Arte

“Living with anxiety isn’t just a psychological strain, it affects us physically too. The sense of being on edge all the time weighed on me and gave me the impression that things were never letting up or improving“, Adrian Smith @adrian3d, artist

Anxiety

We’re back to highlight another mental health issue for Mental Health Month. We understand that some of these topics can be triggering so please take care of yourself while reading.

Today, we’ll be focusing on anxiety. Most of us have felt anxious to a certain degree. Usually it happens at periods of heightened stress, such as getting ready for a job interview, moving to a new place or being in an uncomfortable setting. This is normal as your body produces adrenaline and cortisol that triggers a physical stress response in those situations. In most cases, these anxious feelings go away after the stressful situation is over.

However, some people are diagnosed with anxiety conditions that affects them daily—regardless of what’s happening in their life. These types of anxiety disorders include: generalized anxiety disorder, panic disorder, and various phobia-related disorders. For them, even everyday experiences like going to work, seeing friends, or even just getting out of the house can trigger those same stress responses.

With an anxiety disorder you might feel overwhelmed with emotions of extreme worry and fear on a regular basis. Anxiety affects a person both physically and mentally. You could just be sitting at home with your hands sweating, your heart racing, and heat flushing your face. If your anxiety escalates to a panic attack, you may experience shortness of breath, dizzy spells or the inability to talk. In some cases, you might feel like you are having a heart attack or even dying.

According to the Anxiety and Depression Association of America, anxiety disorders are one of the most common mental disorders in the US. Below are some facts about anxiety:

It’s estimated that approximately 32 percent of teenagers and 31 percent of adults suffer from an anxiety disorder of some kind at some point in their lives

Anxiety affects a person both physically and mentally. Here are some physical symptoms: shortness of breath, shaking, nausea, headache, rapid heartbeat, dizzy spells, and more.

Although anxiety disorders can be triggered by extended environmental stress or traumatic life events, anyone can be affected with anxiety no matter their age, gender, socioeconomic status or sexuality.

If you’ve been diagnosed with an anxiety disorder, we want to remind you that you are not alone in these feelings. Having an anxiety attack might make you feel helpless or lost. In the thick of it, it can feel like there’s no end. We see you and your community is here for you to help you remember that a panic attack is just the product of brain chemistry. It’s okay to have these moments, and it’s important to find the coping skills that work for you. Many people have found things such as breathing exercises, meditation, physical movement, cutting down on caffeine and alcohol and going to therapy as ways to help them with their anxiety.

Check out these resources at the bottom if you have more questions.

National Alliance on Mental Illness- @namiorg It Get Gets Better- @itgetsbetterproject Ditch the Label- @ditchthelabel

Here are some resources UK, & Germany. if you are outside of U.S. Germany, UK, check out Mental Health Europe’s resources.

“Focusing on my own mental health was difficult in the beginning. I needed to ascertain the difference between where my environment was shaping my thoughts and where my mind was affecting how I perceived things.”- Adrian Smith @adrian3d artist

Happy Mental Health Month, Tumblr!

Mental Health is important. With May being Mental Health Month, we want to take this opportunity to not only facilitate discussions on mental health but also to help those who aren’t familiar with mental health issues and coping strategies learn how to navigate these choppy waters.

For many people, discussing mental health issues was not a welcomed topic in their childhood home. Whether you come from families whose cultural values didn’t totally align with your own, or you felt unsafe discussing who you really are—we see you. No matter if you’re just starting on your mental health journey or have been tackling it for some time, you should be proud of your accomplishments thus far.

All month long Post It Forward will be sparking dialogue surrounding four big issues many people—especially young people—face today: eating disorders, anxiety, addiction, and suicide. 

This will be tough. For some, it will be really tough. But it’s important that we let people know it is okay to be open and honest with your personal struggles.

If you don’t want to see these posts, don’t worry. We got you. We’ll be putting content warnings in all of our tags, and you can filter those tags right off your dashboard. You can have total control over what you see (and don’t see).

There has been much talk recently about the less-than-stellar notification system running in iOS. The most common, and valid complaint, stems from the disruptiveness of the current interactions. When a new notification comes through, a modal box appears, suspends any tasks and basically persists until acknowledged or ignored. Beyond interrupting whatever actions are happening on the phone, there is no real way to view or manage multiple notifications. 

  While leaning on Geoff’s patience and always-thoughtful advice, I’ve designed a less intrusive system to handle incoming notifications while giving the user a better way to view and manage their queue.

  The first update adds a badge to the status bar showing the current number of unread notifications. 

 Next you’ll see a new notification appear over the home screen. The “popover” fades over the top portion of the screen showing the icon from the app responsible and the relevant text. The popover will fade in and out over 2-3 seconds. While onscreen, all applications and processes will continue to run as normal. These popovers require no action and once they fade out, the badge count for unread messages will increase by one. 

To access the list of missed notifications, double-tap the notifications badge in the status bar. Doing so results in a familiar action, like opening an application folder, to reveal the list of unread messages. In iOS the linen texture serves as the bottom most visual layer in the UI.

A tap on any one of the messages switches to the appropriate app, and a swipe will delete a specific notification. 

 So far, all works well when you’re phone is unlocked and in use, but what about when the display is asleep? If desired (should be an option in Settings) the notifications will appear on the lock screen with the same possible interactions, a tap to run the app and a swipe to delete. While I like the idea of this, I wonder how often accidental touches will inadvertently launch an app. If the list of notifications don’t jump to their respective apps, they should at least swipe to delete to manage the queue without unlocking into the home screen.