Posts Tagged ‘From’

Do You Suffer From Bipolar Depression Symptoms?

Research on brain structure and function, neurochemical messenger systems (neurotransmitters), and brain-body connections suggests fundamental, delicate, two-way relationships between the brain’s environment and mood, behavior, and resistance to disease.

One focus of brain research has been to identify and integrate traditional medical and psychiatric knowledge with new psychobiological and “psychoneuroimmunologic” data.

Researchers in the field of psychobiology study the biologic basis of disturbances and have established some relationships between mental disorders and changes in the structure and function of the brain.

Findings on research about mental disorders suggest that the health care community ought to place as much emphasis on emotional health as it places on physiological health and ought to recognize how biological, emotional, and societal problems combine to affect individual patients, families, and communities.

Typically, people who are mentally healthy are satisfied with themselves and their life situations. When people have unmet emotional needs or distress, they experience an overall feeling of unhappiness.

As tension escalates, security and survival are threatened. How different people respond to these troublesome situations reflects their level of coping and maturity.

As a consequence, a particular mental disorder, known as bipolar depression, takes place and brings about extraordinary alterations in an individual’s energy, frame of mind, temper, and capability to work.

Contrary to most popular beliefs, bipolar depression is not an ordinary mood swing, where the individual experiences normal ebb and flow of personal experiences that everybody lives through. The signs of bipolar depression are so grave that it is almost impossible to cure immediately.

Bipolar depression, when untreated can bring about serious consequences that may lead to poor functionality, wreaked relationships, and even death as caused by suicide.

In the United States, statistical reports show that more than 5 million people are affected with bipolar depression. This is such an alarming state considering the fact that bipolar depression can definitely wreak havoc to one’s life, community, or even the whole nation.

Bipolar depression can notably manifest drastic changes in one’s mood. It can show a drastic, significant change in one’s temper, ranging from being extremely bad-tempered to a normal frame of mind.

The stages of low and high mood swings are known as “episodes of depression and mania.”

To know more about bipolar depression, here is a list of symptoms of bipolar depression:

1. Extreme irritability

Violent and aggressive behavior, usually episodic, is a means of expressing feelings of anger, fear, or hopelessness about a situation.

A person who suffers or has a history of outburst rage, temper tantrums, or impulsive behavior, can be suffering from bipolar depression.

2. Amplified energy, restlessness, and activity

Patients with bipolar depression have defensive behavior against real or perceived threat to self. These people are impulsive and unreliable. They tend to be hyperactive and commit to a lot of tasks that they cannot even finish.

3. Poor judgment

They are in contact with reality but have difficulty dealing with it. Hence, it is hard to impose judgments.

4. Refutation of the current situation

They are trying not to be aware that they have a problem.

When depression interferes with a person’s ability to function comfortably and inhibits the effective management of personal needs, that person is at risk for emotional problems.

In order to solve the problem, the patient needs to understand that bipolar depression is treatable. Antidepressants and anti-anxiety agents may be prescribed.

Crisis and supportive services in the community include mental health centers, telephone counselling and referral, suicide prevention centers, group therapy, and marital and family counseling. Theres a lot of help out there, we can but hope it gets used.

Understanding the Meaning of Agoraphobia from an Ex-Sufferer

There are two things that are apparent when you start to seek a definition for agoraphobia and that is that, depending on where you look, there is more than just one definition. If we take a look in a dictionary, we will find that the interpretation given there is similar to the following: a disease which results in the sufferer being afraid of open or public spaces which, can result in the sufferer becoming housebound.

The second usual definition goes something like this: An anxiety disorder where the sufferer lives in fear of finding themselves in an embarrassing situation from which there is no escape. More advanced agoraphobics may, indeed, become confined to their home in order to avoid any such discomfort occurring whilst in public.

We can see that the result of being housebound is the same in both definitions, how the sufferer becomes housebound, though, is quite different. So, let’s compare both definitions to the real-life experiences of an agoraphobic.

I became an agoraphobic more than twenty years ago, following a series of panic attacks that occurred whilst I was travelling. At that time, my phobia was only connected to travel by any mode of transport that I chose: car, train, bus etc. but walking around outside posed no threat whatsoever. However, as the years progressed so did the severity of the condition and eventually, after around 18 years or so, I became totally housebound.

So, what is it that can make an agoraphobic’s life so limited? I’ll try to explain as best I can. But, if after reading this you can’t quite grasp the whole concept, don’t worry, most health professionals that I’ve consulted over the years couldn’t grasp it either.

As an agoraphobic, I lived in fear of when my next panic attack would strike. I was lucky, in one respect, in that I’ve never had a panic attack whilst within the confines of my home. However, I do know of other agoraphobics that do suffer them at home, sometimes quite frequently. For me, there was a fear bigger than the fear of having yet another panic attack and that was of having a massive panic attack that left me in a condition whereupon I could no longer stand up and walk or would result in some uncontrollable and embarrassing emotional outburst.

Knowing that certain situations could trigger my panic fuelled the second part of my condition. Being in heavy traffic made me feel very panicky and uncomfortable or standing still and not progressing forward on public transport had the same effect. So any thought of such an encounter brought on my “what if” syndrome. I’d be travelling down a road where the traffic was light and flowing freely when a thought such as: “I hope the traffic isn’t backed up at this or that road intersection” would enter my head and this would get me “what ifing”. “What if the traffic is backed up and we’re stuck there for twenty minutes and what if I have a panic attack and what if I can’t get to work and can’t get home?” This kind of thinking had just one outcome; it made me scared. And being scared and away from my safe zone just brought on my panic. This was one of the worst parts of my agoraphobia; me thinking my way into a panic attack.

Agoraphobia and its partners in crime, panic attacks and anxiety, stole everything that made my life good. But it didn’t stop there. It’s effects upon me altered the lives of my family and friends too. Having recovered from this nightmare existance, it’s only now that I can look back and see just how debilitating this condition truly is.

Why Do You Suffer From Agoraphobia?

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Any phobia has the ability to make life uncomfortable to a certain extent. Agoraphobia is however probably the most wide reaching in its negative impact upon your quality of life. To be afraid of open spaces, or to be fearful of even stepping out of your own back door prevents you from doing so very many things which the rest of humanity take for granted.

Just to go and buy a pint of milk or a daily newspaper may all too easily become impossible to contemplate. The thing with agoraphobia is that it most often starts off as a vague feeling of unease in certain circumstances but this gradually grows into something far more debilitating. Its force is like a snowball gathering snow and speed as it rolls down a hillside. Eventually you can feel like you are caught up in an avalanche of jittery emotions; it is therefore important to take action and do something about it as soon as possible.

The question most often posed is “what action?” If you do manage to get out to see your doctor you are likely to be treated for either anxiety or depression. Not everyone wants to take drugs however and also they do not always work. Agoraphobia makes you feel totally out of control and anything which you can do to help regain a feeling of stability and control will help enormously; and this is relevant no matter whether you are taking tablets or not.

Information helps. Knowing that other people are in the same boat helps you to feel that “it’s not just you”. Trying to think back to the roots of your anxiety will help you identify a potential phobia cure. If you can work out what caused your agoraphobia, then you have more chance of finding a way in which to treat your phobia.

Another way of working to regain your self control, and this is I am sure the most powerfully effective, is to learn to think in a slightly different way. When you have a phobia you tend to dwell upon your fear and imagine what might happen, visualizing all sorts of dreadful scenarios vividly in your mind. These become a self-fulfilling prophesy; it is a known fact that whatever you vividly imagine you create.

You can turn your ability to visualize to your very great advantage by choosing what you would like to see. You can choose to imagine a good outcome, and see yourself as you want to be. This may seem far too simple a solution; but please do not underestimate it as it is very effective. You will probably need to first learn how to eradicate negative images from your mind, just as you would need to wipe a blackboard clean of what is written upon it before writing now information on it.

The hypnosis phobia cure has been shown to be a very powerful way in which you can learn to think in a different way and take control of your life once more. You can use a cure phobia hypnosis mp3 as a way in which to take control for yourself.

Roseanna Leaton, specialist in phobia hypnotherapy to help overcome fears.