The Sky Is Falling: Understanding and Coping with Phobias, Panic, and Obsessive-Compulsive Disorders - Softcover

Dumont, Raeann

Softcover

ISBN 10: 0393316033 ISBN 13: 9780393316032

Publisher: W. W. Norton & Company, 1997

Synopsis

"A unique description of how clients think in the situations that produce anxiety, and how they can work on changing their thinking and reclaiming their lives, which have been lost to fears, rituals, and patterns of avoidance."--Aaron T. Beck, M.D., from the foreword

Gracie hasn't left her house in thirty years out of fear she'll be contaminated. Jerry spent hours each day picking up debris on the subway platform. Norm's bridge phobia led him into alcoholism. David bright, young, ambitious feared he'd lose his job because he so dreaded giving sales presentations.

These are some of the case studies exemplary of the approximately fourteen to twenty million people who suffer from anxiety disorders in this country that are found in this riveting and instructive book. Raeann Dumont lays bare the features of obsessive-compulsive disorder, phobias, and panic. Utilizing cognitive therapy and self-help techniques, she helps readers recognize anxiety-producing thoughts and shows how, through reality testing and assessing anxiety situations, these compulsions can be managed.

About this title

About the Author:

Raeann Dumont specializes in the treatment of anxiety disorders. She lives in New York City.

From Booklist:

Professional therapist Dumont writes for those millions of people whose lives are being "blighted by irrational fears." Whether a person suffers from some unnamed terror, an incapacitating anxiety, or a behavior they can't stop, Dumont believes that all are victims of "magic thinking," in which a conclusion has been formed without a rational thought process. She details this type of thinking and how it can come to dominate people's lives. Case studies of sufferers are presented, including a woman who experiences panic attacks in public places; a man terrified of driving over bridges; and a teenage boy who stops eating for fear of being poisoned. The last section gives pragmatic advice for recognizing fallacious thinking and setting both short-term and long-range goals to relieve these debilitating reactions. This book should also be quite helpful for those trying to aid someone with these problems. Brian McCombie

About this edition

• Publisher: W. W. Norton & Company
• Publication date: 1997
• ISBN 10: 0393316033
• ISBN 13: 9780393316032
• Binding: Paperback
• Number of pages: 320