Some anxiety is normal — a typical reaction to stress that helps us cope with tense situations. But excessive worrying may be a sign of anxiety disorder. When is it a problem?

Financial problems, workplace negativity and deadlines — anxiety emerges from a number of stressful occurrences. And almost everyone experiences it from time to time. That’s OK. In fact, a moderate amount of anxiety can be good, helping us to cope with tense situations and to focus on the task at hand.

However, “abnormally high anxiety” may cause people to feel tense, tired and irritable and to have difficulty concentrating and sleeping,” according to Mastering the World of Psychology.

So when is anxiety a problem? How do we distinguish between the “good” anxiety and the “bad” anxiety?

Here we focus briefly on identifying your level of stress-induced anxiety. Improving our understanding of these as well as our coping skills can significantly help us in our personal and professional lives.

Identifying Excessive Anxiety
Anxiety is a problem when it becomes “an excessive, irrational dread of everyday situations, such as riding an elevator or leaving your house,” says WebMD.com. “People with anxiety disorder experience fear and worry that are out of proportion to the situation.”

There are several recognized anxiety disorders, explains WebMD. These include:

• Panic Disorder — The defining feelings include unexpected, sudden and repeated terror or feeling crazy. Physiological symptoms may consist of being sweaty, chest pain, palpitations and choking.

• Obsessive-Compulsive Disorder — OCD is distinguished by constant fear(s) leading to certain habitual actions.

• Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder — PTSD results from terrifying events like an attack, unanticipated death of someone you love or some sort of disaster. When such occurrences lead to lasting and frightening thoughts and memories as well as to emotional numbness, the diagnosis is PTSD.

• Social Anxiety Disorder — Overwhelming worry and self-consciousness about everyday social situations point to social phobias. Fear of being judged, potential embarrassment and ridicule drive this disorder.

• Specific Phobias — High-level fears of certain things or environments show up as abnormal worries that aren’t in proportion to the object, place or event.

• Generalized Anxiety Disorder — GAD is a mental impairment that involves extreme and impractical worry and feeling tense, even if the cause is nonexistent or minimal.

“When anxiety is severe, disproportionate to the situation, related to a wide variety of things, is difficult to control, and disruptive to your life, it may be more than normal anxiety,” says William Meek, Ph.D. at About.com.

If you often feel very anxious without reason and your worries disrupt your daily life, you may have GAD. “Generalized anxiety disorder causes excessive or unrealistic anxiety and worry — well beyond what’s appropriate for a situation,” according to MayoClinic.com.

Consider these factors that help distinguish normal anxiety from GAD:

• Severity — Anxiety is severe when it arises with intense feeling and long-duration like six months.

• Disproportionateness — Are the anxious feelings based on greater intensity than the situation really warrants? (Think “mountain of a mole-hill” adage.)

• About Everything — If you are feeling anxious about everything all the time, you may have GAD.

• No Control — It may be more than normal anxiety if you find it significantly more difficult than other people you know to control your anxiety, to be relaxed and calm.

• Disruptive — If all aspects of your life (work, family, health, etc.) are affected by greater-than-normal worries, then anxiety is likely excessive.

Today, anxiety disorders affect about 19 million adult Americans. Fortunately, significant progress has been made over the last 20 years in the treatment of people with anxiety disorders.

For tips on anxiety prevention, control and reduction, visit WebMD.com or MayoClinic.com.

Resources

Mental Health: Anxiety & Panic Disorders Guide
WebMD.com

Top 5 Ways to Differentiate ‘Normal Anxiety’ from GAD
by William Meek. Ph.D.
About.com

Mental Health: Generalized Anxiety Disorder
MayoClinic.com, Sept. 11, 2007

Controlling Anxiety and Panic Attacks
LivingWithAnxiety.com

Mastering the World of Psychology (Second Edition)
by Samuel E. Wood, Ellen Green Wood and Denise Boyd
Pearson Education, Inc., 2006

The Doctor Is in Your PC
by Daniel B. Smith
Slate, April 29, 2008