Do you have worries in you mind of “what if…”?; What if I will be fired from work, what if I or anyone in my family gets sick. These concerns might burden so much that you can not enjoy all the good that you have. This is Mark…
Mark, married 2, has everything you could ask for in life: senior position, a high salary, a good marriage, successful children, a beautiful home, and health. His friends envy him, his family proud of him. But Mark worried, he is constantly tense and nervous: What if they will fire him from work, what if he or anyone in the family gets sick, what about the security situation.
And the concerns of “What will be” burdened so much that he can not enjoy all the good that he has, the thoughts of bad things that could happen to him are heavy on him. He feels tired and exhausted all the time, lacking energy, restless, nervous, can not sleep at night. He noticed that his wife and children try to move away from him but he is unable to control his behavior.
Mark suffers from Generalized Anxiety Disorder (GAD). This anxiety disorder is characterized by contently long-term concerns, you saw a future catastrophe in general, makes a person a cognitive and emotional suffering and damage daily functioning. The anxiety behavior often aiming control and relief (for example, Mark called his wife and kids many times a day in order to make sure they are OK, every phone call from his wife, causing him to be alert to receive bad news). Over time, the fears and concerns also impact his health.
During therapy Mark raised different situations that arouse his anxiety. Therapeutic interventions included medication treatment along with talking therapy. Cognitive Behavioral Therapy (CBT) approach focused on Mark’s patterns of irrational thinking (non-adaptive). Through joint analysis of different situations Mark brought from his daily life, he began to see how his behavior of trying to control situations are unhelpful and cannot really prevent things to happen. Its only prevent him from being happy with everything he has.
Support, encouraging and strengthening his mental powers help Mark to learn relaxation techniques and to change his thought to rational (adaptive) belief ( “My son plays football and there is a possibility that he will be injured but he is taking all the precautions: wear a helmet, wear protective belts, his coach aware of the dangers and is more cautious and therefore the chance of injuring are lower.
Rational belief (Adaptive) takes into account that there is always a chance for risk but the risk is minimal and negligible. During the therapy Mark understood that the concerns and anxiety will not help him to control the situation. Mark learned to use relaxation techniques that aim to help reduce anxiety when he feels it begins to take over his mind and increase positive alternative behaviors.
Therapeutic intervention helps accept the fact that in life we have a lack of certainty, and accept the fact that it is important to minimize these situations, but the search for control and certainty is an illusion that does not exist.
