Google searches for "Anxiety Help" have quintupled since 2004. Blogger de Pony Sum has the numbers that seem to show this is no fluke; among other things, searches for depression have not gone up anywhere near as much.
I remember when I was young, a close friend of the family had a panic attack trying to board an airplane.
I had no real understanding of what was wrong at the time, and it was treated as something almost shameful, not to be asked or talked about - and this growing up in a household run by a practicing medical doctor. And yet, I knew about depression, even if only imperfectly, and never felt like it was a subject I couldn't talk about.
There may well be more anxiety floating around than before - in fact, I don't doubt it. But I also feel like society has shifted such that people now more openly acknowledge and talk about anxiety, and there's a greater shared awareness and understanding of the problem, alongside a greater sympathy for those who suffer it.
I remember when I was young, a close friend of the family had a panic attack trying to board an airplane.
ReplyDeleteI had no real understanding of what was wrong at the time, and it was treated as something almost shameful, not to be asked or talked about - and this growing up in a household run by a practicing medical doctor. And yet, I knew about depression, even if only imperfectly, and never felt like it was a subject I couldn't talk about.
There may well be more anxiety floating around than before - in fact, I don't doubt it. But I also feel like society has shifted such that people now more openly acknowledge and talk about anxiety, and there's a greater shared awareness and understanding of the problem, alongside a greater sympathy for those who suffer it.