Why do you think so many people have anxiety these days?

[TitaniasAss]

Or do you think it's just become more recognised? When I was young I remember my mum describing a neighbour as 'living on her nerves' which I think probably meant that this woman suffered from anxiety.

I don't suffer myself, I do get anxious about the things most people get anxious about eg driving test, exams etc but I don't think that's unusual. I work in a secondary school and we have so many children with SEMH and anxiety issues that it makes me worry for their future.

I used to work in a primary setting a few years ago and I can remember an 8 year old telling me that they were having a panic attack because of their anxiety. It was awful to me that a child that young even knew what a panic attack was.

I absolutely do believe that, for teens, social media plays a huge part. Why so many adults?

70% because it's on trend, 30% because it was underdiagnosed / never talked about before.

Half because it was undiagnosed before and half because it’s what everyone else has so I must have it.

Social media is a huge reason I reckon. I was a very anxious teen/young person and was always labelled a "worrier." I grew up in the 90s and am glad I did, I wouldn't do well now as a teen.

I work in a secondary school and so so many of the students are anxious. Have worked with women in their early 20s and they were too.

Completely agree.

I worry that young people have no resilience. No idea how we build it though. I have a teen son and his resilience has definitely dwindled over the past few years.

I think being able to talk about emotions is a great thing. However, I feel like normal human emotions are being medicalised. I am a secondary school teacher and I never hear pupils say they are nervous anymore. They always say they have anxiety. I honestly think a lot of them expect their emotions to be completely stable at all times and they see a deviation from this as something to be feared and managed.

Social media has encouraged peer pressure and comparison.
Resilience not being taught from a young age.
Ambitious familie members who think they are doing the best for their kids by loading on the pressure to do well but not balancing it with resilience.

Also, anxiety is another form of excitement, and kids aren't being taught that either. It can be a useful emotion at the right level, but people always see it as a negative.

But lots of people who say they have anxiety have not actually been diagnosed, self diagnosis is such a big thing now and many of them are just run of the mill nervous probably with a good mix of poor self esteem from a crappy childhood.

Children who get to experience things in a loving and supportive upbringing and where they are encouraged to do risky things safely don't tend to have the same issues.

I think it's a combination of factors.

It was under diagnosed in the past.

Children being coddled to the point that they have no resilience or ability to cope with things going wrong.

There is a culture/trend for seeking a diagnoses for normal human emotions.

The world is more complex now, there are less clearly defined roles, so much is expected of everyone.

The breakdown of communities and community support.

Loss of religion.

This. Normal feelings medicalised.
Serious medical conditions seen as desirable personality traits.
"Neurospicy" being seen as a cool thing.
The pendulum has swung too far.

I feel a bit like this too, I don't tend to see so many people in their 40s plus suffering from anxiety to the same degree as younger people. That doesn't mean they're not there of course, I can only talk of my own experiences.

This came to my mind at work the other day when a younger colleague was being spoken to (politely and constructively) about steps to improve a situation and the colleague responded by holding her chest and saying 'you're causing my anxiety to spike' and sat with her head in her hands. It seemed such an extreme reaction and I agree with a previous poster about a lack of resilience in some younger people in the workplace and schools.

This is spot on.

I tell my dc that feeling nervous and anxious are completely normal emotions. This does not mean that you have anxiety.

I have had medically diagnosed anxiety. My dad had GAD after his first stroke and he became very unwell.

We must stop labelling normal feelings with medical labels because it then becomes a self fulfilling prophecy.

Social media, it's all out there. I think most anxiety is normal, an anxiety disorder can be debilitating. But for the most I do think its just people who feel nervous.

My son is diagnosed with GAD, started during covid when school went OTT with the social distancing etc (he was a key worker child so went in) and in his young brain became convinced he was accidentally going to kill people.

He's never recovered from this and now it manifests in many other ways, and can totally ruin his ability to live a life that a 13yo should have. He was on the CAHMs waiting list, but 4 years on we still haven't been seen, so I've given up..luckily his secondary school are amazing and have done so much to help him.

For kids I think it's trendy. The majority of my classes are full of kids who have anxiety. It's a shame for those pupils who actually do. Lots of them repeatedly say they can't come
To lessons as they are too anxious and can't do their homework as they felt too anxious too. Doesn't stop me seeing them out shopping and socialising with their mates though!!

A number of different factors I think.
My DM, who'd be in her 90's now if she was still alive, definitely 'struggled with her nerves ' and was prescribed Valium by the GP. It was never talked about though. People readily talk about their anxiety now.

Social media is, in my opinion, responsible too. People feel they are failing if they are not 'living their best life ' like they see everyone else living on SM. This obviously affects their mental health. Plus, the fact that everyone talks about their anxiety and mental health now means that far more people think they are suffering with anxiety rather than just having normal feelings about the stresses of difficult or everyday struggles.

I don't think a lot of young people are very resilient now. An education system that doesn't allow independence alongside cotton wool parenting means that young people are naturally anxious when they are expected to stand on their own two feet.
As someone who was brought up in a generation who had freedom to roam from an early age, who learned to deal with the situations you were faced with at the time, I don't think the current generation who phone/message their parents every time something is slightly awry are building the same level of resilience as previous generations.

The way people talk about it now. I imagine their Anxiety as a sort of quivering pink animal, round and small, with frightened googly eyes and pink fur that shoots out into alarmed spikes when a telephone rings.

It must be tiresome lugging around this thing all the time.

Under diagnosed in the past and life is a lot more complicated for young people, for school aged, those who are stressed about school or bullied don’t get to leave it at school anymore, bullies will be discussing them in group chats just upping the meanness. Schools are very busy, loud now, especially for those who struggle with that kind of thing.
pretty much the same for adults too, life is loud, life is 24/7 with emails, bills, banks, friends etc all causing notifications on phones and just a constant thinking about it thing.

Completely agree about normal feelings becoming medicalised. Life is stressful and there are plenty of times you'll feel anxious/worried/nervous, doesn't mean you are an anxious person who can't cope. I think we need to teach young people how to adapt and survive in the World, it won't adapt and change for them. They need to learn how to manage their feelings to exist in the World.

Social media
No resilience
It's "Trendy "
It's worn as a badge of honour among some people I know!

This!!

I do think social media and the Internet in general has been a huge contributer. There is little privacy, so much interaction is 'performance' based rather than genuinely interactive, and there is so much scrutiny and judgement. Scrolling Instagram reels is depressing, the comments will ALWAYS find something to judge, some new way for you to assess and correct yourself. I read a comment section once where a lot of younger people were saying they didn't dance at clubs in case someone filmed them and put it online to laugh.

I also think modern life in general is not conducive to inner calm and confidence. There are multi-billion pound industries dedicated to making people feel dissatisfied. There is too much information - constant updates on wars thousands of miles away, daily depressing news that you can do nothing about but still triggers your natural human empathy. There is too much light pollution and too much choice. Too much unnatural stimulation and not enough down time for processing and reflexion. Stressful jobs without enough phsyical exercise for release of the built up cortisol and adrenaline. There is a breakdown of traditional families and communities which is how we lived for hundreds of thousands of years as we evolved. I really don't think widespread anxiety is just social contagion. I think it's a really natural reaction to a world not built for organic human peace.

All this also true.

I do get anxious about the things most people get anxious about eg driving test, exams etc but I don't think that's unusual. I work in a secondary school and we have so many children with SEMH and anxiety issues that it makes me worry for their future.

This is absolutely normal. Unfortunately, we’ve pathologised ordinary human feelings.

I sometimes think people feel they gain status by being “special” as if they’re more sensitive than other people. It’s rubbish.

I’ve been reading up on this having been to some talks. As humans, we have evolved to live in communities. We would have had awareness of what was happening in our own tribes and an awareness of another tribe living on the other side of that hill, perhaps, but not what was happening on the other side of the planet. We aren’t meant to carry the worries of the world. Our kids are aware of so much more than we would have been, thanks to 24 hour news and social media and it’s just not good for us. It’s a burden if we can’t do anything about it.

eg I could be really worried about the impact of Trump’s re-election, but I can’t control or even influence it, so worrying about it is pointless and likely to develop into anxiety.

I actively encourage teen DD to put anything she can’t directly control or influence out of her mind because worrying about it won’t solve anything.