with the attacks themselves and will get better. This may be the case if you have very mild anxiety that only surfaces occasionally, but if left untreated, most anxiety disorders will get worse over time. How you go about treating anxiety attack symptoms depends on how severe your anxiety disorder is. The best option is to see your doctor and discuss the various treatment options available.