Nearly one in sixty people in the western world suffer with anxiety at some point in their life, but what causes anxiety? And what are the symptoms?

Causes of anxiety

Many different things in this day and age can cause anxiety, the present time has shown the most amounts of anxiety sufferers since records began, because our lives have become so fast paced and unstable where work and finances are involved.

A lot of people start suffering with anxiety because of financial problems, the issue in this day and age is that it is so easy to get caught up in the debt culture of getting another credit card to transfer your balance to every quarter or to buy that stylish car you cant afford on finance. The problem with this comes when the bills start being larger than your income, as the financial worries grow it can manifest itself into excessive amounts of anxiety.

Relationships are another large cause of anxiety, with divorce in the west being at their highest figure since records began, it is clear that many people in failed marriages suffer greatly. This suffering is not just from the breakdown of the relationship but from the after affects as the divorce goes sour and gets dragged through the courts, this is exacerbated by the break down of marriages of those with children.

Work can be a huge cause of anxiety, in days of old it was common practice to start working for a company from the time of leaving school until retirement age, getting promoted as the year moved on. Nowadays there is no security in the workplace; there are many companies, large and small, that make employees redundant to manage their business. Being made redundant can cause a lot of stress and anxiety on an employee as they struggle to come to terms with being let go and have the anxiety of trying to find a new career. To many this is only a temporary set back but to select few this process can be too much and cause anxiety to take over.

Symptoms Of Anxiety

The general symptoms seen in most anxiety sufferers are

- Loss of sexual desire
- Loss of appetite
- Difficulty concentrating
- Restlessness
- Inability to function properly in social settings
- Losing trust in those close to you
- Becoming reclusive and not leaving the home
- Having feelings that people are staring at you or judging you
- Being over emotional
- Muscle tension
- Stress

These are only general symptoms and there are more severe symptoms that can creep in over time if the sufferer does not seek help.

The most obvious symptom that nearly all anxiety sufferers have is, the loss of functioning normally in every day life. No matter what the symptoms a sufferer has, the overall end product of the symptoms is the lack of social interaction.

For a person to manage their symptoms can be very difficult, as the symptoms can already be taking control of them before they realize there is even a problem.