Abnormal psychology

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Heart Attack in Abnormal Psychology
Psychological stressors such as emotional conditions and personality kinds are several of the major reasons of heart attack (Albus 488). For example, people who undergo dejection, hopelessness, and a negative outlook have a higher risk of suffering from high blood pressure, obesity, diabetes, and weakened heart rates, which intensify the threat of a heart attack. People who experience prolonged anxiety also undergo heart attacks because of their susceptibility to high blood pressure and reduced heart rate. Similarly, persons who suffer emotional trauma because of acute fear, grief, startling, and anger have a high likelihood of experiencing a heart attack.
A heart attack has various psychological effects on an individual. For example, persons who experience a heart attack may have reactions such as numbness, fear, helplessness, grief, guilt, shame, anger, shock, need for privacy, and relationship change ((Whalley 61). More so, people who have suffered heart attack experience numbness, a reflex where the mind protects the body to heal from the trauma slowly. It is also normal for heart attack patients to live in constant fear of suffering another ordeal as they live in anger of having the condition as they feel inadequate, exposed, and guilty. Finally, heart attack patients may feel the need for more time alone away from friends and family, which changes relationships dynamics.
Consequently, some people live under stress after suffering a heart attack.

However, an individual can return to their usual selves through psychological recovery (Richards 134). Among the steps a heart attack survivor should take to recover psychologically include expressing emotions, reviewing the heart attack experienced by oneself or with others, and getting adequate sleep, resting, thinking, and spending time with family and close friends. Additionally, a heart attack survivor should avoid abusing alcohol, self-medicating, and taking care while handling machinery to avoid stress-related accidents. Heart attack survivors should not expect to recover from the trauma quickly. However, they should avoid more stress to promote recovery.

Works Cited
Albus, Christian. “Psychological and social factors in coronary heart disease.” Annals of medicine 42.7 (2010): 487-494.
Richards, S. H., Anderson, L., Jenkinson, C. E., Whalley, B., Rees, K., Davies, P., … & Taylor, R. S. (2017). Psychological interventions for coronary heart disease. Cochrane Database of Systematic Reviews, (4).
Whalley, B., Rees, K., Davies, P., Bennett, P., Ebrahim, S., Liu, Z., … & Taylor, R. S. (2011). Psychological interventions for coronary heart disease. Cochrane Database Syst Rev, 8(8), CD002902.