Sorry for the long question. Two months ago I went to Asia for work. I was sick before I left (head cold). About halfway through the trip I was in a meeting drinking cup after cup of some incredibly strong tea and all of a sudden I nearly fainted and my heart started racing. I went to my room and lay down and felt better, but woke up later feeling awful and eventually forced myself to vomit. The next morning (after a sweaty sleep) I felt fine and went to my next meeting, but throughout the day I would have waves of lightheadedness and nausea. Of course I was freaked out that I had some kind of Asian flu and I was on the other side of the world and wouldn't be able to get treatment, etc. Anyway, for the next few days it was like that. These waves of near-fainting, nausea, but periods of feeling fine. When I got home, I thought I felt better, but it continued like that (some days better than others). My travel increased and work was stressfull, and I thought I simply had a virus because each day I'd wake up okay but it would happen again periodically. Other symptoms started showing up, like I didn't like to be around people and was nervous being in public. One day I had my wife's Xmas party, and interview and my annual review and I had a horrible episode. A doctor had prescribed Ativan (when he thought I had an inner ear infection), and I took it that night (and every day since for four weeks). My wife is a psychologist and she said it sounded like Generalized Anxiety Disorder. That sounded odd to me because these symptoms were occurring with and without any anxiety (and I would normally feel anxious anyway since I didn't know what the hell was wrong with me). Since then I have had more depression and anxiety (with no real cause, in cirumstances where I wouldn't normally be anxious), and when I do my ears feel full and I don't know which is causing which.
Anyway, since taking Ativan, it's been better (though I feel like it's wearing off) and I haven't had any real epsiodes where I feel like I'm about to faint, although close. I do keep getting these modest (but very real) lightheaded spells, even when I'm not feeling anxious.
My question is twofold, I guess: does this sound liek GAD to you, and more importantly, is lightheadedness without anxiety a symptom of GAD? When you have GAD can you have the physical symptoms without actual anxiety (feelings of dread, smothering, etc)?