Feels like almost everyone I know has crippling anxiety

[Anonymous]

PP, can you describe the nervous twitching?

about 6 months ago I started having a weird muscle twitch in my calf that I can't figure out how to deal with. I wonder if its anxiety related as well...

[Anonymous]

I blame the 24 hour news cycle. Everything has become SO intense.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:PP, can you describe the nervous twitching?

about 6 months ago I started having a weird muscle twitch in my calf that I can't figure out how to deal with. I wonder if its anxiety related as well...

Ok. So first and foremost: twitching is common and doesn’t necessarily mean anything. Calves in particular are known to twitch.
If you are only twitching and it doesn’t hurt, just ignore it. Next time you have blood drawn, make sure they do an electrolyte panel, because sometimes vitamin and mineral deficiencies can cause twitching.
My twitching? It’s everywhere. My entire body.
I made a huge mistake and googled it ( DON’T DO THAT) and Dr Google told me terrible things, which made my twitching worse.
I’m not sure what came first the anxiety or the twitching but it doesn’t matter now. I’ve been twitching for four months.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I think a lot of people have underlying anxiety that they've managed to repress by staying busy. The pandemic made it so they couldn't be busy. Add that with the constant media hype over the pandemic and it caused people to spin out of control. I have anxiety and have been a nurse working on a Covid ward since the beginning (though we haven't had any cases at my hospital in 3 weeks and have less than 15 hospitalized in my entire state!). Had I not used my coping techniques my anxiety would have spiraled and I would have been like those you describe.

Please list coping strategies
Thank you for all you have done.

I do not watch the news. I had to do this early on in the pandemic (and am still very frustrated how it was handled by the media). At the end of each day I check the Covid stats for my state. If there is anything important in the news I either see it on DCUM or DH tells me. That's probably the biggest thing.

Gratitude and centering. Forcing myself to look at the good in things helps the anxiety. When I feel anxiety coming on, I center myself. The best one for me is calming breaths and once that sets in I find 5 things I see, 4 things I can touch, 3 things I can hear, 2 I can smell, 1 can taste. By the time.im done, that panic feeling has subsided

No wallowing or what ifs. If you let your brain go down that hole it sucks you in. If I start doing that, I force myself to redirect my thought process. I do something else. I think about something else

Committing to social activities. No backing out because I'm not up for it. If I go, I'll have a good time and come back in a better mood. If I bail, I'll wallow.

DCUM provokes more anxiety than the news because of all of the misinformation.

[Anonymous]

I am in an active group of 200 moms. I would guess 50 or so are very active and we know each other pretty well. I am always surprised how many of them have anxiety that impacts their life - either diagnosed and medicated - or just demonstrated by the things they worry about and the severity / duration of those worries. I think if people around you are anxious it can amplify it. I see peers reach out for reassurance and their fellow anxious people reassure them “it is scary! You aren’t crazy”. Except I DO think they are overreacting, over estimating the chance of bad outcomes, or having trouble letting go of repetitive, intrusive thoughts. I don’t say anything because I feel like it would make me seem like an unsympathetic jerk.

Tl;dr - I too am shocked at how many people live their life in a constant state or worry and fear.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I think it's the area. Just look at the schools and colleges forums here. Insanity.

^^This^^

But OP is describing people who are crippled by anxiety. Having actually known two people crippled by anxiety, they were not applying their kids to private schools and posting on the internet about being poor at $350 HHI. They literally could not do anything and were hospitalized.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Easy. Like attracts like. People tend to spend time with people who are similar to them.

Plus, oftentimes, anxiety has a genetic component. So it runs in your family. Anxious people are more likely to end up with other anxious people.

And certain career paths tend to attract the anxious. In some cases, it can be a positive - extreme attention to detail, for example, so I see a lot of anxious people in data.

This. Anxious people like other people who reinforce their world view.
People who are calm and try to convince them their worry is overblown or misplaced are written off because they don’t hear what they want to hear.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:I blame the 24 hour news cycle. Everything has become SO intense.

But as a non-anxious person, I don’t experience it as intense and I am an avid news consumer.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I have had anxiety on and off through my life. I did really well during the pandemic because I was hyper focused on “getting through it.” Ironically, now that things are improving and everyday expectations are back, my anxiety is back.

Girl, same.

Me, too. I managed the pandemic really well. Now I feel like I'm having a belated reaction - really, really bad anxiety. Barely functioning.

Here too. It’s awful.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:There's a lot of shades of gray between being nervous about giving a speech and crippling anxiety, btw.

Lots of people have interrupted sleep, interrupted work, interrupted relationships and various dosing of anxiety meds and none of these people have "crippling anxiety"

Right? I could barely sleep for several weeks, right before Thanksgiving until after the inauguration. If you COULD sleep well with literally a 9/11 death count happening in America every day from a pandemic, AND an attack on the Capitol, AND the final cruel shots from the last administration, I wonder at your sanity.

I’m sorry you felt that way. Most people were aware and concerned and also able to sleep and function normally. Your comment is the type of “anxiety is normal” culture OP is asking about. Reacting that strongly, for weeks of months is not normal. Implying that people who can cope and function inspite of stressful news must be less informed or less “sane” than you is your defense mechanism to justify that you are struggling. It’s ok to struggle and to need help, but it is not ok to lash out at people who are coping and functioning without help.

[Anonymous]

I'm currently living with a level of anxiety I have never experienced before, and am horrified by the toll it is taking on me - starting w/ sleep.

Mine is driven by sandwich generation stress. Two young kids (replete w/ all the pandemic/school related stress), a difficult job, a dying mother who lives alone 400 miles away, siblings who are alternately part of the problem and part of the solution re my mother.

The dying mother is what has put me over the top and made it impossible for me to sleep more than 4 hours most nights - which therefore severely hinders my ability to function.

Sometimes we go through incredibly trying times. Hopefully those are temporary. I think that lots of people in their middle age are experiencing these kinds of stressful life challenges.

I am anticipating better days ahead, but better also means my mother will have died, so that's a pretty difficult thing to wish for.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I think it's the area. Just look at the schools and colleges forums here. Insanity.

^^This^^

But OP is describing people who are crippled by anxiety. Having actually known two people crippled by anxiety, they were not applying their kids to private schools and posting on the internet about being poor at $350 HHI. They literally could not do anything and were hospitalized.

My point is it’s the zeitgeist.

[Anonymous]

It’s definitely the zeitgeist
I’d be interested to know if Dr’s have noticed a significant uptick.
The pandemic was really stressful, but not just because of fear of illness. We all witnessed the curtain drawn back and nobody running the show.
It felt like being on a runway train heading off a cliff with no conductor. It felt like that for a year.
It might feel like that from now on.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:It’s definitely the zeitgeist
I’d be interested to know if Dr’s have noticed a significant uptick.
The pandemic was really stressful, but not just because of fear of illness. We all witnessed the curtain drawn back and nobody running the show.
It felt like being on a runway train heading off a cliff with no conductor. It felt like that for a year.
It might feel like that from now on.

Doctors definitely have. My psychiatrist said she has never been this busy in 30 years of practice. I’m also a lifelong anxiety sufferer who has had the worst year of my life as far as it goes. Worse than when my parents died. And just so awful and I feel like I can’t get away from it.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:It’s definitely the zeitgeist
I’d be interested to know if Dr’s have noticed a significant uptick.
The pandemic was really stressful, but not just because of fear of illness. We all witnessed the curtain drawn back and nobody running the show.
It felt like being on a runway train heading off a cliff with no conductor. It felt like that for a year.
It might feel like that from now on.

Doctors definitely have. My psychiatrist said she has never been this busy in 30 years of practice. I’m also a lifelong anxiety sufferer who has had the worst year of my life as far as it goes. Worse than when my parents died. And just so awful and I feel like I can’t get away from it.

I’m so sorry to hear that. I hope things get better for you soon.