I’m guessing that if you are reading this, you spend enough time in the online mental health space to hear the term “trauma informed” at least once. This is a term designed to indicate that advice, intervention, education, or whatever else is given with the impact of trauma in mind and with the goal of promoting trauma recovery and resolution.
Why has this become such a widely used term?
Simple. Because trauma experts are doing a pretty good job of getting the word out about the impact of real trauma and the specific red flags we need to be aware of when it comes to helping trauma victims without accidentally causing them more harm . It’s a good thing, right?
I would like to propose that we need a companion concept here.
Anxiety Disorder Informed.
That also needs to be a thing.
Why does it need to be a thing? Simply because we also need to recognize when generalized mental health and personal development advice can be harmful to people dealing with the specific problems posed by disordered anxiety.
There are lots of people out there with huge platforms talking about “anxiety”, some of which even have some impressive academic standing, that are not anxiety disorder informed. I am quite sure that they all mean well and genuinely want to help to at least some degree. But we cannot ignore the adverse impact of advice given to someone with OCD or health anxiety (as examples) when that advice has no basis in the realty of OCD or health anxiety.
At worst, that advice can pour fuel on an already raging fire of fear and discomfort. Anyone that has ever been told that they need to appreciate the “wisdom of anxiety” when that anxiety is in the form of harm OCD (for example) will attest to this. At best, that kind of advice can lead a person with an anxiety disorder to conclude that nothing can help them, which is simply not true. It’s just the wrong advice, even if it is very popular.
If you’ve ever wondered why inspiring stories of triumph and growth told by self-help influencers are not helping you get better even when Oprah says they are amazing, then raise your hand because I see you. I promise you are not broken nor is your mental health issue unique or more severe than everyone else’s.
I’m not picking on self-help and personal development advocates. We need them too. But anxiety disorders are counterintuitive. They are the most common, yet often the most misunderstood mental health issues in the west. Nothing about telling an anxious person to go be more anxious seems “right” if you’re in the business of trying to make people FEEL better. But recovery is not automatically about FEELING better. It’s about GETTING better, which is a different thing. It requires an understanding of the problem and a willingness to accept the nature of the game even when you would rather play a different - and dare I suggest a more profitable - game.
All humans experience anxiety. Not all humans experience anxiety disorders. This is an important distinction that must be brought to the forefront of the mental health conversation, and kept there. We need to differentiate between advice addressing anxiety and advice addressing anxiety disorders.
We need a new catch phrase.
Anxiety Disorder Informed.
Who’s in?
156. "Anxiety Disorder Informed"