How Your Health Anxiety Causes Panic Attacks
Chances are if you were to ask a family member or a friend whether or not they have ever worried about their health, the answer would be “yes”. However, for people with health anxiety, this worry begins to take over your life. You spend hours or days feeling anxious about new sensations in your body or worry that a chronic illness is developing or worsening.
If this anxiety intensifies or worsens, you might even begin to have panic attacks related to internal triggers (body sensations and feelings) or external triggers (upcoming medical appointments, being in a medical setting, etc) for your health anxiety. Keep reading to learn more about how your health anxiety could be causing your panic attacks.
What are panic attacks?
Panic attacks, sometimes called anxiety attacks, are intense sudden, physical and psychological responses to feelings of fear and anxiety. Due to the nature and symptoms of panic attacks, you might feel like you are having a heart attack or dying. For someone with health anxiety, the fear of your body not working “correctly” or the fear of dying can be even more concrete and can result in additional anxiety of future panic attacks.
While anxiety can be a perfectly normal response to a stressful event, for some people, their levels of anxiety and panic can be so intense that it prevents them from experiencing meaningful changes in school, work, and relationships. Intense anxiety can result in panic attacks which can have effects on your mental and physical health.
Panic attacks can be terrifying. You may find your panic attacks are triggered by a specific event, person, or even smell. For some people, the panic attacks can be so intense that you might feel as if you won’t survive this type of anxiety or you might even “blackout” and forget how you moved past your panic attack.
Signs of a panic attack
Panic attacks are typified by a sudden onset of panic, anxiety, and fear. They can include both physical sensations in your body and psychological changes in your thoughts and emotions. Panic attacks can feel different for different people and you might experience a wide variety of differing symptoms. For instance, some people feel physical symptoms before psychological symptoms and vise versa.
While panic attacks can feel like they last hours or might never end, they truthfully rarely last beyond 10 minutes.
You might recognize these signs of a panic attack:
Feeling faint, dizzy, or nauseous
Feeling pain in your chest or head
Racing thoughts
Trembling or shaking
Sweating
Choking or difficulty breathing
Feeling extremely hot or cold
Feeling “detached” from your body
Sudden fear of dying
Intense feeling of dread
What happens in the brain during a panic attack?
When you experience a panic attack, certain regions of your brain engage as you prepare to address this anxiety. The amygdala, the region of the brain associated with the “fight or flight” response, lights up. Your brain starts releasing cortisol, the hormone associated with stress. Your brain may also flood your body with adrenaline. As the sympathetic nervous system activates, you might begin to feel the classic signs of panic attack such as sweating, difficulty breathing, and temperature changes. After the threat is gone, the parasympathetic nervous system engages to help calm the body after the threat.
However, for people with anxiety and panic disorders, you might find it’s incredibly difficult to calm yourself even after the threat is gone or even without the presence of an obvious threat. When you experience anxiety on a regular basis, you might find it increasingly difficult to prevent or reduce panic attacks and accompanying symptoms. Those who live in anxiety-provoking environments can actually have larger amygdalas than those who do not experience regular anxiety meaning they are actually more sensitive to perceived threats. If you experience anxiety consistently, you might find your brain sends “false alarms” about what to find fearful.
What happens in the body during a panic attack?
When you experience a panic attack, your body is reacting the same way it might have thousands of years ago to a giant saber toothed tiger - your safety is threatened and it is preparing to fight the threat, take flight from the threat, or freeze until the threat goes away.
While these changes in your body might have worked great to survive an attack from a predator, they are less useful when you experience them when going to a doctor’s appointment. Especially for those with health anxiety, you might experience secondary anxiety related to the physical symptoms in your body during and after a panic attack. Your health anxiety might cause you to feel anxious in your body hours or even days after a panic attack.
Here are some common changes that can happen in your body when you have a panic attacks:
Your blood pressure rises as your heart beats faster
You might have stomach aches, nausea, constipation, or diarrhea - there is evidence of a connection between irritable bowel syndrome (IBS) and anxiety
Frequent anxiety attacks can weaken your immune system
Anxiety attacks can worsen asthma, COPD, or other breathing issues
If you have health anxiety, panic attacks can cause a vicious cycle or repeating feedback loop: You feel anxious about your health which causes a panic attack, and the physical symptoms cause you to feel anxious which brings about another panic attack.
This graphic below explains more about the connection between health anxiety and panic attacks:
Causes of panic attacks
Panic attacks can have many causes and what causes one person’s panic attacks may not cause another person’s panic attacks. Panic attacks can be, but are not always, related to a specific trigger. These are “situational-induced” panic attacks - a specific situation causes these panic attacks. For example someone who has a specific phobia, like how Indiana Jones had a phobia of snakes (ophidiophobia), they might have a panic attack when this specific phobia is triggered. Some people might experience “emotional-induced” panic attacks. These panic attacks are typical at night and occur when you experience a specific intense emotion. However, for some people, panic attacks can occur from seemingly out of nowhere and might be related to a panic disorder, anxiety disorder, or underlying medical condition, such as a hyperactive thyroid. Knowing the cause and potential triggers for your panic attacks can help you potentially prevent panic attacks and better help yourself self-soothe during and after a panic attack.
Here are some common triggers for anxiety that might lead to a panic attack:
Social gatherings
Public speaking or performance
Conflict with family, friends, co-workers, or supervisors
Particular smells or sounds that remind you of a stressful event (i.e. Experiencing a panic attack during a bad storm if you were affected by a hurricane)
If you have health anxiety or have experienced medical trauma, your anxiety triggers might be more related to a specific event, situation, smell, or sound. For example, you might find the following causes your anxiety or your panic attacks:
Going to a medical appointment or to the emergency room
Feeling ill - stomach ache, changes in heart rate, etc.
Hearing medical scares in the news
Learning that a celebrity or a friend/family member has been diagnosed with an illness
Receiving inconclusive test results
Treatment for panic attacks
Psychotherapy
If you find yourself relating to a number of symptoms discussed in this article, you might be wondering about treatment for your own panic attacks. Therapy can help you examine potential triggers for these attacks and practice relaxation techniques so that these symptoms become less severe or go away completely. You and your therapist will work through these triggers in a way that feels safe and comfortable for you. Your therapist might also suggest additional tips such as reducing or stopping caffeine or nicotine intake, sleeping and moving in a schedule that works for your body, and practicing relaxation techniques such as deep breathing or yoga.
Medication
Anti-anxiety medication can be a helpful addition to therapy, or an effective stand-alone treatment, to address anxiety and panic attacks. Be sure to talk to your healthcare provider for more information. If you would like to try medication for your panic attacks, your therapist can collaborate with your provider so that they can ensure you receive the best possible care.
Want to learn more about therapy for your anxiety or panic attacks?
Contact us today at 985-441-7550 or email us at contact@revivepractice.com to schedule your free 15 minute consultation to explore what relief from anxiety might look like for you.
References and additional resources:
Panic Attacks: What They Are, How to Stop, and More
Panic Attacks and Panic Disorder - Psychiatric Disorders
How to Stop a Panic Attack: What To Do & What to Avoid
What Happens to Your Brain When Anxiety Attacks?
12 Effects of Anxiety on the Body
