Generalized Anxiety Disorder - GAD (Episode 038)
Disordered: Anxiety Help
Josh Fletcher and Drew Linsalata
4.9 • 665 Ratings
🗓️ 1 December 2023
⏱️ 44 minutes
🧾️ Download transcript
Summary
This week we're discussing GAD - Generalized Anxiety Disorder. GAD generates the most confusion in the community around Disordered, so we took some time to address a few important issues:
- What is GAD and what isn't it?
- Does being anxious all day mean you have GAD?
- What are some of the underlying processes that drive GAD?
- What about worry and rumination?
In the end, much of GAD is driven by excessive worry and rumination that creates an anxious state when it is directed at problems that can't be solved or don't need to be solved. GAD will demand that you ask questions that don't need to be asked, or engage in overplanning, worrying, and ruminating that you might think you shouldn't or can't walk away from.
Overcoming GAD is about recognizing some of these thinking and behavioral habits, then taking "risks" by leaving worries unanswered, questions unasked, things unfinished or open-ended, and problems unsolved. Sound hard? It is! But hard and impossible are not the same things.
Special thanks to Batman and Bane for pitching in on our opening, and to our friend Elizabeth Lyons for making a cameo appearance as the "Someone call the Ruminator!" woman. Top-notch acting right there.
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Disclaimer: Disordered is not therapy or a replacement for therapy. Listening to Disordered does not create a therapeutic relationship between you and the hosts of the podcast. Information here is provided for psychoeducational purposes. As always, when you have questions about your own well-being, please consult your mental health and/or medical care providers. If you are having a mental health crisis, always reach out immediately for in-person help.
Transcript
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| 0:00.0 | Gad, generalized anxiety disorder. |
| 0:09.0 | Pervasive worry and rumination that you can't seem to stop or control. |
| 0:14.0 | You know, I worry and so to combat worry, I worry more. |
| 0:17.0 | I attack everything like a problem to solve or fix or everything I have to worry about, think about, predict. |
| 0:22.6 | But with GAD, a lot of these worries don't have a solution. |
| 0:25.6 | And it is fueled by rumination. |
| 0:29.6 | Oh no, it feels like there's a problem to solve. Someone call the Ruminator. |
| 0:34.6 | Oh, you think Rumination is your ally. But you merely adopted Ruminator. Oh, you think Rumination is your ally. |
| 0:38.3 | But you merely adopted Rumination. |
| 0:41.3 | I was born in it, |
| 0:43.3 | molded by it. |
| 0:46.3 | Rumination and overthinking betray you |
| 0:49.3 | because they belong to me. |
| 0:52.3 | Welcome to this order. because they belong to me. |
| 0:58.0 | Welcome to Disorder. This is episode 38, entitled Generalized Anxiety Disorder, also known as GAD. |
| 1:05.0 | I'm Joshua Fletcher, not the Ruminator, and I'm a psychotherapist and author specializing in anxiety disorders in the |
| 1:13.6 | UK. I also go by the name, Anxiety Josh, on social media. I am Drew Lince, a lot of co-hosts of |
| 1:19.8 | disordered, also not the Ruminator. Actually, we're all the Ruminator sometimes, I think. Anyway, |
| 1:24.0 | I'm a grad student studying clinical mental health counseling on the way to being a licensed therapist in New York. |
| 1:29.5 | In the US of A, I'm a former sufferer of anxiety disorders and depression for many years, |
| 1:33.9 | a podcaster and author, and I go by The Anxious Truth on social media. |
| 1:38.0 | Hope you guys enjoyed our little theatrical intro there. |
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