Anxiety is a reflex response. It involves the whole body. Every person experiences it. It is hard-wired into our being. It alerts us to possible threat. It primes us to respond to danger. It is necessary for our survival.
Anxiety begins when our body detects threat.
I say ‘body’ because it can begin with any of our senses- sight, smell, taste, touch, sound. It can also start in the brain with a thought. Remember, the brain is part of the body. Somehow we often forget that.
Consider driving along calmly. No discernible anxious feelings. All of a sudden a car coming the opposite direction swerves towards you. You react in that instant. This reaction is anxiety.
Once triggered, anxiety causes many things to happen. Physiologically, the nervous system is triggered. Not simply the thinking nerves, but the autopilot ‘sympathetic’ nervous system. Stress hormones such as adrenaline and cortisol are released. The pulse rises and with it the blood pressure. Breathing becomes rapid and shallow. The pH of our blood drops. The pupils dilate. Muscles tense. Sensitivity to stimuli heightens. Thoughts centre on danger, escape and seeking safety.
Consider your reaction to the oncoming car. You thinking goes fast. The world seems to slow down. Nothing in the world matters but the threat of the approaching car. You swerve and break without even realising what you are doing. This is the anxiety reflex helping you avert disaster.
This is only one example. The specifics of any anxiety reaction can vary from person to person, and time to time. This is partly because our reflexes learn. Not simply in our thinking brain, but in our reflex brain. Our senses become primed to certain stimuli. What was once simply a colour or noise becomes a threat to our reflexes. We can know in our thoughts it is not a threat. But our reflexes don’t know it.
Consider the after-effects of the oncoming car. You collided anyway and were hurt badly, but you recovered. Now a number of things might have become ‘threats’ to our anxiety. The sight of the inside of a car. The smell of petrol fumes. The taste of blood in the mouth. The sensation of pressure across the shoulder and chest. The sound of a motor running. All of these require no conscious thought. Of course the conscious thoughts of planning a car journey may also trigger anxiety. But conscious thoughts are not necessary to feel anxious.
Significant trauma and long term stress can cause some of these anxiety features to be locked in causing physical illness. Constant muscle tension. Chronic pain. Frequent headaches. Fatigue and exhaustion. The list goes on.
Anxiety can trigger and worsen physical illness. It may be making you more unwell than you realise. At Integro Health we recognise this important fact. That is why we have a whole-person approach to wellness that does not separate physical from mental health problems. If you think that your anxiety is making you unwell, Integro Health can help you on the path to wellness.