Panic & Anxiety Attacks, the whole story at last :)

I hope to explore these debilitating conditions in this and subsequent articles as these are the main reasons, in my view, for people to suffer from depression, although they are not the only ones; most reasons will usually start from this point.

BUT first some necessary background.

Panic attacks, ptsd, ocd, general anxiety disorder/s, a(n extreme) lack of confidence, disassociation, most phobias etc, have similar effects on its sufferers regardless of any previous history or single event or cause.

Anxiety is defined in my Penguin book of Psychology 3^rd edition, as; a vague & unpleasant emotional state with qualities of apprehension, dread, distress and uneasiness.
This is different, although in part connected, to a fear, which usually has a defined target or cause, and that my friends is at the root and a clue, to how people suffer from these types of disorders in the first place.

Depression is defined in the same book as a; mood state characterised by a sense of inadequacy, a feeling of despondency, a decrease in reactivity or activity, pessimism, sadness.

As most people will feel this way for completely understandable reasons for short periods the better terms to use instead of this one is Melancholy or in Psychiatry terms Anhedonia, which means a general lack of interest in the pleasures of life, either or both are a better fit and are more accurate terms to use then depression which has been overused to the point of losing it’s real and original meaning.

In a nutshell all the anxiety disorders have one important thing in common, all the sufferers are frightened, of everything…………..

It doesn’t matter if they are combat veterans in the military sense of the word or they have had to endure an abusive and/or a violent, negative events or environments, THE outcome for many will be sadly the same.

People will even learn to fear the anxiety state itself and so they will enter into an unhappy and pointless loop which they feel that they can never escape from, hence why most people will eventually visit their doctor for anti-depressants.

So let’s get down to brass tacks and explore where an unhealthy level of anxiety comes from, and in so doing, understand the real causes of it and hopefully gaining some useful insights as to how people can help themselves combat it’s affects without any unnecessary long term need for drugs.

In a previous article I covered the subject of stress, please refer to The Physiology of stress published in December of 2011, there I explored how stress affects the human body via hormones and explored why we as a species even have it. Anxiety is an outcome to someone having to face an unexpected event and it has the same effects as our natural defense mechanism of “Fight or flight” but in an emotionally stable person it will pass as the person will usually have learnt the best coping method to allow them to face the given challenge, or they will have enough self belief or confidence not to be phased by any fears that may prevent them from being successful.

In someone who has suffered from a disjointed or damaged emotional developmental phase in their lives will not have been given the time to have learnt to feel safe or gained enough self belief to be able to feel that they can cope with any situation, they will also be preoccupied with so much unnecessary stimuli that they will just freeze when faced with some everyday situations, like going outside, going shopping, talking with other people etc.

It is also worth noting that some pets can also inherit these types of conditions, mainly from their very owners.

As having suffered from these types of conditions myself it is a demoralising and unhappy way to live, and in a lot of cases unnecessary too. Having said that for some people who have learned to adapt and accept it they will find a way to still have a life and be as happy as they can be, if you are one of those then I am very happy for you, but for the rest you don’t have to resign yourself to feeling unhappy, there are always options if you are strong enough to want to look for them and reading this Blog is just one J

Lets start from the beginning and look at the stages that many child psychologists view as the normal developmental phases in an average child’s emotional development, I suspect that you will start to see a pattern or a theme here that correlates to what has been said above?

I will offer what many text books suggest as to what to expect from their new borns but add, in Italics, as to how these elements can become disjointed, it will make for some very sobering reading especially if you are a new parent, or an old one reading with “fresh eyes”.

The first Two years; Learning to Trust.

The first two years make up the nurturing stage, during which a baby develops a bond of security and trust.

How do you think that this early but integral stage can be lead the way if the child is surrounded by an emotionally unstable and confused environment, where the parents row due to the stresses of life, where rows are the norm and although the Mother may feel she is doing her best to give her child what they need, if she too is overwhelmed by events outside her control?

The defiant Twos; Finding their voice/s.

Two year olds tend to be very excited about their new found control, this stage is also filled with rapid mood shifts, stubbornness, tantrums, and an insatiable need to “do things my way……..”

At the same time the infant has a strong need to be clingy to their parents as many toddlers go through what is called “Separation Anxiety”

The child has just turned 2 years old and already the term Anxiety has reared its head. In my experience many adults that have had unhelpful early years carry these types of confusions well into their adult lives and in most cases the parents don’t realize that they usually have the means to lessen or at the very least, be able to help their child be less affected. Life isn’t meant to be easy but if you took a second to see that at an age when a child is beginning to make sense of the world around them having this time surrounded by people who are struggling to cope when they are an integral part in making sure that their child is trying to learn the very skills that they will need to survive in this sometimes confusing & competitive world.

Preschool years; I have an imagination and I’m not afraid to use it.

The ages from 3-5 are the play years where a child will spend most of their waking lives, and sleeping ones too, play acting. This fantasy world is crucial for them as they start to piece together how the world works and how they fit into it. They play at being parents, being mother and fathers. They will play with other children/siblings and they will usually mirror what they have seen.

The downside is that they will also develop fears, which will include ones that seem to have no connection to what has happened in their lives or have any obvious cause, being afraid of the dark, losing a parent/death, being left alone after school are just a few of what they will have nightmares about, and a few sleepless nights for their parents too.

Again this is another crucial time for the infant, learning to cope with these fears and anxieties has to have the parents/environment be stable and supportive, and these phases can easily set the scene for an infant to have a warped perspective/s about how they view themselves and the world around them, if I was to fix a date or time to when phobias can start from THIS would be around the age.

School years; Now lets put it altogether………

The school age period, ages 6-12, is a transitionary phase from fantasy and free form playing, to group games and sports. They will begin to feel guilty about wrong choices. They will learn about the rules that govern how they relate to others as well as rules concerning exclusion & inclusion. A healthy school age child should be able to express their emotions. Around the age of 5 they will also learn how to keep and share secrets, and at around 8 they will become more aware of their private thoughts and feelings. They begin to compare themselves with peers and become more concerned about their abilities.

I have always maintained that the ages from 6-12 are one of the most crucial stages in a child’s development, and in many cases this maybe the last chance to undo many confusions or bad habits that a child may have acquired in the preceding years. It should come as no surprise that “guilt” rears it’s ugly head around about now, and it should come as an even less of one to realize how that could be a tool to manipulate a child’s behaviour and feelings.

The last accepted phase is Adolescence; Searching for identity.

As most parents and even grandparents will acknowledge these are usually very turbulent times for teenagers the world over. As the young adult will be trying to be free of their parents but at the same time still be dependent on them in many ways. Peer pressure will be a much stronger force then even Star Wars or their parents can be in their lives, so pleasing the very people that they should be pleasing takes an often annoying back seat, and no doubt is the cause of many arguments and unrest on both sides of the age gap. They will often switch from acting responsible to still reliving their terrible twos, sometimes in the same day, even the same hour. As this phase plays out and often starts turbulently it usually settles down and the teen will show vast improvements in their relationships. While trying to earn “grown up” considerations like being able to drive they will at the same time become more adept at social situations and conflict resolving.

An interesting comment here is, “become more adept at social situations and conflict resolving.”, the trouble with that is only if they have had the chance to learn those very skills, and if the preceding years have been emotionally unstable this maybe unlikely, so they may not only have stunted social skills but be afraid of confrontations and how to resolve them, especially when they could lose out on the very things that they may need for themselves, so the upshot is that they could become more introverted and shy, the other side of the coin is that they could assume that anger is the only way to get what they want so they develop other confusions or perceptions, like assuming that arguments are the only way to resolve disagreements, the worst case scenario is that violence towards others is acceptable.

Although the above is only an over view and in no way exhaustive it is meant to give readers a chance to visibly see some of the crucial stages in a child’s emotional development, a bit of an eye opener wasn’t it? Lol

The above is in no way a criticism of what is involved in being a parent or a judgment aimed at any one parent in anyway shape of form, but it is a “heads up” for any parent, or a child who has now grown up with more questions than answers.

To help readers to gain a greater understanding let’s focus on an important stage of a child’s development in a little more depth.

Two year olds are easily distracted a phase they soon learn to outgrow, but if they don’t could this lead to A.D.D.?

Likes routine and finds changes unsettling, if this element were to carry on could this lead to greater anxieties when faced with necessary change/s later in life, could they be so bad that the anxiety grows to include a fear of everything??

They are afraid of noises, trains, thunder and even flushing toilets, separation especially at bedtime is still frightening, and they will get angry when told to stop doing some activities. Bearing in mind what I have written above it won’t come as any surprise to see that there is a very real possibility that these elements can lead to anger issues and neurosis much later in life.

The bottom line is that if any confusions are allowed to develop in a toddlers personality they will just become more prominent by the time a child reaches adolescence, and it is possible that they may have also had at least one unusually “negative event or experience” by the time they get to college or high/senior school.

From birth all infants start to try and understand the world around them these stages are crucial to how any newborn will be able to relate and be successful in the world that they will grow up to be an integral part of as adults. IT cannot be understated that it is very easy for their feelings to be abused and damaged in countless ways that will pave the way for preventable and unnecessary disorders in the coming years and although we can’t prevent most of them, and it could be argued that we shouldn’t even try, if we can understand the causes then a person in their later lives could still relearn some of the skills that they may not have had the chance to while they were younger, one is never too old to learn.

To close this first in a series of articles covering this type of subject matter, Nature & Nurture go hand in hand when it comes to how an Embryo will develop and what it may be predisposed to acquiring, this process may be transparent to the parents involved or the environments that infants may have to live through, sometimes things just happen due to bad luck or bad timing so we may still be at the mercy of what life has to challenge us with, doesnt mean we have to roll over and just accept it,

Further reading; Please refer to the “Archive & Recent Entries” boxes on the right of your screens.

Nature & Nurture, the debate continues, published in January 2012

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Child_development_stages

Are Anti-depressants being over prescribed, Published May 2011

Panic/Anxiety Attacks, a revisit.

A Emotional Confusion that has plagued our species for much longer than written history has been able to document it, and for me, it is a very telling condition that many sufferers decide to live with unnecessarily in most cases.

I would like to hear from anyone who suffers from this debilitating condition or knows someone who does, ANY insights or experiences are welcome either comment directly to this thread or send me a private and confidential email to sp-madden@hotmail.com.

Thank you

Nature V’s Nurture the debate continues.

Life is tough, but its tougher when you’re stupid. -John Wayne

http://www.livescience.com/4168-nature-nurture-mysteries-individuality-unraveled.html

 

Two studies have caught my analytical eye in the last few days, one was posted by a Facebook friend, Helga Weiss, and the other I found due to having my curiosity aroused enough to wanting to put pen to paper, yes I know I am supposed to be taking a hiatus to write my book but this is involved in that process, so let’s view it as practice

To help you get up to speed these are the two links in question-

http://www.livescience.com/18132-intelligence-social-conservatism-racism.html

http://www.thedailybeast.com/cheats/2012/01/26/report-prejudice-linked-to-low-iq.html
(Read the comments)

I made a comment on the nature v’s nurture link at the start of this article, I said “I have always felt that what we are born with is just the “starting gun going off”, the race being life and how we actually finish it is our choices……………”

And that sums up by opinion about the first link, namely we can have infants born with a high IQ that due to the environmental factors can grow up to be closed minded and prejudiced ridden adults, either through design or accident,  and my view on accidents is that most can be prevented. On the other hand we can have an infant with a low IQ go onto be very successful just through hard work, not taking no for an answer and a little luck and opportunity……….

Our species tends to gravitate towards one extreme thinking process or another so usually taking the pragmatic view tends to be anathema to how their minds usually work, but one quote from the first link may help to clarify things a little, “Nonetheless, there is reason to believe that strict right-wing ideology might appeal to those who have trouble grasping the complexity of the world.”

And that one quote should give you pause for thought.

If children are raised in an oppressive, negative, or just plain unhealthy environments they will not gain the necessary “skills” to know how to cope with what life will ultimately throw at them, and even more importantly hinder them from leading happy and successful lives, REGARDLESS at how high their IQ maybe because they will lack skills and awareness in another important form of “Q”, namely their levels of EQ or Emotional Quotient, sometimes referred to EI, or Emotional Intelligence.

Try this little quiz, http://psychology.about.com/library/quiz/bl_eq_quiz.htm

Please do the quiz BEFORE reading further J

This is my result;

What’s Your EQ?
Emotional Intelligence Test
How Did You Score? Your results indicate a high score on emotional intelligence. What Does Your Score Mean? People who score high on emotional intelligence tend to be skilled at interpreting, understanding, and acting upon emotions. They are adept at dealing with social or emotional conflicts, expressing their feelings, and dealing with emotional situations.

My IQ is 120, I was born into a violent and negative as well as emotionally confused environment and then went onto being raised by a single Mum, self-made man?

Maybe, maybe my genes gave me the right blueprint and I just had to wait until I gained enough self-belief and self-awareness to finally be able to fit the pieces of the puzzle together, doesn’t that imply that I had to make conscious choices??

So what about a person with a lower IQ/EQ?

Does having a low IQ predispose a person to being a prejudiced adult with no life?

In my humble view not necessarily as we all can make choices, if we allow our pasts to rule our future then we will just reap what we sow. If acting ignorant and closed minded is how we wish to be known for then that is exactly how we will be seen by others; our social circle and our levels of self-respect will never be allowed to grow as that has to be a conscious choice for them to be able to. Even people who view themselves as having some form of “learning disability” can sometimes be their own worst enemy by allowing that tag to be even used and in so doing assuming that they cannot have a healthier level of self-respect, not everyone with disabilities has lower levels of S-R, it is usually a choice ONE which can be changed, if the desire is strong enough.

So back to that quote “Nonetheless, there is reason to believe that strict right-wing ideology might appeal to those who have trouble grasping the complexity of the world.”

 

This mentality will always force me to take a pragmatic breath or two, why not simply acknowledge that “you” find the world confusing”, and become more determined to gain the necessary knowledge to become less so?

Are people who don’t lazy, indifferent, or just plain ignorant??
Not in my view, this mindset is very telling, it indicates to me a person who is in self-destruct mode, in other words they just don’t care enough about themselves or be capable of really caring about others to want to change. In a word they are a car crash just waiting to happen, one that is under their direct control. So either due to fear or anxiety they wont change until they are forced to. And as I have said in the previous articles this type of mindset usually leads to them withdrawing from general society into likeminded groups.

I believe that this is Human Evolution at work as well as survival of the fittest, the family environments that lead to children without the necessary skills and self-belief/respect to cope with the complexities of life will just fall by the wayside, either that or they will just “Transformmodyfy” in to a Republican……….

In a nutshell, we may be born with a greater level of challenges to have to face but how we choose to finish the race is based on what choices we make during it. Some maybe happy with just getting to the grave just happy that they made it alive, others may get there kicking and screaming, IT isn’t how you die that matters it’s how YOU LIVED………….

Be lucky My Friends.

The Physiology of Stress.

AND why it is directly connected to YOUR levels of Anxiety.

Most people reading this may not know what stress is, the way the body reacts to high levels of it, OR why we as a species even have it. So this maybe a good place to start, so pull up a comfy chair grab a cuppa and we will start this quick medical foray in to this much misunderstood but necessary part of our physiology.

When you perceive a threat, your nervous system responds by releasing a flood of stress hormones, including adrenaline and cortisol. These hormones rouse the body for emergency action.

Your heart pounds faster, muscles tighten, blood pressure rises, breath quickens, and your senses become sharper. These physical changes increase your strength and stamina, speed your reaction time, and enhance your focus – preparing you to either fight or flight from the danger at hand.

All well and good so far but the trouble with stress OR more importantly how you and your body handle it, is that if you do not adapt to greater levels of the hormones that are released to help you cope with it leads to the Anxiety family of disorders, these range from the mild or General Anxiety Disorder to the disabling versions which includes PTSD, Post Traumatic Stress Disorder, what may surprise some of you reading this is that PTSD isn’t just confined to soldiers.

Anyone who has faced a situation or event/s that they have felt that they can’t cope with OR just as importantly haven’t been given the “skills” to cope, will suffer lesser or greater by this serious BUT treatable disorder.

We all need stress it is part and parcel of being human and most if not all mammals will react in similar ways to it.

But we are all made differently nature gives us a gene set and life will do the rest. Family environments, work, school unexpected events will all challenge us in various ways, at best it will be a roll of a dice that may influence how we cope and what resources, if any, are available to us to help us cope.

What has gone before is of little interest to us now, understanding the causes will most definitely help but it is what you decide to do now that is more important. Acknowledging that you have anxiety issues has to be the first step, being in denial seldom solves anything and until you can admit you have problems then you will be unlikely be able to start the healing process, you will, as I have said on many occasions be in a pointless loop……….

A major cause of depression or melancholy in most adults is their lack of being able to either wanting to help themselves or not knowing that they even need help in the first place so they stay in this “purgatory” state of mind until it is too late for them to be happy with themselves and enjoy their life on this planet, seems a waste, doesn’t it?

Adrenaline and Cortisol are necessary hormones for mammals to be able to cope with stresses of what life will throw at us, but if we feel that we can’t cope those levels rise and then become harmful over time, people can show signs of an “overdose” of stress by their hands shaking when under relatively low levels of stress, they will show signs of “second guessing” themselves. Their levels of self-belief and respect will usually nose dive as a consequence. This is what is meant by people who are “Burnt up”; they have reached their limit to be able to cope with stress.

If you are a parent then you can show signs of an unhealthy lack of ability to handle stress WHICH your children can inherit, however young they maybe, and there is evidence that those effects can be felt BEFORE the infant is even born.

We have evolved to how we are now due to mutations in the gene pool, when our ancestors were under stress those that had certain mutations carried on their genes, those that didn’t, didn’t. So if your grandparents were under more stress then they were able to cope with you may see a predisposition to higher levels of anxiety either in yourself, or your own children. This may lead to conditions like Type 2 Diabetes, a sobering thought.

It cannot be understated that the importance of how you handle stress may not only affect your life but those that you hold dear.

Most people feel that they can’t cope due to a unnecessary low level of self-belief or confidence in their abilities, this can either be due to an early environment/s or just may have manifested over time. Either way rebuilding their confidence in themselves is usually a major step in the healing process and one that the sooner it is started the better.

For me to tell you that you can cope is unlikely to help you because as soon as you are under stress or outside your comfort zone you will very quickly forget those words, the best way is for you to put yourself into situations that help your comfort zone grow. But it has to be with small steps, getting too ambitious too quickly will only lead you to regressing, or crashing which will make you question the whole healing process. Due to the limitations of this platform I can only offer general advice but if you wish to have an individual assessment then please send me an email and I will do my best to help you personally.

As for most things in life, the more you put in the more you will get out and helping yourself now is obviously no exception.

You may feel overwhelmed and have no idea where to start, but if you are still reading this YOU already have.

Any solution to ANY problem always starts with assessing what the problem actually is, how it manifests itself, or in medical jargon, what “symptoms” are  presented. So let’s start there.

Isolate what the problems or issues are; do you suffer anxiety only at work, school, or when someone shouts at you?

Do you feel higher levels when you leave your house, get on a bus, or just talking to people on a one to one basis like when you ask shop assistants for help etc??

Do you feel that you are not worthy to be helped or feel that your needs are not important??

Being honest and being able to be objective at this stage is crucial to the success of the following steps, so ask a trusted friend/partner for their views, how they see you could be a world apart from your own perspective and I suspect a much healthier one too.

Anticipate these situations and have a plan to how you can cope with them. If it’s work related ask for more training or ask to be coached in ways to improve how you perform the tasks needed. If it is school related then ask a teacher for some one to one time so you can gain confidence that you can do the “work” to the required standard.

If it involves some form of agoraphobia then ask a friend to be another set of eyes, they can then offer feedback as to what you could have done differently, so the next time you can try it, if the idea works then keep it IF it doesn’t then adapt it and try again.

If your issues involve a lack of self worth or self respect then you will need to start with how you perceive yourself and the possible causes. This may involve some form of therapy as most people, however eager they want to help, are usually unable to cope with the subsequent needs of what this may really involve. If therapy isn’t an option initially then you can try the following general advice, with the same offer of help stated above.

Most causes of a lack of self respect have common causes, as I have mentioned in previous articles, you may need to face the cause/s of why you feel this way about yourself to be fully able to start the healing process, and this may mean that you will have to talk about events that maybe painful or stressful to have to revisit. In my experience hearing a healthier perspective to these events can empower people to be able to start to move forward with their lives.

The reason for this is that people with low levels of self respect tend to keep running away, what they don’t have to face will mean that the issues will just go away as the fear of facing them is too great. THIS isn’t the case once you have started to face them in a safe and non-judgmental environment. YOU owe it to yourself and your future happiness to feel the fear and do it anyway unless you like being in a pointless loop?

Acknowledge any successes however small they may appear, give yourself praise for a job well done, or completing a task, you may not know what this feels like, hence why you have these issues in the first place, but you need to be able to tell yourself that YOU did good, keeping a journal or diary will help with this phase. Being able to look back at events and how you coped may inspire you to keep going when you may be faced with a similar situation again. Don’t rely on your memory to help you because as soon as you are under any unwelcome levels of stress you wont be able to recall what you did that worked the last time.

 

Never let your guard down, this will be an ongoing process. It may take weeks or months but as soon as you become complacent and assume that you are “healed” you risk crashing. You need to be aware of how you feel and what still triggers higher levels of anxiety all the time, and you need to keep asking yourself what else can you do to counter any negative thoughts. When you are in a quiet place visualize situations so you can “practice” solving any issues that may hinder any success, or how you can cope with them.

These are general tips to try and get you to think differently about you, how you perceive yourself, and your abilities to cope with situations and life in general, however daunting this may feel to you now, YOU do have the abilities to cope you just need to see for yourself that you can and with each positive outcome your levels of self belief will grow and so will your confidence, I am confident that if you follow the advice here or adapt it to suit your personal needs, YOU will not only feel more confident but you will have a much more happier outlook with your life then you have ever felt before, I suspect that you will agree once you can commit to helping yourself.

Further reading;

http://helpguide.org/mental/stress_signs.htm

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Agoraphobia

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/General_anxiety_disorder

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/PTSD

YOU can’t fix anything if YOU are broken yourself.

Part Two.

YOU can’t fix anything if YOU are broken yourself.

The follow up to my previous article called “I wasn’t there…….”

Before you proceed further it may be worth visiting the following articles/pages in My Blog;

http://seamusmadden1960.wordpress.com/category/introduction/ & the previous article to this one http://seamusmadden1960.wordpress.com/2011/10/26/i-wasn%E2%80%99t-there-sort-of%E2%80%A6%E2%80%A6%E2%80%A6%E2%80%A6/

In my previous article I introduced some complicated terminology that maybe worth revisiting before you continue with this article;

Depersonalisation, in psychiatric terms it means a loss of contact with one’s own reality. In mild cases this could manifest itself in the sufferer feeling in some way unconnected to themselves and the situation they are presently in, but in more severe cases sufferers can feel that parts of their bodies don’t belong to them.

Dissociation, is an altered state of consciousness characterized by partial or complete disruption of the normal integration of a person’s normal conscious or psychological functioning. Dissociation is most commonly experienced as a subjective perception of one’s consciousness being detached from one’s emotions, body and/or immediate surroundings and amnesia is a common theme for many forms of this disorder.

I will be introducing other terminology in this article too, but don’t worry I wont leave you high and dry as I will be making sure that you have links, as explained in the “Introduction” article in my Blog, to help you along the way.

Now we have that bit over with lets get cracking,

Most if not all people who suffer form some form of Emotional Confusion, E/C, can trace it’s likely origin back to an environment or sequence of events in their past. However some people may feel that ignoring the subsequent affects of those events will mean that they will just go away, they wont and if they are not dealt with they will only hold you back. Running away seldom solves anything.

Those that suffer from some form of E/C, we all have some to a greater or lesser degree fyi, and choose to ignore any behavioural maladies will usually exhibit common behaviours which will have an affect on their lives and more importantly THEIR future happiness. They may find it hard to feel confident in a lot of social situations and social interactions with others in groups, they can be prone to angry outbursts, fits of sulking that can make them unlikely to be invited in the first place. Their view of their own needs will be secondary to others needs, which will make them appear untrustworthy, due to the fact that if you don’t value your own needs then it is very unlikely that you will be able to know the value of others either. People will view them as undependable so they will seek further refuge in their own thoughts or restricted social circles. They will wrongly assume in a lot of cases that they are under some form of microscope and may feel that everything in the whole world revolves around then in some way.

In the worst cases they may lash out unnecessarily or even be prone to stalking those that they feel have done them some form of wrong, the term for theses types of people are Bunny Boilers.

The bottom line for many is they will, or feel that they are, becoming isolated so their negatively based thought processes will just go into overdrive which could even lead to Psychotic beliefs or actions. All this because they wont face the root causes of their E/C for whatever reasons so we are losing good people for no rational benefit, self indulgence taken to career levels………..

One of the terms used to describe this type of unhelpful mindset is called Passive Aggressive or P/A. There are 9 key areas that if certain behaviours are presented can lead to a diagnosis, they are;

Ambiguity, Competition, Intimacy, Chaotic Situations, Excuses, Procrastination, Sulking, dependent, & Victimisation.

** Please try and resist the understandable temptation to self diagnose, we are all usually our own worst judges especially if the content is very likely to be negative in content **

I will pick a couple of the areas above and expand on them here, my purpose is to make the general reader aware not try and use this platform as a diagnosis tool.

One of the common “indicators” to someone who maybe suffering from this treatable disorder is Ambiguity, they will talk cryptically with the intention of making others feel insecure, but in reality all they are doing is advertising their own insecurities for other perceptive people to “read”. This one area confirms what I have quoted for a very long time, “Sometimes how others behave tells you more about them then how they maybe trying to make you feel”, and also underlines one of the purposes for my book, “understand why you behave and think then understanding how others do will help you gain a greater empathy”

The other area I want to highlight here is Dependent, in this case it means a fear of dependency. What some people may not realize is that this usually means that the person hasn’t learnt how to trust their own abilities, NOT that they don’t trust others.

All these types of E/C which includes the Anxiety family of disorders all revolve around the person’s lack of self belief/confidence/worth/respect, and the overriding indicator is that everything leads back to “SELF”, in other words them.

This isn’t them being selfish, it is a default mindset that indicates a lack of understanding of emotional issues, because they never had a chance to learn them in supportive and safe environments, and the longer they ignore this the less likely that they will truly find happiness.

A sister disorder to P/A is Dependent Personality Disorder, or DPD, here the whole area of Dependent mentioned above has gone through a 180 and now the sufferer can not cope in life without a “significant other” to take control of their lives, and in a lot of cases that control is total. Please note it is often seen that a person suffering from P/A can also suffer from DPD at times, so they can switch back and forth depending on their levels of stress and anxiety.

The purpose of covering all these aspects of behaviour is to help the reader appreciate the following segment of this article and by reading both parts of this two part article gain a greater understanding of why others behave in the myriad of ways that they do, and also to help you understand your own behaviours, what you do with this information is totally up to you.

People can hide their maladies under the carpet for all they are worth but in my experience it seldom bodes well for any future successes, however humble they may end up being. The reason is that they all have one common denominator, their crucial developmental years, in other words their childhoods. In my forthcoming book I start by exploring key stages in a childs informative years and the obvious damage that any negative environments or traumatic events can do to them.

It has been a long held belief of mine that all the members of the “Anxiety Family” of disorders all revolve around one thing, a lack of confidence in ones own abilities, all the disorders mentioned in these two articles are all preventable, if not at the time of their making then later IF the sufferer chooses to make positive changes to their lives and the hardest thing that many sufferers are faced with is forgiving and accepting that these events are usually outside their direct control, the second hardest step is finding ways to move on, and in a lot of cases, the motivation to even want to.

For a lot of people that I have spoken to the one subject that rears it’s ugly head the most often is Sexual Abuse, in all it’s forms. This event will be the most likely cause of any anxieties that the victim will suffer from into their adult lives, not just because of that event but because there will be a correspondingly negative environment that will go hand in hand with it, not in every case obviously, but more than you may expect. Research has shown that S/A will damage a childs/young adults emotional well being, those that have suffered neglect in some form have been known to have had remissions or a form of hiatus from its affects, most sufferers of S/A seldom do.

We cant undo these types of events and as I mentioned in my other article, Victim or Survivor, we can either view it as an indicator of our own worth or just try and view it as just bad luck. The point is we can either choose to deal with the subsequent E/C or we can choose to allow them to rule our lives, so many people are faced with those two choices, lets explore the Pros & Cons of both methods.

Rule your life method; Pro.

Ignore your past and just focus on solving the residual maladies.

Any therapist who knows what they are doing will try and help guide you to solving any issues that you feel you have. They should understand the causes of most disorders and have trusted methods that will help you find a way through them.

Rule your life method; Con.

But not facing them can run the risk of them not being totally resolved so you may end up in a from of remission that could lead you to becoming complacent and any innocuous event could trigger a relapse with disastrous results.

Deal with them; Pro.

Taking the hard path to self discovery.

Taking a Holistic view means that your life is explored and as and when a key event is highlighted this can then be faced and reinterpreted from a more healthier and positive perspective. You maybe surprised that a therapist just saying sorry can have on their patient just by using that simple word.

Deal with them; Con.

The down side is that you will likely be faced with a stressful and emotional time. Reliving any event or moment in time from your past will usually lead to a flood of emotions to cascade out of you, but you have survived all these years being a lost soul so a few moments of epiphany now may allow you to find yourself, to yours and everyone’s benefit.

I suspect that if you were truthful you know that option B offers the best long term solutions but if you wish to choose option A and you leave it for long enough then you will be old enough to no longer care anyway.

It is understandable for people to choose the route of least resistance but this isn’t just about you, is it.

The key here is not to get too ambitious, small steps usually leads to bigger gains. The first step usually revolves accepting past events for what they truly are, YOUR past.

The second step usually revolves around seeking help to resolve any E/C and seeking a total resolution to them, as much as possible. Don’t expect them to disappear and neither should they as these experiences can help improve your ability to be insightful and empathic about how others may feel, and being able to find a positive however small is a small step in the healing process ONE which should never be underestimated.

The third step usually means facing any negative environment or traumatic event head on. Listen to how the therapist can offer other perspectives that you have not had the chance to explore yourself as you have spent so many years being self indulgent they just wouldn’t have occurred to you. This doesn’t mean that you are a failure BUT because someone has failed YOU.

This step will most likely be the longest, no real surprise there but worth noting all the same.

The forth step will find you viewing situations in a totally different way, as well as how you actually view your own self worth.

The outcome, however slow the progress may feel to you, will be that you should start to feel whole again and not feel that there is a missing piece that has haunted you for as long as you can remember. You may also find that your internal voices will now be more supportive as opposed to them being a hindrance to any moments of happiness that were usually very fleeting.

YOU can have this, all it takes is you making the right choice and being ready to put your own needs first, I know you are worth it, YOU just have to realize that yourself.

Be lucky

Seamus Madden MASC

From the forthcoming book, “The Book of Explanations”.

I wasn’t there, sort of…………

Many moons ago and on more than one occasion I experience a “weird” feeling. One that I was reminded of again recently. I was standing in a car park waiting for a lift home when I felt that I was physically there but in some way I wasn’t, I quickly realized that this wasn’t the same feeling as I had felt before, this time I felt I was really there and the feelings I were recalling were a memory of how I had felt on previous occasions, so what was different?………..

Firstly it dawned on me that my life and my role within it was radically different than it was before, so I had to understand what was actually going on this time round.

SO what was going on…………

The answer is a simple one, which as usual belies how deep these emotional confusions go, and I doubt I am the only one that has experienced them either.

The “Technical” term is Depersonalisation; in psychiatric terms it means a loss of contact with one’s own reality. In mild cases this could manifest itself in the sufferer feeling in some way unconnected to themselves and the situation they are presently in, but in more severe cases sufferers can feel that parts of their bodies don’t belong to them. I have seen the later first hand when I use to make false limbs for people who had intentionally taken steps to rid themselves of a part of their body that they felt didn’t belong to them. It had been noted that some would go use some very drastic methods to achieve that end, including placing their limb on a rail track until a train removed the offending limb……….

In the less affected sufferers it could be viewed as an escape or coping mechanism borne out of some traumatic event/s from their pasts. Like depression I view it as a symptom of a much bigger picture and if allowed to become chronic the affects can be just as debilitating for the unfortunate many.

Bearing the last paragraph in mind I have found in many cases that most “Emotionally rooted confusions” seem to have a lack of Self Esteem {SE} as a root. Contrary to what some people may believe low levels of SE are usually caused by some form of abuse be it sexual or physical OR have their roots in some form of dysfunctional/indifferent environments, the bottom line for many is that they are seldom shown love or encouragement or it is the “wrong type of love”, or a mixture of both as the end result seems to have similar affects either way. As very few of us are lucky to have a perfect upbringing most of us have to accept that we maybe a work in progress, even more proof that “you” are not alone.

Even those that feel that they had a perfect upbringing with doting and loving parents and early years may wonder why they have felt similar feelings at least once in their lives, the better question is why wouldn’t you have?

We are all human, we share a common set of emotions, and we all have to go through a predictable set of phases that lead to adulthood, it isn’t what we have to go through it is how we view ourselves, before, during, and after that defines our character and the traits that show in that process. What may surprise some readers of this article is that the lower your level of intelligence or IQ, the less affected by these types of “disorders” you may end up being.

Please take a moment to really think about the last part of that paragraph, “What may surprise some readers of this article is that the lower your level of intelligence or IQ the less affected by these types of “disorders” you may end up being.”

What do you think it means?

At it’s heart it means that we have the solution/s to our own self perpetuated maladies. We may not have made them they may have resulted due to events far outside of our direct control but we keep them going due to a lack of understanding of the potential causes that some events or environments may have on us at a much later date.
Please try and resist the temptation of becoming indignant and use profane language at this moment, mainly due to the reason that I cant see or hear you, so it would be wasted. There is a process going on inside many peoples heads that seems to rule their lives, and in some cases, could lead to them not having a very long one, or a long and unhealthy one at best. Taking a second now to keep reading what follows may just help you turn your life around, don’t you think that would be a good idea?

Talking to the many people I have over the last 6 years has led me to a very important observation, and that is that having an unhealthy level of SE can lead to destructive mindsets that prevent us from caring about ourselves enough, we will smoke or drink too much, become dangerously obese, be predisposed to addictive drugs or other behaviors that are socially inhibiting. The list is endless and can range from the very slight to the down right life destroying.

This isn’t me saying that all emotional confusions of this nature must have these types of causes as nature or ones genes play an important part too, it isn’t so much a case of nature or nurture but an unpredictable mix of both these aspects that will ultimately affect how any one person may evolve.

I doubt that there is a gene that primarily controls shyness or one that controls anger directly either but I do believe that a cauldron of many “ingredients” can lead to how some people may behave even if their lives are more perfect than others; it is possible for similar events to gain a foothold in our genes over millions of years that may explain many of the behavioural disorders that we see today, or our predisposition by many to them.

As I said above, people with lower levels of intelligence seem to experience depression and other similar symptoms far less than others the reason is that people with a higher level are more aware of themselves and the outcomes of possible events, or so they believe. The trouble with intelligence is that it doesn’t always go hand in hand with common sense, and ones perception of what is and how something is doesn’t always follow how an individual may think it should,

Common Sense, although can be innate in some, is usually born out of experience and trial and error for many more.

People cant truly mind read but if you understand yours and others behaviours then you will be very close to being able to do just that as most behaviours, if not all, are indicators of how someone can view themselves; the Anxiety family of disorders, for example, can show a lack of confidence and self belief borne out of an indifferent or aggressive environments. To go even deeper and to simplify the process even more, the more we “shrink” down the behaviours you will notice that they will usually lead to a common denominator; people with anger management issues can also indicate a lack of self belief too.

Finding the common denominator is key to understanding the root causes of most anger and anxiety issues that far too many people have to endure in these modern times, and in a lot of cases, unnecessarily too. In my experience the two lowest denominators are Guilt and a lack of Self Belief, and they can usually be lessened when the person has explored the events that are the root cause of those confusions as putting those events into perspective through another’s eyes can usually offer a more healthier and less harmful spin, and in a lot of cases, to the persons life in a very direct and positive way.

Having read all of the above you maybe wondering where Depersonalisation and Disassociation come into the mix?

The answer is a simple one, psychologists et al view these “confusions” as a sign of stress, or to be precise, a lack of being able to handle it, and guess what the common denominator is……….

You seem to be getting the hang of all this psychology stuff so lets break this all down into a plan?

Most negative behaviours are usually the cause of some kind of confusion, understanding the process that leads to these confusions will usually offer better long term results rather than just sweeping them under the carpet and hoping they will go away, they wont, so facing them now will be far healthier in the long term than popping an Anti-Depressant for 5 years and assuming that will solve all your issues, that wont either.

It is now accepted by many that we are born with 6 basic emotions; Anger, Fear, Disgust, and sadness with Joy, and Surprise following closely behind. Take a close look at this list…………

Four are negative sounding, one is positive and one is neutral. The four negative ones were inherited as a way of protecting the gene carrier so they can get to an age when they can safely procreate and stand a chance of keeping any offspring alive so the process can continue, and as a species our evolution and the very fact that we are still here, is testament to the success of that very process, but socially, technically, and more importantly, emotionally, we are evolving faster than we our emotional make up can keep up with.

Contrary to what you may presently believe, guilt isn’t one of the six, it is derived from a mixture of the ones above, and brainwashing techniques are born out of the process that “taps in” to a person’s fears via manipulation techniques, using these very emotions, which wasn’t nature’s intention, worth noting those facts.

As we are no longer tree dwelling or vegetarians, we now walk upright and can manipulate objects with apparent ease and we are so dependant on technology that has raced forward in leaps and bounds that for many the pace has left them very far behind, or that is how they feel.

The whole point of all this necessary background information is to give you the Reader a better understanding of where you come from and allow you the chance to decide where you will end up, and just as importantly, how.

No one’s life will ever be perfect, we all have imperfections, good for us I say, but some imperfections don’t help us in our search for happiness, although that can start with being happy with what we presently have, that can be a transient stage at best for many, so assuming that this is a long term status quo is naïve at best. Some of our traits are so ingrained that it is unlikely we will ever be able to fully adapt them, but with some thought and self-respect we can make sure that those traits don’t rule our lives and starting by accepting how the traits we have can be unhelpful is an integral stage in gaining Integrity.

So what about Depersonalisation et al?

It is part of the Anxiety family, as are OCD, Panic Attacks, PTSD, and the countless others that are being added on a daily basis by well meaning Psychologists/Psychiatrists; we have to have a tag that defines who we are, what ever happened to the simple phrase of “Troubled Person”?

Anxiety is born out of a belief that a person is unable to cope with the situation or event that they may have to face, the anticipation is usually worse than the actual event but as this mindset is controlled by Cognitive Distortions which by their very definition are ruled by irrational thought processes, this whole process is allowed to continue and usually unabated. The Anxiety has a lack of confidence as it’s root cause, and a person’s levels of confidence, self belief, and self esteem are what a caring and capable upbringing is supposed to give a Child during their informative years. If a Child is surrounded by arguing parents who care more about their own dysfunctional lives then the caring of their vulnerable offspring then it is no surprise that some children gain these disruptive confusions well into their adult live.

Although the possible permutations vary in subtle degrees it won’t come as any surprise that the example used above can vary but the outcomes seldom do. Children need to know that they are loved BUT just as importantly need to see and feel that they are safe and being brought up in a loving environment. Having one parent doesn’t mean that any child wont receive these necessities but how they will perceive their role in the world around them, and how “big” that world will ultimately be will be dependent on what support network the single parent has access too.

To be continued…………

From a forthcoming book by the same Author

Try this little “test”, :)

 

Answer the following questions, quickly but truthfully, to the best of your ability,

PLEASE USE A SEPARATE PIECE OF PAPER 

 

1, What is your mood today?
(Happy, Upbeat, sad, Melancholy etc)

 

2, When was the last time that your mood was the exact opposite of Q1?

 

3, How would you rate your level of intelligence?

            (Slightly lower than average, Average or maybe a little above, I’m a Rocket Scientist)

 

4, Do you view yourself as articulate and able to express yourself confidently?

 

5, How do others view you, the same as your answer to Q4?

 

6, What, in your opinion, is stopping you from achieving any goal you want?

 

7, What is the most important wish that you want?

 

8, Name one “bad” thing that you would change about yourself?

 

9, Now name one thing that doesn’t need changing?

                        TURN THE PAPER OVER AND CONTINUE READING THIS NOTE.

 

A lot of people have had a tough time of life; events, environments and just bad luck have all played their part in making life more challenging than it needs to be. But we are seldom “judged” on what has happened to us, but more by what we did when faced with them, AND we are usually our own Judge and Jury. Seldom are we a fair jury either, if anything we can be overly critical and unfairly place blame where none was warranted, or even deserved. What we usually do is not give ourselves any credit for what we have achieved, unless it is negative…………

A lot of events are outside our direct control, either we were far too young to know any different, far too inexperienced to actually know what we should have done, either way some of us are predisposed to seeing things through others eyes, in a nutshell our perspective of life in general, is not balanced, it is biased. This biasing isn’t of our making, it is usually inherited.

 

The questionnaire above is designed to get you to think about who you are and where you are in your life, at this time of writing, there are no right or wrong answers; it is only for you to gain some self awareness.

 

NOW, pretend someone else wrote those answers AND not you…..

WHAT DO YOU SEE?????

Victim or a Survivor?

We are all victims of something at some time or another during our lives, ironically we don’t view ourselves as victims when it is positive, but we are still arguably one then as well.

The foundations of how we feel and therefore will react to any traumatic or happy events were covered in other chapters but some basic information may benefit to have repeated again.

As a species we are hard wired to assume the worst, it is an instinctive defence mechanism. It is better to play safe than sorry if you like. In the days when that mechanism was being laid down we were not as knowledgeable as we are capable of being now, well some of us at any rate, so ignorance was the norm. But it isn’t an excuse now. We shouldn’t swim in crocodile infested waters, stick our fingers into dark corners of garages, poke hornet’s nests or play chicken with a river that has piranhas as the main predator, but people do so all the same. Some things we can control, some things we can anticipate but is there really something that we can truly call an accident?

We are brought up in environments that are outside our control, no one will take any notice of a 5 year child stating with all the vigour of an experienced politician that the bath water is too cold for this time of year and that I don’t take kindly to being washed that way, thank you very much. Some parents/guardians will do their best to teach the basic requirements that will help their child into their adult years but others will be forced via natural forces to have children and so will “teach” their children how to be victims or survivors or at the very best pass on unhelpful confusions and not be able to lessen their potential harm. And that is where the cognitive distortions start. Cognitive distortions are irrational thought processes that lead to Neurosis. We all have them, we may see things only in black and white, that everyone likes or hates us, that the only obvious answer to anything that happens to us can only be negative etc. But people who have been exposed to negative events or prolonged exposure to negative or dysfunctional environments will invariably learn to assume that the way they think about themselves and the situations they will come in to contact with are the norm and that is the only way to think.

We go out of our way, usually, to interact with others of our own species; we have to learn the skills that allow us to be successful at it, and we have been given abilities like paranoia, to be the best we can be, unless we allow neurosis to control our thought processes. We may put ourselves into danger when common sense/instinct tells us we should be more careful, dark streets late at night, why didn’t we go home earlier etc.

Maybe we need to be faced with the same mistake enough times for it to eventually sink in so that the one person who has control now is us, we either allow the years of brainwashing to own us or we gain some self worth and esteem.

Victim/Survivor?

Life’s events may mean we may get some unlucky breaks, some of those breaks maybe harsh, unfair and totally unnecessary, bad things usually are. But we are animals at heart, we may have the ability to rationalise whereas other mammals may not be able to do that, but we are more animal than robot. So we have to accept that we cant always expect ourselves to know what may happen in any given situation or whether bad luck will just play it’s unwelcome part. We have to learn to handle mistakes, as part of the learning curve of being a homo sapien.  In any given event we may start off by being a victim but what we are at the end of it is up to us, our choice.

If we are now self aware enough to know that our early developmental years were a little off whack then we owe it to ourselves to change the way we think, or look for examples, be it people or writing, that help us to reprogram those cognitive distortions into more positive ones so we can come out of any event as wiser survivors not despondent victims who, through their own volition, choose to stay that way.

I have spoken to many victims of some nightmarish events, some of them maybe just a little less harmful than others but they all have one thing in common. The victim didn’t know how to make sense of the events that happened to them so their negative or even instinctive programming took over and so started years of unhappiness. They felt that they were in some way to blame, that they must have caused it or made it happen. This, in some cases, from people who were not yet in puberty. They are no more responsible for those events as anyone going to a party and having their drinks drugged, there is just too much “going on” around them for them to always see the threats let alone know how to prevent them, if we thought that we could be attacked every time we left the house no one would ever be able to leave, more proof of cognitive distortions at work.

We are all therefore going to be victims of bad luck at some time or other, we will no doubt make many mistakes at some time or other in our lives too. But being a victim of such events or making mistakes does not lessen our self worth, our self esteem. It doesn’t mean we are failures that we have let ourselves down or our families either and however hard it maybe at the time we must try not to let these events get out of proportion as the situation could always have been worse. We deserve to be happy, it is a natural right to be so, if other people choose to perpetuate their unhappiness by committing bad acts then that says more about their lack of self esteem and the fact that they cant or wont make positive changes to their lives, it doesn’t mean we have to follow them, does it?

Understanding the way we think and feel as individuals is gained by being honest with who we are and how we got that way, warts and all, when we can put our hands on our hearts and say I am what I am then we have gained integrity, many people seldom reach that level of self understanding, they may try the good book, which was written by people who didn’t have it either, they may follow a more spiritual path, which seldom fully answers the questions it generates, OR they can listen to people who have been there, done that and who are still smiling.

The next chapter explores why people do bad things.

All text © Seamus Madden, from a book called The Book Of Explanations. If he can leave reality alone for 5 minutes and finish the thing, J

Are Anti-depressants being over prescribed……..

A psychotherapist says depression can be debilitating — but that it’s also been largely created by doctors and drug companies as a medical condition. 

In 2007 I wrote an article for a writers website called Helium.com. In it I asked are Anti-Depressants (Anti-D’s) really necessary and shouldn’t health professionals be looking at their patients care from a holistic perspective. I went on to explain my reasons. The article was inspired from my experiences from a UK viewpoint as I found from personal experience that they were handed out far too easily and in most cases unnecessarily. Four years later I now live and work in the USA and have now found out that someone I personally know has their local MD still prescribing her Anti-D’s after Ten years, so I decided to revisit the question again, here are my findings, from the other side of the pond.

Anti-D’s have long been a catch all drug for over 20 years but my fear is that ill-informed patients and their care-givers are being manipulated by misguided or two faced drug companies motivated by profits. And my personal experience backs that up, as well as countless counseling sessions with “patients” via internet based sites. It is now obvious for many therapists and psychologists that depression isn’t a “medical” condition but a behavioural one, you could say that it is a mindset rather than a specific chemical disorder. But if you ask a lot of Doctors they will treat it as such and prescribe drugs to help the patient cope better. It is understandable that the patients could be less informed than their Gp/Md’s but can their doctors really be that way, and will the health care that they are expected to give be compromised due to their misguided or ignorant methods?

In 2005 the CDC, Center for Disease Control & prevention did a study that looked at the total number of drugs prescribed in the US via doctors and hospitals. In its study of the 2.4 billion drugs prescribed, of those, 118 million were for antidepressants. These exceeded the drugs that are prescribed for high blood pressure, high cholesterol, asthma, or even headaches. This percentage of these types of drugs is alarmingly high, way higher than I would expect for an average population. So either America is on the verge of a depression led epidemic or there is a problem here. To offer another statistic, between 1995-2002 the use of Anti-D’s rose by nearly 50%.

What needs to be established is whether or not there is a genuine need for the (over) prescribing of these and other types of psychotropic drugs, drugs that affect the brains chemistry, or could it be that better and more efficient therapies like counseling is the answer. It is agreed by many that these drugs can give some patients a “breathing” space so allowing them time to seek counseling that can help them sort out their lives. For many their depression is a symptom and not the actual disease as many that have spoken to me seem more anxious and their “depression” is an outcome of the patient’s inability to know how to cope.

But are the patients also to blame?

25% of people, young and older, will have a “depressive” episode at least once in their lives. In a recent study published in the Journal of the American Medical Association, actors pretending to be patients went to doctors in the San Francisco area and said they were depressed. The “patients” who asked for an antidepressant were significantly more likely to get a prescription for one than patients who didn’t ask for an antidepressant. I suspect that the drug companies have latched on to this “need” and ran with it, profits matter more than common sense it would appear.

The Food & Drugs Administration did a study that found out of 12 Anti-D’s published and unpublished, the combined scores showed that anti-d’s were 51% efficient at treating depression, 2% better than a placebo. But 118 million were still prescribed in 2005.

What is very apparent, to me at least, is that there is a “need” by some people; that they just cant cope with modern life and the stresses of family life and the job climate of late, so they and the drug companies are fuelling the over prescribing of these drugs.

This could result in the same issues that were faced with the use of antibiotics, people will just get blasé and the benefits will lead to less efficacy from their over use.

Since 2005 I have spoken to hundreds maybe even thousands of people via Internet help sites as well as face to face, the overriding observation that I have gleaned from all these interactions is that people are scared. They don’t know how to cope with what life is throwing at them, perceived or actual. This anxiety has slowly grown and is backed up by the statistics shown in this article and the research I have done related and unrelated to it in the preceding years. Drugs on their own are not the answer but should be viewed as an additional “tool” in helping people cope. The first and by far the most successful method of therapy is counseling, but it has to be objective and focused on the actual issues that the person is facing, and they seldom are honest in the “symptoms” that they present, as the character in the TV series House has been quoted as saying, patients usually lie.

There is a genuine need for therapies that help sufferers, just by looking at the levels of suicides in teens, anxiety levels in women, and the levels of anti social behaviour in men, all point to the observation that people are just not coping in the main environments that the population in general have to interact in.

The potential patients are not always the best people to judge what they actually need so national or local government and health professionals should now take the lead and focus on what people actually need rather than just pandering to the motivations of the drug companies and the Gp/Md’s that are more ruled by profits than the holistic needs of their paying customers. In my experience most people need encouragement and self esteem building therapies that allow them to grow past their anxieties and lack of self belief issues, once that aspect of their lives has been assessed accurately then drugs can play their useful part, rather than how it is now where a drug is assumed to be the starting point and not an aide to healthier living.

I suspect that the best explanation of how some people are coping, or not, can be summed up in this way, S.I.N., or Stressed Induced Neurosis. A phrase that I have coined which seems to back up the observations and research I have done in the last few years. I believe it is a condition that shows up in some very common behaviours and mindsets. When people feel that they are out of their comfort zone, or feel very uncertain, seeking hope, losing trust in themselves or in others, or their lives, family etc. They can lose some of their abilities to be rational and/or objective. They wont question what they are told especially when the source should be viewed as suspect. They will habitually second guess their judgments and will usually make bad ones as a result. This bears out what I have discussed above, but the only real solution is for those people to take a step back and see the wood for the trees, if they cant do it on their own then they should be able to find suitably experienced professionals out there that will be able to help and guide them while they gain healthier levels of self belief and confidence back, drugs may help this process but counseling should be the first port of call.

Seamus Madden MASC.

A UK registered and accredited stress therapist.

Sources:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Antidepressant

http://www.nimh.nih.gov/statistics/1ANYPERS.shtml

http://articles.cnn.com/2007-07-09/health/antidepressants_1_antidepressants-high-blood-pressure-drugs-psychotropic-drugs/2?_s=PM:HEALTH

http://www.organicconsumers.org/articles/article_20329.cfm

http://www.helium.com/items/447417-anti-depressants-are-they-always-necessary

Hello world!

Hi,

Thank you for popping by. This site is primarily a place where you can read insights about human behaviour.

You may find the following useful as it will help you understand my purpose in writing this Blog;

Firstly, I do not judge people on a personal level, I am just discussing behaviours from a “lets fix this” perspective AND not a “lets blame you” one.

Secondly, I use Wikipedia as a form of dictionary in the initial research of all my articles, but I will seek a recognized “paper” on any subject if I believe it will help the reader to gain a deeper understanding, anything that you see in “Italics” means that Wikipedia should be your first port of call if you wish to do any follow up reading.

Thirdly, My “mantra’ for as long as I can remember is that everything is a choice, one that you can make now, today, is that if you really want to gain a goal then its your choice to start the process. If by reading this Blog you feel inspired to try then GOOD FOR YOU!

And Lastly, I will always be here for you, BUT you have to ask for my help, if the help is genuinely needed and you are ready, YOU will find a way to ask.

As the “About me” points out, i have gone through the gamut of what life can throw at people and i have learned useful methods to be able to cope with the subsequent stresses and challenges that life dishes out. Seldom fair but like it or not we are all still animals at heart and we will invariably be controlled by the same forces that control them, from reproduction to politics and that has to include survival of the fittest.

Learn how to cope with life and you are half way there to having a very happy one, so what do you want to achieve???

If you wish to contact the Author please send any comments etc to sp-madden@hotmail.com

Please show your support and encouragement by clicking on the “+ Follow” button at the bottom of the screen, You can also sign in via Tweeter & Facebook. AND if you really want to help please share the address of my Blog via your Home Page too, Thank you

I hope to hear from you soon,