What is Anxiety? written by one of Youthline's Young Ambassadors

Anxiety (with a capital A to differentiate it from everyday nerves) encompasses a variety of disorders characterised by similar symptoms and actions. Some examples include Obsessive Compulsive Disorder (OCD), Generalised Anxiety Disorder (GAD), Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder (PTSD) and many others. The most common symptoms of most Anxiety disorders are an elevated heartrate, difficulty breathing and compulsive actions (actions that someone feels an overwhelming need to do in order to calm down, such as constantly tapping), but Anxiety can manifest in many different ways.

My experience of Anxiety is different from that of other people, but I hope my explanation of it is useful for those living with it and for those who don’t understand it.

Anxiety is not merely being nervous all the time.

Whilst some living with Anxiety do experience chronic nerves, most of the time Anxiety is an amplified version of everyday nervousness: low to medium stressful events for people without Anxiety might become highly stressful for those with it and the reaction to stress will be stronger with an elevated heartrate, panic attacks and other debilitating symptoms. People with Anxiety might experience a background, everyday level of nerves that prevents them from doing certain activities or they might avoid certain people, places or events because they don’t want to risk increasing their Anxiety to a debilitating degree.

People with Anxiety know they’re being irrational.

There’s no point in telling someone to calm down, that they’re not thinking straight – people with Anxiety know this. They know that they are safe, that they don’t need to be panicking right now, but their brain has misinterpreted a situation as dangerous and has therefore supplied their body with chemicals like adrenaline to help them escape this dangerous situation. Imagine you’ve just woken up from a nightmare: you’re in your bedroom, you’re safe – you know this for certain – and yet you’re still scared. Why? Because your brain woke you up because it thought you were in danger. And then it provided you with the necessary chemicals to help you run away, to escape. But there is no need to run away. Because the bad dream is over. And so, you’re left sitting up in bed –  panting, anxious – because your brain thinks you’re still in danger and it needs some time to process that you actually aren’t. This is a common experience for people with Anxiety during a stressful situation and, whilst there are coping mechanisms to alleviate symptoms, they can’t simply tell the brain to stop worrying.

Anxiety can’t be easily fixed.

Like many other neurological disorders, its symptoms could be managed with medication or therapy, but these aren’t cures or guarantees. Not every medication works with every person and not every course of therapy leads to a less anxious person. There are coping strategies to manage difficult symptoms, but their effectiveness relies on the individual (and sometimes they just don’t work regardless). But that’s ok because identifying Anxiety and learning what makes it better or worse can already be incredibly helpful to someone living with it.

How can you help someone with Anxiety?

If someone’s having a panic attack during a bout of extreme anxiety, try asking “what do you need from me?” or “can I get you anything?”. You could try specifying things if the other person is struggling to speak: they might need water, space for themselves or a reminder of how to breathe calmly.

Outside of this situation, people living day to day with Anxiety might need a little extra help during personally stressful situations. It could be helpful to pay attention to what scenarios make them more nervous than usual or what coping mechanisms they rely on. Additionally, reading resources such as this one and listening to a variety of people with anxiety disorders talk about their experiences would be incredibly useful, especially if you can help educate others about the topic.