Most people, when going though periods of intense stress, choose to try one or more of the common anxiety drugs that have been developed over the years.
The reason is simple.
These drugs can change your mood almost instantaneously from a feeling of anxiousness to calm.
And they can do this without any effort on your part.
In terms of effectiveness, however, it seems that drugs are no more effective in being able to cure long term stress than is talk therapy.
The study is from a Consumer Reports survey take a few years ago which polled subscribers who were suffering from stress and anxiety.
In it, the participants who filled out questions to a survey, were asked to rate the effectiveness of various types of treatment that they were taking.
When the results were tabulated, it seems as though the benefits that participants received from talk therapy was, in most cases, every bit as good as those received from drugs.
And, in many cases, the patients rated talk therapy as better.
One of the main reasons that talk therapy scored so high was that it carried no side effects.
But a second reason is that the goals of drug therapy and talk therapy are somewhat different.
When drugs are prescribed for anxiety, the goal is to help the person get past the stress of the moment so that they can live a normal life.
With talk therapy, however, the goal is more long term.
It is to help the person recognize why the feelings of stress and anxiety are present.
And then, once the understanding is there, it is to help to get over their stress.
For the most part, when people make the decision to try talk therapy, they seek the help of a therapist.
But, friends and family members can often be just as helpful.
In fact, if you have a close relationship with such a person, the breakthrough can occur much faster because you don't have to get over the trust hurdle that you have to when going to see a professional therapist.
As humans, it is natural for us to want to talk.
Many emotional problems that humans experience derive from us holding emotions in and feeling that we can't talk about our fears and issues.
But once we lose those restrictions and inhibitions holding us back from communicating our feelings, we often find that, just by the process of talking, we actually are able to resolve our own stress problems.
The reason is simple.
These drugs can change your mood almost instantaneously from a feeling of anxiousness to calm.
And they can do this without any effort on your part.
In terms of effectiveness, however, it seems that drugs are no more effective in being able to cure long term stress than is talk therapy.
The study is from a Consumer Reports survey take a few years ago which polled subscribers who were suffering from stress and anxiety.
In it, the participants who filled out questions to a survey, were asked to rate the effectiveness of various types of treatment that they were taking.
When the results were tabulated, it seems as though the benefits that participants received from talk therapy was, in most cases, every bit as good as those received from drugs.
And, in many cases, the patients rated talk therapy as better.
One of the main reasons that talk therapy scored so high was that it carried no side effects.
But a second reason is that the goals of drug therapy and talk therapy are somewhat different.
When drugs are prescribed for anxiety, the goal is to help the person get past the stress of the moment so that they can live a normal life.
With talk therapy, however, the goal is more long term.
It is to help the person recognize why the feelings of stress and anxiety are present.
And then, once the understanding is there, it is to help to get over their stress.
For the most part, when people make the decision to try talk therapy, they seek the help of a therapist.
But, friends and family members can often be just as helpful.
In fact, if you have a close relationship with such a person, the breakthrough can occur much faster because you don't have to get over the trust hurdle that you have to when going to see a professional therapist.
As humans, it is natural for us to want to talk.
Many emotional problems that humans experience derive from us holding emotions in and feeling that we can't talk about our fears and issues.
But once we lose those restrictions and inhibitions holding us back from communicating our feelings, we often find that, just by the process of talking, we actually are able to resolve our own stress problems.