psychological symptoms

[jean-paul]

Hi everyone, I'm new here.
I'm 22 and i've been suffering with anxiety for the last two years.
I recently saw a psychiatrist who said I have GAD and agrophobia. (I query the agrophobia because I am usually better when I'm outside.)

My problem is that I can never seem to believe with conviction that anxiety is the problem. I am constantly thinking that I have some other more serious mental illness and that it is a matter of time before I slip into some kind of deep psychosis from which I will never awaken. I don't know why I think this, maybe its just that the anxiety symptoms are so overwhelming or because I associate my anxiety with some rather foolish drug adventures when I was younger.
An example of what I am talking about happened yesterday when I went to play snooker in a less than reputable pool hall. Everyone there (except me) was openly smoking cannabis and needless to say the room was a haze of smoke. I started feeling deeply uneasy, things became intimidating and oppressive and I was nervous.

My initial thoughts were 'this is just anxiety because I am being confronted with a drug environment.' However, it soon became 'oh my god i'm clinically paranoid, i'm insane, disturbed, contaminated etc'

This has been rather more long winded than I intended. I suppose my questions are.
1. does any one suffer from similar thoughts/feelings.
2. anyone know of the best kind of therapy to get rid of these intrusive and dark thought spirals.

Any help/reassurance/advice would be sooo gratefully received.
Jean-Paul.
x

[monkeybutler]

Hi, first off i'll admit i have definitely felt the same way in certain situations, and sometimes just when i've been bored/lonely or feeling a little anxious for whatever reason.
when i'm in a social situation and start feeling like that i tend to start feeling more introverted and self conscious, like if someone says something to me i'll feign interest and give a quick reply with fake emotion just to hide my anxiety so they don't know i'm feeling scared.
sometimes thoughts like you describe can make me feel like i have a mental illness, but as i'm reading more and more, its actually a very common fear among anxiety sufferers, myself included. just knowing that seems to help.
As for therapy options i'm not an expert on that but i've heard cognitive behavioural therapy (CBT) as you may have heard also is good.
My advice, and something that i try to do in such situations, would be to accept the nervous feelings you're having as acceptable, it's normal to feel like you did, especially when you have anxiety problems like so many others.
i could type more but i'm afraid this was quite long already :P i'll definitely reply to anything further you'd post here, though i'm new and still need to get used to how this forum works :P
good luck :)

[jill]

Hi hun :D:hugs:

It is very common when you suffer anxiety to believe that there is something more sinister going on, hunny, even with anxiety are flight, fight response is switched on and we are looking for danger, when acute with anxiety, we put 2 and 2 together and come up with 5 (worse case scenario) If you look through threads on here, you will find, YOU ARE NOT alone with this :hugs:

When I was acute, one of my many fears was loosing the plot, the fear at time was soo overwhelming at one point, I even seen myself in a straight jacket, BUT, I know now, this was sooo not true, when acute, we find is soo dame hard to think logic, with the andrenalin going the anxiety high are minds start imagining all sorts of scary things, anxiety feeds on these negative scary thoughts, if we can learn to change them to more positive reasuring thoughts, it helps us move on a little.

As Monkey said, CBT is good therapy. You can, look on the net for free cbt and try yourself, there are books on cbt. When I was acute, I bought one, but looked at in in shock with thoughts off, WHERE do I start, so if you can get with a cbt therapist, this would help with your thoughts.

We can link our problem to things that we have foolishy done in the past, like you have hun (drugs) BUT PLEASE Jean-Paul, DON'T be to hard on yourself, we all make mistakes, its what we learn from them that counts.

You have, unkowingly I might add, attatched a strong emotion to your past drug use, the smell, brought forward your thoughts of your past mistakes and your feelings towords making that mistake must be worked on. YOU ARE NOT the only one who has taken these types of drugs and you have NO FACT, that it was the drug taking that caused the way you are right now. So, hunny, be kind to yourself regarding you passed, its a must:hugs:

When we are confronted with what WE FEEL, is triggering our anxiety, we must try and put positive reasuring self thoughts in place, eg..

Its ok to be nervouse right now, its because ???? and give a good positive reason, then use distraction, if you try and distract first, this is going against our bodys normal respose, we KNOW that right now, present moment in time, we have anxiety, SO, we except the feeling, give good reason for it being there, THEN distract our thoughts away from how we are feeling, CBT can help with the spiral of anxiety, we all get nervouse from time to time, thats normal, but when you do cbt they show you how to stop it spiraling higher than normal, help you go through thought pattens, help you put more positive reasuring thoughts in place, learning cbt is not easy, but with alot of hard work, time and the right support, it does work.

Jean-Paul, YOU DO HAVE anxiety, nothing more sinister, you ARE NOT, going clinically paranoid, insane or disturbed, this IS an anxiety thinker, YOU ARE NOT ALONE, with these types of thoughts,
.
Please hun, learn all you can about anxiety and how are mind works and whats just as importan, learn about yourself.

***psychiatrist who said I have GAD and agrophobia, (I query the agrophobia because I am usually better when I'm outside.)***

YOU KNOW, yourself better than anyone, I don't like labels, this is just my oppion, If you label yourself with to many things these labels are dame hard to get off and it can leave you feeling like you have to many issues to address and it can be very overwhelming and cause MORE anxiety, you go looking into more things. I myself when acute, did not want to go out, but did, but, Mr P, Mrs A came with me of course, I had anxiety 24/7 and pa's on and off, my thought pattens where all over the place, Steven King, (horror storie author) had NOTHING on some of my thoughts that came into my haed, BUT now I know, I have a good imagination, mix that with adrenalin, anxiety and ohhhh boy, I could frighten the life out of myself.

Sorry, woffling LOL

I know how dame hard this is for you right now, it get sooo confusing when you are acute, learning about panic, anxiety is the hardest thing I have ever had to learn, but learning about myself was just as hard. I do owe my recovery to this GREAT site, so. Please hun, learn all you can about anxiety and how are mind works and whats just as importan, learn about yourself.

YOU TAKE CARE

LOVE JILL XXX