Anxiety Dizziness: How They Appear And How To Combat Them
Anxiety is one of the most prevalent mental disorders or alterations worldwide. In fact, it is so common that most of us have probably noticed or will notice anxiety in the face of some event or the stress of everyday life, and it is not strange to have experienced an anxiety crisis either.
It is not unusual that when we are anxious we notice intestinal discomfort, general discomfort, tachycardia or hyperventilation, these being physical symptoms of our high level of distress. Another symptom that may occur is dizziness. Although they can appear for many reasons, sometimes they do so due to a high level of tension and anguish. That is to say, dizziness due to anxiety, which we are going to talk about throughout this article.
Before starting to analyze why we can get dizzy due to anxiety and in order to contextualize the situation, we are going to briefly remember what getting dizzy entails and what we call it anxiety.
What is dizziness?
We give the name dizziness to that sudden feeling of vertigo, dullness and narrowing of consciousness which can arise in various situations and causes a feeling of discomfort, muscle hypotonia, and the appearance of blurred vision or tunnel effect. Sometimes dizziness can end in fainting or loss of consciousness, and although they are usually sudden, we can sometimes previously notice a slight sensation of mental slowing, general malaise and/or agitation beforehand.
There are multiple reasons why we can become dizzy, such as dehydration, hypoglycemia or some diseases of greater or lesser severity, but it is also possible to find with some frequency that the experience of continued stress, extreme moods or anxiety can cause dizziness. to provoke them.
Regarding anxiety, we consider as such: a state of generalized and diffuse discomfort that arises as a reaction to the anticipation of some possible evil or danger that may occur in the future, although there is no directly dangerous stimulation at the time of its appearance. A mental and physiological state is generated characterized by a high level of negative affect and high physiological activation.
Anxiety is characterized by having cognitive, physiological and behavioral components generating responses at each of these levels.
At a cognitive level, it affects the way we see situations and the emotions they awaken in us. At a behavioral level, it affects what we do or stop doing to avoid anxiety with behavioral responses such as attempts to avoid or escape feared situations. And finally, at the level of physiological activation, the body reacts to anxiety in different ways, such as generating the presence of cardiac and respiratory acceleration or with the symptom that is the origin of this article: dizziness.
The presence of anxiety can occur in the face of very diverse phenomena, generally being caused by the presence of traumatic or stressful situations over which we have no control or capacity. the existence of excessive environmental demands for the resources we consider to have. It is usually a consequence of some type of stress that generates high activation, to which there may be some type of vulnerability at a biological level.
A very similar concept would be that of anguish, although there is a small difference: anguish usually refers more to the physical reaction while when talking about anxiety we usually talk more about cognitive and emotional aspects.
How does anxiety dizziness appear?
As we have been commenting, one of the possible effects of anxiety on a physiological level is the appearance of dizziness. When this happens we find that the experience of a negative emotion, generally a very high stress continued over time along with fear, generates an activation of the nervous system in such a way that it affects the sympathetic nervous system.
An activation occurs that initially generates a high feeling of muscle tension in response to a possible attack or moment when we have to defend ourselves. Likewise, breathing and heart rate also increase, something that causes much more oxygen to enter much more quickly in order to generate energy. But if the stressor is not reduced and remains in force, eventually our reserves end up depleted and the body is not able to maintain permanent tension, which may cause loss of muscle tone, discomfort and dizziness.
Among other aspects, hyperventilation, in which our breathing is accelerated and shallow, causes the oxygen levels that reach us to not be optimal something that favors dizziness and vertigo.
Also the level of muscle tension generates a great energy expenditure that can cause the system to become overloaded. Also the presence of tachycardia and high blood pressure will cause dizziness to occur when it drops due to not being able to maintain said level forever.
Dizziness due to anxiety, although annoying, is not dangerous to the subject’s life. However, it is advisable to take into account and discard if they could be the product of some other type of affectation especially if nothing has happened recently to cause continued nervousness on our part.
At a neuronal level, these dizziness are explained by the activation of the nuclei of the vestibular system (which works with information about body posture and balance and is linked to dizziness) and its connection with the limbic system (which works, among others, with emotional information, such as the perception of fear and anxiety). It is specifically in the parabrachial nucleus where both systems come together, this being one of the main points that make us feel dizzy when we are nervous and anxious.
Different neurotransmitters are also involved in this alteration, such as cortisol or histamine.
How can we avoid them?
The fact that the cause of this type of dizziness is the presence of anxiety means that we can find a very logical way to avoid them: reduce or learn to manage our level of stress and anxiety in such a way that it does not generate somatic symptoms such as dizziness. .
Some of the simplest and most basic methodologies, and at the same time useful, is the use of relaxation techniques. Among them stand out the use of breathing techniques such as diaphragmatic breathing or the use of techniques that combine this with the tension and relaxation of muscle groups, such as Jacobson’s progressive muscle relaxation.
Another notable aspect is working with beliefs and thoughts that generate anxiety, if necessary modifying and proposing alternative interpretations of events with cognitive restructuring techniques. Decatastrophication or putting yourself in the worst possible scenario to assess the real threat of the concerns can also be useful.
In addition to this, it can also be useful to work on a physiological level with techniques such as biofeedback, so that we learn to evaluate the state and better manage our basic physiological processes (specifically breathing, cardiac activity or muscular activity).
Finally It is worth highlighting the importance of keeping the body hydrated and well nourished as well as resting correctly, so that our physical state makes it difficult to suffer from dizziness.
