Wildcat Pause: The Anxiety Issue

Treating Your Anxiety: An Informa
Q: What percentage of teens do you think struggle with
anxiety at SWR?
A: “The percentage probably mirrors whatever the
stats are for the nation. So we’re probably somewhere
around 30 percent.”
Q: What would you say is the most commonly used form
of treatment?
A: “Therapy is the most common . . . more common
than medicine in terms of official treatments.”
Q: What are the differences between the types of
treatments?
A: “Behavioral and cognitive are often combined
treatments, which is called cognitive-behavioral
therapy. And those really work on your thoughts,
which are your cognitions. It is looking at your irrational
thoughts and trying to either challenge them or replace
them with more rational thinking. On the behavioral
side it’s more about escape and avoidance, so therapy
involves changing your behavior. The classic example
is being afraid of a dog. The behavioral change is
being around a dog. Giving them cognitive strategies
on one side to deal with their thinking anxiety, but
also behaviorally making them be near a dog which
changes their normal behavior of running away from
a dog. The other thing with behavior would be, for
example, people who don’t want to leave the house.
. . they’re agoraphobic. Part of their therapy would be
to get them to go outside and take the garbage down
to the road. Then the next thing may be getting them
to take the trash out and then go for a walk to the end
of the block, and then come home. Then you slowly
increase it to making them go to the store, and maybe
not going into the store, but the next time go inside for a
minute.”
Q: How has the treatment developed as we continue to
learn more about anxiety disorder?
A: “Most cognitive-behavioral therapy was developed
in the late 1960s and early 1970s, and it hasn’t changed
significantly. For the last 40 to 50 years, therapy has
stuck to those main components -- the cognition and
behavior. What professionals have
done over the past 40 years is
research to make sure that these
techniques actually work. The
techniques themselves were
developed many years ago.
What’s happened over time is
specific research to ensure
they work. You can’t just
create a technique,
you need to surround it
with strong evidence
that shows it works.
You’d never want to
teach somebody
something if it
doesn’t actually help
them. That would be
counteractive.”
A relatively short-term
form of psychotherapy
based on the concept
that the way we think about
things affects how we
feel emotionally. Cognitive therapy
focuses on present thinking, behavior,
and communication rather than on past
experiences and is oriented toward problem
solving. Cognitive therapy has been applied
to a broad range of problems including
depression, anxiety, panic, fears,eating disorders,
substance abuse,
and personality problems. Cognitive therapy is
sometimes called cognitive behavioral therapy
because
it aims to help people in the ways they think (the
cognitive) and in the ways they act (the behavior).
Cognitive therapy has, for instance, been used to
help cocaine -dependent individuals become
abstinent from cocaine and other substances. The
underlying assumption is that learning processes play
an important role in the development and
continuation of cocaine abuse and
dependence. These same learning processes
can be used to help individuals reduce their
drug use.
Behavioral
This form of therapy seeks to id
potentially self-destructive or u
functions on the idea that all
that unhealthy behaviors can
of treatment is often on curren
change them.
Combined
It combines
therapy with
therapy. Trea
centered aro
someone’s th
and beliefs in
their actions
moods. It oft
on a person’
problems an
solve them. T
term goal is t
a person’s th
behavioral p
healthier one
can also be
along with th
treatment.
Cognitive Treatment
From Dr. Peter D’Elena, school psychologist
Anxiety disorders are the most commonly diagnosed
and prevalent disorders among all psychiatric
conditions. They represent a disabling range of
conditions that are fairly well understood but grossly
undertreated. Indeed, most people suffering from
an anxiety disorder do not seek treatment. While
traction has been made in getting people help
and destigmatizing the interventions that help these
disorders, much work is left to be done.
Q: Do you
believe medicinal treatment is a good way to
permanently get rid of an anxiety disorder?
A: “So we will compare talk therapy (cognitivebehavioral)
to medicine. If two people have anxiety,
one gets talk therapy for 10 weeks and the other gets
medicine for 10 weeks. What they’ll find, almost always,
is that the people who were on the medicine, their
symptoms come back sooner. For people that have
been in talk therapy, their symptoms seem to stay away
for a longer amount of time. So it shows you that talk
Page 4/March 2020/Wildcat Pause