Question

Karen is in her first year of seminary. Prior to joining the seminary, she was a teacher in a small catholic high school. She loves to work with the groups of people she knows in class; but she is always concerned about whether she is doing a good job and whether her peers see her as doing a good job. When she is studying, she gets up and rings her hands, her palms sweat, and she finds that her heart is racing. She spends endless hours studying to make sure she gets things right. With class projects, she begins to feel overwhelmed and sick to her stomach when she has to stand up in front of other people. As she prepares herself to do her presentation the day before, she is either awake till late in night or if she goes to bed, she has problem in sleeping. Joann is a 73-year-old, retired architect who recently went to Japan. While in Japan she fell and broke her femur bone and knee cap. She spent eight weeks in the hospital recovering. She traveled back to the United States and the pins came out of her knee, which meant she had to have more surgery when she returned. She spent six months in physical therapy and seemed to recover nicely. However, in the past few months she has stopped sleeping well, experiences ruminating thoughts about the accident and repeatedly checks to see if her leg works. She also refuses to leave home because she is afraid of falling. On the basis of your understanding of the above scenarios, answer the following: Name and describe the symptoms of the difficulties experienced by each of these women.

Answer 1

The difficulties experienced of Karen include;

• Over concerned of how people would evaluate her.
• Feeling nervousness, increased sweating and rapid heartbeat while studying.
• Feeling overwhelmed and sick to her stomach for class projects.
• Sleeplessness and anxiety before a presentation.

Karen's symptoms of anxiety are due to some social situations as she fears being negatively evaluated by her peers, she is over anxious when studying,she gets overwhelmed and sick to her stomach for class projects, and has problem sleeping before a presentation. Social situations are endured with intense fear and anxiety by Karen which indicates that she has a Social Anxiety Disorder.

The difficulties experienced by Joann are

• Suffered an actual serious injury and had to go through multiple surgeries because of it.
• Experiences ruminating thoughts about the accident.
• Repeatedly checks whether her legs work well.
• Sleeplessness due to ruminating thoughts.
• Refuses to leave house because of her fear of falling.

The symptoms of Joann has occurred after her injury and surgery. The thoughts of pain and sufferings that she has to endure keeps her stressed and anxious. The symptoms of Joann indicate that she is suffering from Post Traumatic Stress Disorder (PTSD).