Below is a list of common disorders diagnosed in both children and adults that come up when you type list of anxiety disorders into google.
Generalized Anxiety Disorder
Obsessive-Compulsive Disorder.
Panic Disorder.
Specific Phobias.
Social Phobia.
Separation Anxiety Disorder.
Selective Mutism.
The word anxiety brings all these disorders together. I prefer to use the word alarmed over anxious when exploring this issues. There is less negativity attached to it and I find it brings us closer to the bodily sensations of what is going on.
The Alarm System
Our alarm systems play a vital role in our make up as human beings. It moves us to caution and is there to protective us. It serves our attachments by making sure we stay close to who is caring for us. As children attachment is the preeminent need and so it has lots of work to do for us.
To see how important it is you can notice how many alarm based games young children play growing up. I am talking about the type of games when they are being chased by monsters, the floor is lava, hide and seek etc. All the types of games where the children just love to be scared. It starts early with games like Peek-a-boo. How scary must that be for a baby to willingly cut themselves off from a caregiver.
The beauty of play is that it’s safe and so the alarm system can go up and then come back down again. All this play helps to get our alarm system up and running as we grow older. Creating an alarm system for the outside world.
All the disorders above have alarm in common. When we talk about these disorders as anxieties it can lead us all to often to the thoughts, or to our mind trying to help out but there is a futility about trying to think your way out of it. There is a lot of work to be done this way and it’s almost trying to suppress the alarm system without acknowledging the root.
Space for our Alarm Systems
In compassionate Inquiry and my work with families it’s my aim to get to the root of these issues and that means giving the alarm in us an invitation to be there. Be curious about, bringing it into the play mode when possible and discovering the feelings of alarm that go with it. Because if an alarm goes off, it might be a false alarm or it might be real but either way it gets our full attention. The alarm might be in us as parents. It might be in children. Our alarm systems will feed off each other as we try and make sense for the world.
Find out more
Make space for your own alarm system and notice how it feels. Notice it in your children both in play and out of play. The beauty of alarm is that if we can feel it then we can find our courage. Because if you can’t feel your alarm then there really is nothing to be courageous about. Not feeling it might look courageous, but it isn’t what you might say ‘true’ courage looks like.
To find out more about my work with families, parents and compassionate Inquiry then get in touch mail@joeatkinson.co.uk