As companies that once seemed invincible keep trickling down the drain, Joe and Jane Citizen are seeing a slide in the personal investments they'd been banking on to carry them and their families through life - 30 percent loss has been an oft-cited figure for some 401(k) funds over the last few months.

And that's generating the kinds of emotional responses triggered by unanticipated, uncontrollable events that shake lives and lifestyles.

"It's definitely the biggest fret factor I've ever experienced," says Jason Cole, managing director of Abacus Wealth Partners, a financial planning and management firm in Center City. "It feels like to most of us, including myself, that we're in a 20-round boxing match, and we're getting beaten up every month."

When her quarterly pension statement arrived in October, the Rev. Wil Gafney of Mount Airy says, "I simply did not open [it]. I was anxious, and I wasn't going to look at it because then, in some way, the anxiety would be realized and there would be nothing I could do."

But eventually, says Gafney, 43, an associate professor at the Lutheran Theological Seminary at Philadelphia, "I . . . decided I needed to know." When she opened the statement, she discovered that her investments had dropped less than 20 percent in value - not as bad as she had feared.

David J. Rosenthal considers himself an active investor, "but lately, the angst has grown so much, it's distracting."

The last thing Rosenthal needs is distractions as he navigates his own firm, Atidan in Yardley, through the turbulence.

"I have 50-plus employees. I have to feed them all," he says.

Money always ranks high on the list of what stresses people out. But these days, with experts seeming as stymied about the economy as the kid down the street, trepidation is rising as stocks are falling, psychologists and financial planners say.

Tom Smedile, president of Swarthmore Financial Advisors, says one client told him that he "checks his 401(k) balance every Friday night . . . with a drink in hand."

On the flip side, Cole says one client told him she went about three months without opening any of her statements.

That's not all that uncommon. It's a defense mechanism called denial, says D.J. Palmiter Jr., a professor of psychology at Marywood University in Scranton. An event, whether it's getting bad economic news or discovering a spouse has been unfaithful, can be so painful your mind tries to protect you by ignoring the reality.

To a degree, Palmiter says, the strategy might help someone adapt to the situation. But it's more likely to be harmful. Better to maintain the rituals of your life - keep going to church, or out for pizza. Also, sleep, diet, exercise, and engagement with family and friends are keys to a healthy mind in an unhealthy economy.

Tom Meyer, of Meyer Capital Group in Marlton, says he has tried to calm his clients by advising them not to panic and to plan for the long term.

Evidently, that's more easily said than done.

One of his clients, Meyer says, stood in line at Wachovia Bank on a day its stock sank to withdraw $2 million from his business account. Then he went from bank to bank buying $100,000 certificates of deposit, so they would be under the limit that qualifies funds to be insured by the federal government.

A retiree Smedile advises decided to pull her money out of the stock market and she, too, put it into CDs. "I may be making a big mistake, but health-wise, I think it's the best thing for me," she told Smedile.

"The same dread is affecting everybody as they have concerns about their personal security and the security of their families," says Wynnewood psychologist and management consultant David Weiman. "It's connected to your sense of whether you're going to be viable, whether you'll survive in life. That's basic stuff."

"People are watching their lives change before their eyes, says Nancy Molitor, a clinical psychologist and public-education coordinator for the American Psychological Association, who has experience helping patients dealing with financial stress.

"They feel they worked hard, they did what they were supposed to do," she says. Yet all that money they socked away for their retirement or the kids' college education is shrinking fast.

Feeling anxious about such personal changes is normal, Molitor says. "It becomes a clinical problem when a person becomes dysfunctional."

She's seeing a lot of drinking, which isn't surprising. Research has shown an increase in alcohol sales and movie tickets during economic downturns, Molitor says.

But cosmetic companies say lipstick sales also get a bump up in a bad economy - plausible, economists say. A woman may decide she can't afford a $500 pair of boots, but a $25 feel-good lipstick - that's affordable.

Many people see their financial condition as a reflection of their success and intelligence, says Wynnewood psychologist Maggie Baker, who specializes in the psychology of money.

It's important to disconnect your sense of self from how much money you have, she says: "Deal with your emotion, so you can act in your own best interest."

Weiman gives his clients these suggestions to counter their economic fears:

Separate what you can control from what you can't.

Reduce exposure to negative information. If your Internet home page is a news Web site that regularly has updates, don't look at it all day.

Make a plan that can improve the situation and take a step, no matter how small, toward it. "As a prof of mine once said in grad school, 'Action is an antidote to anxiety,' " Weiman says.

Finally, don't repeat negative behavior.

"If you keep punching yourself in the eye, it hurts," he says. "There's something you can do about it - stop."