Generalized Anxiety Disorder Symptoms

Generalized Anxiety Disorder: Introduction

Generalized anxiety disorder (GAD) should not be confused with normal anxiety that people experience in daily life. It's a persistent and inflated nervousness and concern, without any apparent, provoking cause.

People with GAD may constantly anticipate disasters and unnecessarily worry about everything they are associated with in life. Sometimes, the cause of anxiety is difficult to identify. For some, thinking about the day ahead triggers anxiety.

What are the Generalized Anxiety Disorder Symptoms?

Signs of generalized anxiety disorder develop gradually and often start affecting people during childhood or teenage years. It can also occur in adulthood. Women are more prone to GAD compared to men, and often spreads to the affected person’s relatives.

A number of persons with generalized anxiety disorder signs and symptoms get frightened easily compared to other people. They feel tired most of the time, cannot concentrate for long, and may sometimes experience depression.

Some of the symptoms for generalized anxiety disorder:

• Feeling restless or jumpy
• Get easily tired
• Loss of concentration or foggy thinking
• Getting irritated easily
• Muscle strain
• Sleep disorders

Additionally, an affected person does not associate his or her anxiety with panic attacks, nor with public embarrassment, being unhygienic, isolated from friends or home. Nor does it involve becoming overweight, having numerous bodily illnesses, or having a grave disease.

Anxiety or physical generalized anxiety disorder symptoms cause medically significant suffering or harm in public, professional, or other essential areas of performance.

The worry is not a result of direct effect of medication or drug abuse, nor is it related to any general health condition. To be diagnosed with GAD, one has to have excessive worry (related to matters in daily lives) for at least six months.

However, severe symptoms of generalized anxiety disorder can become debilitating and make it hard for the affected individual to perform normal, everyday tasks.

Anxiety and worry are experienced on an increased scale, for most of the time lasting six months in the least, and is associated with normal life activities or events. Also, those affected find controlling worries difficult.