HOW CAN I RUN ANXIETY OUT OF MY…………….?
Prasanta Kumar Roy
Assistant Professor in Clinical Psychology
Institute of Psychiatry, Kolkata
The calling bell rings and Prasanta wakes up. Oh! It’s 7.15am!!! and he is late. “What went wrong with the alarm?
Did it not ring on time? Did I forget to adjust the alarm on time? I must have been careful last night! What should I
do now? Today I have a meeting and I cannot afford to wake up 15 minutes late!!!” He remembered that he was so
tensed last night regarding today’s meeting that he fell asleep late and did not have a good night sleep.
Ria is a student of class X. For the last one year she is working very hard as she is to appear for her board
examination but she did not do well in her last annual examination. She wakes up early morning everyday to
prepare for her studies, and if she fails to wake up on time, she becomes very upset and gets angry on her mother.
She always starts crying the night before her class test and says that she would not be able to remember studies at
all.
Mrs.Banerjee spends the evening mostly on her varanda. She waits for her husband and children to come back from
work. If her daughter is late for 5 minutes she would start calling her up to make sure that she is safe and coming
back home straight from college. If her husband misses to pick up her phone she would call up his colleagues and
ask if Mr. Banerjee is alright.
Saikat wants everything perfect in his business. He can not trust others in his work and manages every bit of his
work. Due his perfectionism he overloads himself with halluva of work and often fell sick. He suffers from chronic
gastric problem and easily affected by cough and cold.
Gargi is a homemaker. She efficiently manages all the problems at home and has a detailed grasp on every aspect of
her domestics. But she becomes a little hesitant when it comes to going to Bank or public dealing. She cannot go out
without her husband and in any case if her husband is not around she finds herself in a mess.
People often experience a general state of worry or fear before confronting something challenging such as
a test, examination, recital, or interview, even when deciding marriage, joining a new job, shifting from
one home to another or when face some new challenges. These feelings are easily justified and considered
normal. Anxiety is considered a problem when symptoms interfere with a person's ability to sleep or
otherwise function. Generally speaking, anxiety occurs when a reaction is out of proportion with what
might be normally expected in a situation. Above mentioned cases give a glimpse of how anxiety may be
manifested in our day to day life. Do you have any of them?
Anxiety Disorders are common and are off various forms. Some of the common anxiety disorders are
Panic Disorder where person experiences sudden bouts of anxiety or panic attack, Phobia or irrational
fear (like fear of height, closed place, crowded place etc.), Generalized Anxiety Disorder where person
experiences anxiety in every task, Social Anxiety or fear of facing other people, Obsessive Compulsive
Thoughts
I cannot do anything right,
everything I do goes wrong
Physical symptoms
Poor concentration, tired,
lethargic, loss of interest
Behaviour
Unmotivated, stops meeting
friends and going out,
becomes withdrawn.
