Anxiety affects more than a million Americans annually, leading to significant emergency room visits and healthcare costs. In her book, "The Narrowing," clinical psychologist Alexandra Shaker explores anxiety's complexities as it straddles health and illness. She describes it as both biological and social, shaped by emotional and practical forces. Shaker highlights the paradox of anxiety; while it can reveal hidden needs, it often becomes a futile struggle against chaos. Excessive anxiety, especially in conditions like OCD, hampers decision-making. Shaker warns about the dangers of 'cyberchondria,' where seeking online reassurance exacerbates health anxiety.
Over the course of one year in the United States, more than 1.2 million emergency room visits and expenditures exceeding $42 billion are attributable to anxiety.
Shaker emphasizes that since most devastating events are not those we have worried about, anxiety, more often than not, is an ill-conceived exercise against chaos.
The paradox of anxiety is that it is at once irrational and understandable. After all, although a catastrophe is unlikely to be imminent, one cannot completely rule one out.
Health anxiety has recently been fed by 'cyberchondria,' the urge to get reassurance from the internet, which is, alas, fickle, untrustworthy, and, worst of all, bottomless.
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