 Hey Psych2Goers, do you know someone that you think may have anxiety, but you're not sure? Anxiety doesn't have the single face of outwardly obvious signs like fidgeting or erratic breathing. There are different types of anxiety and different tolerances or ability to hide it. We're here to provide some info so that you may be able to be there for someone who may be too embarrassed or fearful to ask for help outright. You know that the surface can hide many things. So let's peel a little bit back and look at some signs of hidden anxiety. Number one, irritability and anger. People with anxiety tend to feel irritable, which can then escalate into expressions of anger. To the outsider, it can look like the person is moody or testy, sometimes without an apparent reason. This is often from the anxious person hiding a constant multitude of worries over time allowing them to brew. Where this moodiness turns into anger is when the worries start getting interpreted as threats. Anxiety does a great job of upping and exaggerating the freak-out level of even the smallest thing. The outburst of anger could well be the anxious individual unleashing a protective response. Number two, overly conscientious. This one is tricky and tends to be downplayed or ignored since it usually benefits others. The outside world gets this super meticulous, incredibly prepared individual who shows up extra early to appointments, finishes their work far before the deadline, and all while being well-dressed with perfect hair. In fact, the work is finished so efficiently, the person has time to assist others. Doesn't that sound great? Wait, not so fast. Watch out for these things happening to an abnormal extent. Sure, it's easy to wave it off as thinking, well, if they can do it, why not? But before you happily skip off to reap the rewards of their hard work, consider what's actually happening. Companies have a tendency to take advantage of and exploit the symptoms, piling on more work and expectations. Unfortunately, this is kind of terrible for the person with anxiety. They're still human, and as such, they still have the same human limits. All those extras they take on simply fast-track them to burnout or a meltdown. They may be overextending themselves to conceal fears of failure and nervous energy. They could be trying to live up to their unreasonable expectations of themselves, overcompensating in all areas to alleviate their failure phobia. This is not sustainable. Number three, endless criticism. The follow-up to the previous point about over-conscientiousness is the Anxiety's person's inner critique. It's loud, it's constant, and it's a real Karen. Not only do those with anxiety apply strict criticisms to themselves, but also to people around them, making those people pull away, leading to more anxiety. You can see how this excessive worry readily starts the domino effect of making a mountain out of a molehill. They see many things around them are scary or wrong, just as they perceive things that they themselves do are wrong. They believe that what they do or say could leave to failure, rejection, terrible things, and so on. The endlessness of the what-if worry and so on scenarios slide them down the slippery slope of hyperbolic fear with hyper-self-criticism as their only rope to safety. To increase the feeling of safety or control, they might start trying to control the environment by becoming hyper-critical of friends and family. Number four, codependency. This one stems from the fear of losing, disappointing, or being rejected by other people. The fear is such a destabilizing force that they constantly are thinking they'll be suddenly abandoned. To alleviate this fear, they cling extra tight to a loved one. They might also be blindly loyal to them and only live life through the other person. This codependency tendency can display itself by two frequent calls, constant checking in for no reason other than I just wanted to know. They may even refuse to leave their home without the person they fear losing the most. Number five, unusually overbooked or underbooked social schedule. This is swinging from one end of social busyness to the other, depending on if the greater fear is losing people or other self-directed phobias. The fear of losing people in general can manifest as an unusually overbooked social schedule. Their thoughts and feelings are geared and locked in on the perception that they cannot refuse anyone anything because if they do, they'll be dropped or otherwise rejected. If the greater overwhelming fears are things like embarrassing themselves in public, being trapped in certain spaces or other things that increase in likelihood with socialization, their schedule becomes a barren wasteland. Keep in mind too that although this can sound somewhat reasonable, the fears are from a place of warped perception. So embarrassing themselves in public could be something no one even noticed, but the person with anxiety feels they've shamed themselves forever. And number six, fidgety or restless body language. This is something that can be physically observed in the moment. Anxiety can make a person more restless and on edge since they're already hyper-conscious about how they look, how others see them, and so on. The nervous energy has to go somewhere. The nervous energy leaks out in subtle fidgety actions and gestures such as shifty or avoidant eye contact, knuckle cracking, lip biting, playing with hair or clothes or even non-stop rambling. This physical response to restlessness can become habitual, such as constantly finding something to occupy their mind like social media scrolling or mobile games. If socializing causes anxiety, isolating habits can also crop up, like having headphones on in public. So that person may not be standoffish or purposefully rude, they could just have anxiety. As we've seen, anxiety disorders are complex and varied. Symptoms can be similar, but not identical between the different types of anxiety. And can be experienced in varying degrees. All that said though, there is a normal range of anxiety experienced by most people. So no, being anxious because of a specific event like a test or a presentation is not a disorder. A disorder is when the anxiety has gone beyond that normal range and is now causing clinically significant distress or impairment in multiple, often everyday aspects of life. It can be difficult to discern either way though. And the only ones who can give you a clear definite diagnosis are doctors. They're also the best ones equipped to help or at least guide a person to appropriate help. So reach out if you need it. Did you find this video helpful? Let us know in the comments. We hope this video has helped a bit to calm your nerves and we'd love to see you at the next Infobite. In the meantime, comment, like and share. See you soon.