Crippling Anxiety Morphing Into Physical

[MysticTraveler]

I have had anxiety for over 40 years and for the most part it was just a nuisance. In 2007 I had a major breakdown and have never recovered and it has totally disabled me.

It has now morphed into severe physical symptoms and some my doctors have never seen.....like burning all over my body and a feeling of an electrical charge going through my body. I am in torture 24/7 and don’t sleep more than a couple of hours a night.

I cant take medications as everyone I tried made it worse or I had a major reaction. I would love to communicate with anyone fighting anxiety and especially if you are doing it naturally.

 

[LoveIsHealing]

I know what it is like to have severe anxiety and horrible panic attacks. Stress can do crazy things! If you want to try something natural, an easy one is Magnesium. Have you tried that yet? The Magnesium Glycinate form is supposed to be the best for anxiety and depression, and it really does seem to work. It might help you sleep too. Have you tried doing deep breathing exercises? People don't breathe correctly when stressed out. It can make big difference. :)

 

[goingonhope]

Hi Mystic Traveler, I guess I'm wondering if you've ever had a MRI (head), because symptoms of burning sensations can and do occur from head to toe and anywhere in between with multiple sclerosis and so do electrical shocks shooting through sometimes varying, sometimes reoccurring more specific areas of the body.

From my experience where there is longstandiing unidentified illness, there is longstanding anxiety and depression that simply cannot hope to be understood. Also, when a person has been identified as having psychiatric illness, an accurate finding and diagnosis of such medical problems as MS can be most seriously lost, even dismissed, but certainly delayed. Do you know it's not uncommon for MS to even be misdiagnosed with something like bipolar. Go figure, sounds nutty, but still remains one of other commonly misdiagnosed illnesses.

My first distressing symptoms of MS were in my teens, and it is now 30yrs. later and I was definatively diagnosed with it in the end of last yr.

Anyhow, Mystic I suggest you regularly and clearly track all of your severe physical symptoms, (and history with) if you don't already and perhaps schedule a neurological exam.

Heat and stress causes something like MS to flare and sometimes the plaques/lesions that are acquired create a new baseline as such illness progresses.

So, I'm not suggesting that you have MS, but what I am saying is I experience each of those two symptoms with my MS flares and I recognize these.

Also, I'd like to add that whatever an individuals focus is generally on, and/ or has been biasly slanted toward in the circumstances of existing known other conditions (whether doctor, psychologist or other) they tend to narrow there search and assign understanding and reasons that make sense to their profession, area of education or calling.

Please take care Mystic Traveler and I do hope you find some relief from your symptoms and any and all answers.

 

[Hashi]

I use visualisation, guided meditation and DBT skills. Also deep breathing, as Love says - I was advised to do this for a minimum of 20 minutes timed by the clock. The anxiety gets bad at first but then it really does ease. If I wasn't doing it for so long, I wouldn't get that benefit from it. Any strategy really takes discipline to actually do. Of course, I often think I'm too anxious to do them, and it's hard to be quiet or focus, but I make myself spend the time trying anyway. I think doing them consistently has been much more important than how well I can do them. Their effect increases over time.

I think it's also essential to work on what's causing the anxiety. It may well be psychological but I agree with goingonhope that it would be good to rule out physical reasons, if you haven't already done this. 40 years is a very, very long time to experience this, and serious to have had a breakdown too. Do you know what's causing it? (I'm not asking you to say if you don't want to, just whether you're aware of the reason/s yourself.) Are you able to work on things in therapy and in other ways?

 

[Rainbow_Habitué]

I had that kind of anxiety a few months back (I could sleep though). I started taking this magnesium drink called 'Natural Calm' and it reduced massively in a couple weeks. Dosing is difficult to get right (too much can be a bit of a natural laxative) but it really helps. It freaked me out when it fizzed like mad, but that's what it does. It can taste kind of strong, but I find it pleasant. :)

 

[Grama-Herc]

As simple and crazy as this sounds''''Drink Water""" for some reason it helps. No one drinks enough water any more. If I can't stand drinking water some days, I suck on ice. But being dehyrdrated can send those of us with this issue into a tailspin. Try it and let us know what happens. It won't be instant but after a couple of days you should feel much better

 

[Bullying Survivor]

Try the "Guided Body Scan" meditation by Jon Kabat-Zin; it's from the Mindfulness Based Stress Reduction program and you can find it on youtube. It takes about 40 minutes. I do it every day. I still have anxiety and trouble sleeping, but it really helps to create a pocket of stillness in your day. I am sorry you are having such a struggle with anxiety. It can be so hard and so all-encompassing. You are not alone.

 

[Sheer Force of Will]

I have not found any good, natural way to deal with what you are talking about, but my PSTD first manifested itself as a conversion disorder as well. I had never dealt with the things that I had seen or the things that were done to me as a child and the stress of holding that all in manifested itself as fainting, sudden weakness, full body pain, acute exhaustion leading to the inability to walk or talk and inability to work.

I am doing much better now that I have started therapy and begun working through my PTSD. In fact, I have been doing better since I acknowledged it. I had a horrible trauma in December that really took away my ability to pretend everything was ok. I don't know what to tell you to do, because I honestly don't know what helped me.

Conversion disorders are exceptionally rare, and I do not know enough about psych to really know how they are treated. Are you in therapy? Do you have a supporter? The two things that I think did it for me were being in therapy and having a supporter. My supporter changed to someone better able to handle it, which was also a really important change for me. So, again, I have no real idea what to tell you, but if you have a conversion disorder, as I did, they are very rare, but you are not alone!