Body tremors with anxiety
Anxiety Shaking: Causes and Treatments
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Anxiety and worry are emotions everyone feels at some point. Approximately 40 million American adults have anxiety disorders.
Feelings of anxiety can trigger other symptoms, such as:
- muscle tension
- difficulty concentrating
- increased heart rate
- uncontrollable shaking or trembling
Tremors caused by anxiety aren’t dangerous, but they can be uncomfortable. Sometimes losing control of your body when you’re having anxiety can quickly escalate into other symptoms.
This article will explore the connection between shaking and anxiety, and leave you with some ideas for how to treat this symptom.
Panic disorder and anxiety that leads to attacks have some things in common, but they’re not the same condition. Both conditions can lead to physical symptoms that feel out of your control, including trembling and “the shakes. ”
If you have generalized anxiety disorder, ordinary situations may make you feel intensely fearful or overwhelmed. You may find it hard to concentrate. You may also experience your mind going “blank” as the fear and worry from your thoughts take over.
In addition, headaches, muscle aches, and other pains you can’t explain may accompany your anxious thoughts.
Panic attacks don’t always have a clear cause. When you have panic attacks due to a certain trigger, it’s called an expected panic attack. That means they’re somewhat predictable.
The symptoms of a panic attack can be seen and identified by someone else, while the symptoms of anxiety take place mostly in your mind and may be harder to spot.
When you’re having severe anxiety, it can cause physical symptoms. Perceived stress, danger, and high levels of emotion usually set off anxiety. Anxiety can lead to a panic attack, but it doesn’t always.
Similarly, having a panic attack doesn’t mean that you have an anxiety condition.
When your body is subjected to stress, it goes into fight, flight, or freeze mode. Stress hormones flood your body and speed up your heart rate, blood pressure, and breathing.
Your body prepares to deal with the stressor, interpreting the anxiousness as a signal that you’ll need to stand your ground or escape from danger. Your muscles become primed to act, leading to a trembling sensation, twitching, or shaking.
Other symptoms of anxiety and panic disorder include:
- difficulty concentrating on anything besides anxious thoughts
- fatigue and muscle ache
- headache or migraine
- nausea, vomiting, or loss of appetite
- rapid breathing
- excessive sweating
- feeling tense, irritable, and “on edge”
Once you’ve determined that you’re having a panic or anxiety attack, fighting against your symptoms might make them last longer.
The most effective strategy to stop trembling from panic or anxiety is to guide your body back to a relaxed state.
Certain techniques can help you calm down:
- Progressive muscle relaxation. This technique focuses on contracting and then releasing different muscle groups. It can be done in tandem with deep breathing. The goal in practicing this technique is to get your body to relax. This can stop you from trembling.
- Yoga poses. The child’s pose and sun salutations can help you regulate your breathing and bring calm back to your body. Regular yoga practice has been shown to reduce anxiety symptoms.
- Mindfulness exercises. Exercises that incorporate meditation can also help stop you from shaking. Mindfulness meditations to guide you through 5 to 10 minutes of awareness and relaxation. These can be found on apps, such as Headspace, and online.
Practicing these techniques when you’re not in a state of panic or anxiety will make them more effective when you need to use them.
Long-term solutions for people with anxiety or panic disorder can include medication and help from a licensed therapist or psychiatrist.
Several methods of therapy can help you identify the triggers of your anxious thoughts and feelings. These include:
- cognitive behavioral therapy (CBT)
- talk therapy
- eye movement desensitization and reprocessing therapy (EDMR)
If you frequently experience anxiety or panic attacks, you should speak to your doctor about medication treatment options. Those include:
- Benzodiazepines. These are drugs that help relax your mind and calm your body. Alprazolam (Xanax), chlordiazepoxide (Librium), and clonazepam (Klonopin) are examples of this class of drug used for short-term anxiety and panic relief. Both prescribers and patients should be aware that benzodiazepines are associated with a risk for tolerance, dependence, and addiction. The Food and Drug Administration requires that they carry a boxed warning.
- Selective serotonin reuptake inhibitors (SSRIs). This is one class of drug that might be prescribed for long-term treatment.
Escitalopram (Lexapro), fluoxetine (Prozac), and paroxetine (Paxil) are examples of this type of drug usually prescribed to treat depression and anxiety. - Monamine oxidase inhibitors (MAOIs). MAOIs are used to treat panic disorder, but can work for anxiety, too. Dicarboxamide (Marplan) and tranylcypromine (Parnate) are examples of this type of medication.
Integrative treatments, like herbal teas and supplements, can cut down on anxiety and panic attacks for some people. More research needs to be done on herbal treatments to determine whether they’re effective.
Remember that herbal remedies aren’t necessarily better for your body than traditional medication. Herbals have properties that cause side effects and interactions just like medication does.
Online therapy options
Read our review of the best online therapy options to find the right fit for you.
Physical symptoms that feel out of your control can be frightening and make your anxiety feel even worse.
The good news is that anxiety and panic can be helped with medication, therapy, and a proper diagnosis.
Make an appointment with your doctor if you’re experiencing anxiety-induced trembling or shaking.
Body Tremors, Shaking, Trembling, Vibrating Anxiety Symptoms
Body trembling, shaking, tremors and vibrating are common symptoms of anxiety disorder, including generalized anxiety disorder, social anxiety disorder, panic disorder, and others. Many people experience body tremors symptoms when they are anxious and stressed.
To see if anxiety might be playing a role, you can rate your level of anxiety using our free one-minute instant results Anxiety Test or Anxiety Disorder Test.
The higher the rating, the more likely it could be contributing to body trembling and tremors.
This article explains the relationship between anxiety and body tremors, trembling, and shaking.
Body tremors, shaking, trembling anxiety symptoms description:
- Your arms, hands, feet, legs, stomach, sides, chest, back, head, buttocks, groin, or even your entire body may feel shaky or like they are trembling, shaking or vibrating.
- It feels as though your entire body is trembling.
- You feel like your body is shaking, trembling, or vibrating for no apparent reason.
- Your body feels jittery.
- Even though you aren’t anxious or stressed, your body is trembling and shaking.
- It feels like your body is vibrating.
- Some people describe this symptom as body tremors.
- After a nap or when waking up from sleep, your body feels like it is trembling, shaking, and vibrating.
- Tremors, trembling, shaking or vibrating might be visible or not visible.
Body tremors, shaking, trembling or vibrating can occur on the exterior of the body or feel like it is occurring on the inside, or both.
Body tremors, shaking symptoms can persistently affect one area of the body only, can shift and affect another area or areas, and can migrate all over and affect many areas over and over again.
Body tremors, shaking symptoms can come and go rarely, occur frequently, or persist indefinitely.
For example, you may feel your body tremors once in a while and not that often, feel them off and on, or feel them all the time.
Body tremors, shaking anxiety symptoms may precede, accompany, or follow an escalation of other anxiety sensations and symptoms, or occur by itself.
Body tremors, shaking anxiety symptoms can precede, accompany, or follow an episode of nervousness, anxiety, fear, and elevated stress, or occur ‘out of the blue’ and for no apparent reason.
Body tremors, shaking symptoms can range in intensity from slight, to moderate, to severe. It can also come in waves, where it’s strong one moment and eases off the next.
Body tremors, shaking symptoms can change from day to day, and/or from moment to moment.
Body tremors, shaking symptoms often seem more disconcerting when undistracted, when trying to rest or go to sleep, or when waking up from a nap or sleep.
While some people may be able to control their shaking, trembling, and vibrating by calming themselves down or by tightening and loosening their muscles, most often this symptom occurs involuntarily, meaning there isn’t much you can do to stop it from occurring.
Some people experience tremors only when moving certain muscles, while others experience tremors all the time regardless of muscle movement.
All of the above variations and combinations are common.
What causes the body trembling anxiety symptoms?
Medical Advisory
Behaving anxiously activates the stress response, which immediately causes body-wide changes that give the body an "emergency boost of resources" to deal with a threat - to either fight or flee - which is the reason the stress response is often referred to as the fight or flight response.[1]
Part of the stress response changes include tightening the body’s muscles so that they are more resilient to damage and stimulating the nervous system so that our senses are amplified and our reactions are faster. Both of these changes can cause the body to tremble while a stress response is active.
When these responses occur infrequently, the body can recover relatively quickly from the stress response changes.
When stress responses occur too frequently, however, the body can remain in a state of semi stress response readiness, which we call stress-response hyperstimulation (also often referred to as “hyperarousal”).[2]
A body that becomes hyperstimulated can exhibit symptoms similar to an active stress response. But there is an important difference. Symptoms can occur involuntarily, meaning at any time, making it seem as if they are occurring "out of the blue" and without reason.
As long as the body is hyperstimulated, it can exhibit symptoms of any type, number, intensity, duration, frequency, and at any time. Experiencing body tremors, trembling, and shaking symptoms is a common symptom of both an active stress response and stress-response hyperstimulation.
Just as too much caffeine can cause jitteriness and trembling because caffeine is a stimulant, so can stress and stress-response hyperstimulation, since stress hormones are stimulants. Some people say that they have a “case of the nerves” because they are shaking so much.
Moreover, a lack of sleep can aggravate body tremors anxiety symptoms.[3] Many people who are sleep deprived experience this symptom until their sleep debt is caught up. Trembling, shaking, and vibrating commonly occur due to a lack of sleep.
The combination of a anxiety, stress, hyperstimulation, and sleep deprivation can cause a wide range of symptoms, including those that affect the body’s muscles and nervous system. These effects commonly cause body tremors, trembling, shaking, and vibrating symptoms.
How to get rid of the body tremors anxiety symptoms?
When anxiety body tremors symptoms are caused by apprehensive behavior and the accompanying stress response changes, calming yourself down and shutting off the stress response will bring an end to the response and its changes. As your body recovers, this symptom should subside. Keep in mind that it can take up to 20 minutes or more for the body to recover from a major stress response. But this is normal and shouldn’t be a cause for concern.
When the body tremors anxiety symptoms are caused by hyperstimulation, it can take a lot longer for the body to recover, and to the point where this symptom subsides. For more information about how long this could take, Recovery Support members can view the article “Hyperstimulation Recovery Expectation Guidelines” in chapter 10 in the Recovery Support area of our website.
Nevertheless, when the body has recovered from an active response or hyperstimulation, body tremors, shaking, and trembling anxiety symptoms will completely subside. Therefore, body tremors needn’t be a cause for concern.
You can speed up the recovery process by reducing your stress, practicing relaxed breathing, increasing your rest and relaxation, and not worrying about this feeling. Sure, it can be startling, unsettling and even bothersome. But again, when your body has recovered from the active stress response and/or stress-response hyperstimulation, anxiety-caused body tremors will completely disappear.
Play the clip below for Jim Folk's commentary about the Body Tremors anxiety symptoms. Jim Folk is the president of anxietycentre.com.
Body tremors is a common symptom of elevated stress, including the stress anxiety can cause. Jim Folk experienced body tremors to a severe degree during his 12 year struggle with anxiety disorder.
If you are having difficulty containing your worry about this symptom, you may want to connect with one of our recommended anxiety disorder therapists. Working with an experienced anxiety disorder therapist is the most effective way to overcome what seems like unmanageable worry and problematic anxiety.
For a more detailed explanation about all anxiety symptoms, why symptoms can persist long after the stress response has ended, common barriers to recovery and symptom elimination, and more recovery strategies and tips, we have many chapters that address this information in the Recovery Support area of our website.
Internal trembling in the body, trembling in the body, causes
Symptoms of internal trembling in the body: trembling in the body, trembling in the knees, weakness in the body, an attack of trembling, an attack of weakness, general trembling, severe weakness .
Internal tremor causes: Case reports
Trembling in the body - frequent involuntary contractions of muscle groups or groups of muscle fibers in different parts of the body. There are physiological, essential, parkinsonian and cerebellar tremors. Physiological trembling in the body usually increases with nervous excitement, anxiety and fears, overwork, cooling, withdrawal, and certain diseases of the nervous and endocrine systems.
Internal trembling: Case studies
Girl, 14, high school student.
At the reception with my mother, a health worker. The main complaint is severe trembling in the body and a feeling of lack of air. From the anamnesis: frequent severe acute respiratory viral infections (at least 5-6 per year).
Present illness began on July 23, 2012. The girl woke up at night and suddenly felt a strong trembling all over her body, dizziness. “There was still nothing to breathe and my heart was pounding.
” Mom measured her blood pressure - 140-100. They called an ambulance, the attack was stopped.
June 24 - trembling in the body resumed, but was not pronounced, episodes of shortness of breath. June 25 - recurrence of the attack. Pressure - 150-100. Ten days later, a strong attack again. June 26 - two attacks in a row.
We first consulted a pediatrician and then a neurologist for help. The diagnosis was CVD. Treatment was prescribed: persen, teraligen and neuromultivit. However, there was no positive effect. The attacks were repeated with the same force, and in the period between attacks, trembling in the body and a feeling of lack of air remained.
By the beginning of the school period, fears appeared. The girl stopped leaving the house. She complained of general weakness. A complete medical examination of the body was carried out, including multislice tomography of the abdominal cavity (the adrenal glands were examined), REG, EEG, duplex scanning of cerebral vessels, MRI, etc.
No pathology was found.
Examination in our clinic by CIG (cardiointervalography) revealed a rigid sinus rhythm, which indicated an exorbitant overexcitation of the autonomic nerve centers. These centers were localized using computer thermometry and treated.
All of the listed symptoms disappeared in the patient after the seventh session of physiotherapy.
Man, 57 years old, retired, former military man.
In September 2009 I flew to Spain for a vacation. When approaching Madrid, the plane had a technical problem with the landing gear. The plane was forced to circle over the airfield in order to run out of fuel and prepare for a hard landing. Many passengers are hysterical. Everyone prepares for the worst...
But the landing was successful, no one was hurt.
Having already found himself on the runway, realizing that the worst was behind him and calming down internally, the man suddenly felt extreme weakness, palpitations, instability and strong trembling in his legs, which lasted about ten minutes and passed on their own.
After two weeks, he suddenly has a feeling of inexplicable anxiety and a strong heartbeat. And by the end of the month, the first panic attack develops.
The man turned to the Clinical Center of Autonomic Neurology a year after the described episode (before that time, he had been seen by various specialists, including psychiatrists, received medication, homeopathy).
Main complaints: trembling in the legs, turning into a tremor of the hands and trembling of the whole body. Daily panic attacks with marked palpitations, fear of death, severe prostration.
After the first course of treatment, the frequency and severity of panic attacks decreased sharply. A repeated course, conducted three months later, completely freed the patient from the pathological manifestations of autonomic disorders.
Other symptoms of VSD
Shortness of breath, difficulty breathing
Strong heartbeat, rapid pulse
Trembling in the body, shaking hands
Sweating, perspiration, profuse sweating
Stomach pain, burning in the abdomen
Heaviness in the head, headache
Muscle tone, spasm of the neck muscles
Feelings of urinary incontinence anxiety
Discomfort in the intestines, diarrhea
Blurred vision
Presyncope
Sleep disorder, insomnia, drowsiness
Subfebrile temperature
Chronic fatigue syndrome
Weather sensitivity
Myths and truth about VSD
— Put yourself in the place of a doctor.
The patient's tests are fine. All kinds of examinations from ultrasound to MRI show the norm. And the patient comes to you every week and complains that he feels bad, has nothing to breathe, his heart is pounding, sweat is pouring down, that he constantly calls an ambulance, etc. You cannot call such a person healthy, but he does not have a specific disease. This is - VVD - a diagnosis for all occasions, as I call it ...
Read the interview
IRR in faces
This page contains excerpts from the case histories of patients on the main complaints with which people turn to us for help. This is done with the aim of showing how different and “complex” the symptoms of vegetative-vascular dystonia can be. And how closely sometimes it is “soldered” with violations in the work of organs and systems. How it "masquerades" as "heart", "lung", "stomach", "gynecological" and even "psychiatric" problems that people have to live with for years...
Learn more
How to stop body trembling after a strong fear
The last few days we all live in constant tension, and from terrible sounds in the streets the body is trembling.
How to calm this reaction of the body to huge stress, says Elena Khil, a psychologist, trainer, and an expert in the psychology of communication, who studies the impact of empathy and emotional intelligence on psychological well-being and close relationships.
When you feel anxious, stressed, fearful, your body releases stress hormones that send out arousal energy so you can run away from danger or fight it. If you don't use this stored energy, it negates the trembling. Learning how to calm your nervous system when you're nervous can be done through stress reduction strategies.
Instagram: @hoskelsa
Naturally, when your whole body is trembling, you would like to be able to regulate this reaction and calm down. In addition, if you encounter such a manifestation for the first time, it is likely that it will cause you anxiety or even panic. This is a completely normal reaction to severe stress. Fear for your life and the lives of loved ones, explosions, disturbing news, shocking photos and videos keep the level of stress hormones in your body extremely high and overexcite your nervous system.
Unfortunately, there is no instant cure for uncontrolled jitter. However, there are practices that, during times of anxiety, gradually calm the nervous system and help reduce trembling. The first thing to do is to focus on the sensations in your body.
1. Pay Attention to Your Breathing
When you are worried or afraid and begin to tremble, your body releases adrenaline. This is a defensive biological reaction that can make you feel like you are not in control of your body. However, it is not. We cannot control many things when we feel anxious, but we can always influence our breathing. Start by keeping a close eye on him. Take a deep breath in through your nose, hold your breath and exhale through your mouth, hold your breath again. Slowing down your breathing will help stop the rush of stress hormones and reduce trembling. Find your comfortable breathing rate and repeat 10-20 times. And you will gradually feel how your body calms down and the trembling gradually disappears.
Instagram: @frida_aasen
2. Meditate for 1-2 minutes
Even a minute or two of meditation can help you relax and relieve stress. Moreover, such a simple meditation technique, how to follow the cool air that you inhale deeply and the exhaled stream of warm air, gives a greater sense of calm to the body.
You can place your hand just above your heart and slowly stroke yourself up with each inhalation and down with each exhalation. This will allow the nervous system to release oxytocin, which will reduce the concentration of stress hormones.
If your child or someone close to you has a nervous trembling, hug them and breathe with them, or stroke slowly on the back or from shoulder to elbow while inhaling slowly up and down slowly with a deep exhalation.
Instagram: @gisele
3. Practice rhythmic movements or steps
The release of adrenaline stored in the body will help reduce nervous excitement.
