Anxiety And Tension, Soreness, Twitching and Weakness (Episode 58)

SPEAKER_01 0:01

Hi guys, uh my name's Corey. I'm calling all the way from Melbourne, Australia. Um, managed to come across you guys on Spotify when I hit my peak of all my sort of anxiety and panic attacks. I got my first one in the gym, ended up in an ambulance, didn't know what was happening. Called my family to tell them I love them and the whole nine yards. I'm finding that I'm getting better thanks to your videos and some other cues as well with friends. Um, one thing I can't seem to shake though is daily, constant, endless migraines, tight headaches, back of neck, everything. Just it's like it seizes up, and I've been to every kind of doctor, uh specialist there could be, and I feel like I'm losing my mind um imagining something that's not there, or maybe I'm just that rare breed of anxious person that managed to only cop only cop this myself. Um just wondering if I am truly going insane or if it's a genuine possibility that it's purely from anxiety. Um, thanks for everything that you guys do. I appreciate any help.

SPEAKER_03 1:14

Welcome to Disordered. This is episode 58 entitled Anxiety and Tension. Today we're going to talk about muscle tension and twitches and weakness and all the things. I am Drew Linsolata, one of the co-hosts of Disordered. I am a therapist in training in New York, specializing in anxiety and anxiety disorders. I am an author, clearly a podcaster, uh psychoeducator, an advocate, and a former sufferer of anxiety disorders for many years of my life.

SPEAKER_04 1:41

And I'm Joshua Fletcher, also known as Anxiety Josh on social media. I'm a psychotherapist in the UK, specializing in working with anxiety disorders, previous sufferer and author of And How Does That Make You Feel? Welcome, dude.

SPEAKER_03 1:56

Hi, how are you doing? I'm rocking and rolling. We are we are loaded for bear today. So we're gonna go right after the whole muscle muscle tension thing.

SPEAKER_04 2:03

Muscle tension was a big one for me back when I, you know, I can uh relate uh to the to the question a lot, particularly when I was in the midst of first developing my anxiety disorder um and learning about what was happening in my body because how easy is it to misinterpret signs of muscle tension, but also how easy is it to miss how much anxiety actually affects the body in terms of tension?

SPEAKER_03 2:36

Oh, yeah. Uh, thank you for Corey for sending that in and sharing the story. We always appreciate that. Uh, what was your do you had any particular tension that would stick with you that was the overriding? I'm really concerned about this one.

SPEAKER_04 2:48

I had a few, I had loads actually, and I did put it all down to muscle tension, and I used to I used to go to the doctors because I was misinterpreting and catastrophizing the final output symptom, if that makes sense. So I had a headache for like six, seven weeks. And obviously, when you're anxious and you don't know what's going on, I had no psychoeducation, no help, just my thoughts and rumination to help me. Uh, so I thought my this headache was obviously a brain trimming. Who has a headache for six, seven weeks? And then I kept in the in the cycle, because the more I worried about a headache, the more I would became tense, and then this it was a tension headache, and it kept going on and on and on. Uh, interesting, similar to Corey, all the tension was in my neck, in the back, in my shoulders, my upper back, in my chest, all these muscles, big muscles as well, all tense, out of place, my posture was gone, and then all this tension manifested on my scalp and head because obviously it's pulling down all the different muscles, they're not like they usually would be. Uh, and I realized after a while, oh god, this is tension. And that's only one of the things, but I remember that particularly when I was unwell because I was googling yeah, why is this headache? What's what could this be? And then obviously, when you're anxious, you have other symptoms as well, like dizziness, derealization, lightheadedness, and so I'm just rapidly misinterpreting what's going on when actually it was muscle tension because I'm anxious all the time.

SPEAKER_03 4:21

Yeah, you're essentially like uh for me was chest, chest pain for sure. I used to walk around poking my my chest all the time, and those are big muscles, right? But also I had the same thing. I had my traps and the lower part of my neck, and I used to do this, I had an anxious tick where I would push my jaw out, so I was craning my neck all the time, which I did not notice until I videotaped myself, videotaped, listen to me, like it was 1972. I I I recorded myself driving because I used to get so anxious when I was driving, and I noticed that I was I was craning my neck for this weird thing that I used to do, and that's not a natural position for your neck. So I had tension at the base of my skull, in my neck, my traps, my shoulders, and my chest was just always, always tense. And like you're flexing muscles, your scalp muscles are now flexing, like they like you took your scalp to the gym. You don't normally flex all those muscles, so they're sore.

SPEAKER_04 5:12

Yeah, and the tension was like it will you don't realize it when you're tense. How many times do do you will someone point out that you're tense? So if I go to like a meditation class, or I once saw like a social media thing, it was like, stop, unclench your jaw, remove the tongue from the top of your mouth. I was like, Oh yeah, holy crap. And I didn't even notice I was doing that. Yeah, you don't notice a lot of tension when when with that, but you only notice it when it starts to give you weird symptoms, or when you try to release it.

SPEAKER_03 5:47

Um for me, uh I didn't realize and it actually I was also a breath holder, and we'll talk about breath some other time, but I didn't know I was doing that until it would hit me like, why am I panting? Well, because who was president last time I took a breath? Like I would hold I would habitually hold my breath, but also my shoulders would be up around my my ears all the time. I had no idea I was doing that.

SPEAKER_04 6:08

Yeah, I'm a stupor, so my shoulders never went up, right? They went forward. Uh, and because I'm tall, like you as well, when your shoulders go forward, huge part of your skeletal makeup, so much big muscles there as well. Where's the anxiety and the stress of anxiety gonna manifest as tension? It's gonna be in your chest, you know, and then I get stabbing, shoot, shooting pains in my chest, and then obviously during the time when I had heart palpitations, I put this as a post on my Instagram the other day. During the time I had heart palpitations, I got a stretchy, stabby, painy chest that was hurting, and then palpitations. So I'm like, oh my god, I'm gonna drop dead at any second. I'm gonna have a heart attack, even though they were two mutually exclusive things, again, due to muscle tension, not happening at the same time, just like I have a headache that won't go away, and I'm feeling DPDR.

SPEAKER_03 7:07

Oh, clearly, my brain is immersed in it's riddled with tumors, clearly, because it's my cognition is weird and my perception is weird, and my head hurts at the same time. Perfect storm for an anxious person.

SPEAKER_04 7:17

Yeah, yeah. Did you go down the WebMD Google hole of um oh it's it's definitely uh an adrenal tumor on your on your petary gland? Well, um I'm like, wow, I mean I have those symptoms.

SPEAKER_03 7:33

Right, exactly. So at first, it's funny when you said I had no psychoeducation, then nothing. It was like I had to walk uphill in the snow both ways to school. Like we sound like you know, those guys. But when I first started first having panic attacks back, I was in the late 1980s, so I'm older than you, and uh, we had talk about nothing. I had to go to the damn library, like take stone tablets out and read about anxiety. But e even when I was doing the bulk of my recovery work in the early 2000s, like 2005, 2006, it was the beginning of this stuff. YouTube was just starting, like WebMD existed, but you're right, it was essentially they would have just rebranded that website catastrophe. They just catastrophe.com would have been the better way to go.

SPEAKER_04 8:10

Well, well, as we know, and if there's avid listeners of the podcast, yeah, your threat response isn't interested in probability. No, so if you go on WebMD, typing all these symptoms in the midst of threat and high anxiety, it's like a game of where's Waldo, where your brain is really good at it, your threat response and your amygdala is really good at it, and it's not interested in the dehydration, muscle tension, stuff like that. Nope. It's interested in the catastrophe, the threat.

SPEAKER_03 8:39

Yeah, what it wants to hear is, you know, and those listen, I'm not picking out WebMD, or if you just Google this stuff, like, well, this is a possibility. But like you said, it's not interested in and probability, it only cares about it's possible that this is this orphan disease that only 11 people have ever had. Now I'm the 12th, clearly. So, you know, it's really a tough place to be. But how do you know? You could the probability's on your side, yeah. But how do you know? It does happen. You don't. So in this situation, yeah, Corey's saying, like, I don't know if I'm just a special anxious person and and this is a problem and I'm the only one that ever has it. Yeah, of course. Because is that possible? Yeah, it's possible. It's like 0.00000001% possible, but that's enough for an anxious brain, not zero.

SPEAKER_04 9:20

Yeah, and Corey said as well in this question, he said, I'm still worrying about going crazy. Yeah, well, if you're worrying about going crazy, which you won't, but if you're worrying about going crazy, that like all day, that's gonna have a physical effect on your body in terms of tension. Now, the muscle tension is actually a good thing. It's an outlet for the adrenaline, it's an outlet for the cortisol. Your body's doing exactly what it's supposed to do, but there is, you know, the consequence of that is you're gonna get tense muscles, posture, you're gonna get headaches, you're gonna feel dizzy, you're gonna get stabby pains. Drew mentioned before, you're gonna get muscle twitches, you might get a bit of feel a bit of weakness. You're not gonna feel like yourself, and then you end up inwardsly compulsing. And Gore, if you're all the way up to episode 50, what are we on? 58 now. 58, it was 58. Yeah, you'll learn the principles what we talk about to step off that hamster wheel.

SPEAKER_03 10:19

Yeah, for sure. And and I think it's interesting because it's not only I discovered for me, and I this is probably a common experience, that muscle tension was also the relief, the result of bracing. So, like those are bra, those a bracing response, right? And I like when you said you stooped, so my shoulder to go up, but I would I mean, even now, if I have a really stressful kind of day, I will suddenly notice that I'm a bit more, I don't know what I would call it, a defensive posture. You know, you always hear people talk about oh, the self-hug or whatever you want to call it. Like, yeah, it's a little bit like that because the stooping over and the rounding in a little bit. I mean, normally I'm gonna sit like this, but if I'm having a tougher day, I might discover, like, oh, I'm I'm doing this today. You know, I'm can't see me on video, but I'm hunched over. And the the that bracing contributes to that. And then you're out of alignment and I'm tipping over, so my center of grain, I'm not over my hips anymore. It's a it's just it's a mess. And then it makes you think like something is really wrong. An anxious brain will say, Oh, something is really wrong here.

SPEAKER_04 11:23

I don't know if I've mentioned this tip before, but like I what really helped me directly now, Corey, is that obviously you you know you're in the midst of anxiety and stuff, but tips to help and help things easier. Uh, one that helps me, I remember like YouTube years ago, and it was a really good kind of scapula stretch that helped me, particularly if you're tall. So if you're someone who has lots of neck tension, headaches due to neck tension, scalar. If you feel like you've got stretching or a band on your scalp, this is an absolute dream. So if you find a chair and you put your arms behind the back of the chair and lock your fingers in, so your scapula is pushed or together at the back, almost trying to put your shoulder blades together, and you hold it there in lock, it's gonna feel really uncomfortable. You hold it there for three minutes, set a timer after 40 seconds. You're gonna get pins and needles in your arms and hands, but just keep holding it, keep going. Obviously, if you if you can, if you've got like um kind of things that restrict your movement or mobility issues, obviously, do look up alternatives, but anyway, you hold it there for three minutes and then slowly release at three minutes and push your shoulders forward, open up your scalp, and you will feel one of the biggest stretches on your whole back, and it will reveal to you how tight your back has been and your shoulders, and it will reveal to you, oh my god, yeah. And you'll suddenly start to feel lighter through your neck because of all the tension. It's usually because of posture, anxious posture, etc. And I still do that now. I mean, I got better posture nowadays, but yeah, I remember doing that, and I just remember like immediately, like, wow, that was cool. So that's a little quick um physio tip from someone who is not qualified to give physio tips.

SPEAKER_03 13:18

Welcome to kinesiology with Josh, episode one. The uh the the we have, I think this is one of those instances where you can take sort of general health or wellness advice about stretching and mobility and and muscle relaxation and use it. Like a lot of times that general sort of advice or tips don't really apply because they're not anxiety disorder informed. So the only thing we would do is like make sure that you're not trying to frantically escape from what you think is a horrible danger when you do these things. But stretching, I'm a huge fan of progressive muscle relaxation because when you teach an anxious person how to do PMR and they practice it a few times, they develop an awareness. You get that like proprioceptive awareness of what your body is doing, and then you start to recognize the tension that you didn't recognize before. The only way to recognize the tension is to learn how to release it. Like practice releasing it, and then you start to recognize the difference between, oh yeah, I feel tension and oh now I don't. So that release of the tension and the PMR exercises are usually a body scan, top to bottom, like tense, tense your jaw, let go, tense your hands, let go. And you start to recognize, you recognize what relaxing feels like because a lot of people listening to us to will say, Well, yeah, I'm really super tense, but how do I what do I do? I don't even know what to do with that. We have to practice. Right. I don't know what relaxed feels like. Okay, well, things like jacha's stretch or progressive muscle relaxation can teach you again what yeah relaxed muscles feel like. I forgot. I had totally forgotten. I was twisted up like a spring all day long. I had no idea what relaxation felt like.

SPEAKER_04 14:49

Yeah, but but as well on the flip side of that, and there'll be a section of listeners here who struggle with something called panicogenic relaxation, which is a term I read in Sally Winston's book. Um, and it's people who are afraid to relax, yeah, because they're afraid of everything that will hit them. So it so use that as an exposure. One of my exposures was doing progressive muscle relaxation, knowing actually it's probably gonna make me a bit more anxious. But I wanted to teach the brain that no, this is safe, let's go for it.

SPEAKER_03 15:22

Because that bracing, or you know, I call it bracing before the muscle tension in a way is a shield against the feelings, like it it's a pr I need to get away from this feeling, this internal agitation, and I brace and I but if you let go, it's just there, you're face to face with everything you think and feel. So that can be challenging in a big way.

SPEAKER_04 15:41

Yeah, I used to find that really challenging. Um, and yeah, by the way, Corey, you know, you feel you're going crazy, you're not. That's just the onset of panic disorder. I felt that you know, it's and the that the biggest here we're giving you kind of some tips for muscle and stress responses, but the the biggest thing is to realize actually what's keeping me anxious is this worry. So, yeah, listen to the principles of everything here, particularly inwards compulsion, go through the episodes and because I know you're new to it, uh, to this podcast, and yeah, you'll get there. We do these, we we identify tension and stress as an overall wellness thing. We don't try to get rid of tension and stress as a way to get rid of all anxiety, or because we're afraid.

SPEAKER_03 16:29

You have to always remember the part where you're afraid of it. I mean, nobody wants to feel tense and stressed out, right? So, people again, general wellness advice. Oh, I'm so stressed out, man. I had a really hard day at work. Okay, well, muscle relaxation, stretching, yoga, that sort of stuff. Really cool. Anxious people do it because they're afraid and they're trying to save themselves. So you just don't want to stretch and do that sort of stuff as a safety thing. This makes me feel safer now. I mean, it might, that's true, if it brings your anxiety level down a little bit, which is a nice bonus. But you know, what can I learn? I'm trying to learn something by practicing these stretches. I'm trying I'm exploring, I'm curiously exploring my symptom of tension here a little bit. I'm interacting with it in a curious way so I can learn about it a little bit, as opposed to explain it and make it go away because I'm terrified of it. It's important.

SPEAKER_04 17:14

I used I used to get talking like I used to get I still do actually when I'm stressed. And this is good because I always give advice for stress. There's things you can do for stress. Sure. You know, we talk about willful tolerance and leaning into uncertainty with anxiety, but stress is great. I always try and prevent stress, and you can react to stress. There are things you can do. Um, I notice I'm stressed when um my face is tense, like my cheeks, my forehead, my eyebrows. I used to get eyebrow twitch. I still have and and eyelid twitches. Oh I had an eyelid twitch the other day, and it lasted if I've I've only just realized it's gone. So there's some principles of the of this podcast, right?

SPEAKER_03 17:57

I had an eyelid twitch for about two months, and that is incredibly annoying and disruptive the eye twitch.

SPEAKER_04 18:04

Yeah, I had it, and it's annoying, but like it's because of stress, so I have to do things to combat the stress. Yeah, I just realized it's gone. Great. You know, it's rather than again constantly keeping an eye on it, waiting to see if it's gone. I left it alone and it goes away. It doesn't worry me. Yeah, but if I went down a the rabbit hole of Googling and seeking reassurance, googling eyelid twitches, you know, you you're gonna that's not you're not gonna your anxious response is only gonna be interested in all the catastrophe of what an eyelid twitch is, not the fact that the obvious thing is that I've been stressed.

SPEAKER_02 18:40

And the is it gone? Is it gone now? Is it gone now? Is it gone now?

SPEAKER_04 18:43

Is it gone now? Yeah, don't get me wrong, I'm human. I was a bit like, oh, have I still got that eyelid twitch? Rather than, oh my god, my whole life is on hold now. Yeah, and this has a hundred percent of my attention.

SPEAKER_03 18:53

It's funny because twitches were a big thing for me too. And and I was interested. This is, you know, look, I learned things every day from you guys that listen. And I'm uh, you know, I I feel like it's a privilege to learn from you guys. And only later on when I started podcasting about this stuff and the community built around the podcast, did I recognize, oh my goodness, so many people have twitching problems. I had that problem everywhere. I had twitches in all the strangest places in my body, and they were every day. And I I remember doing things like I once had a twitch, believe it or not, in my glute, my left glute, right? My butt.

SPEAKER_04 19:26

It was like one of your biggest muscles in the body.

SPEAKER_03 19:28

Huge muscle. And so you noticed that. Like I could put my hand back there and feel the twitch because it's a big muscle. And I remember frantic, I was at in my office at the time. I was in a really stressful situation, and that freaked me out so much. I closed the door, I put on like soft music, and I sat in the lotus position on the floor of my office trying to relax away this twitch because I'm like, this is not good. This can't be, this can't be good. This is dangerous. And of course, it did not work. It twitched for the whole damn day. I don't know how long that lasted, but I used to get him in my calves, my quads, my front deltoid on my left side. Always my left side would twitch. My lip would quiver. And then one day I discovered, hey, you know, I I'm not really twitching like I used to. I don't know when it all went away. I have no idea. But at some point, and I remember thinking, oh, I guess I didn't have MS or I didn't have ALS or because you you looked at uh your well, you stop the inwards compulsion, you stop ruminating, scanning, and obsessing. Well, what I learned I think it's important about when you talk about muscle tension or muscle weakness, we talk about that. I used to have that, and I do all kinds of crazy compulsions to to check my muscle weakness. It was my brain was still checking on it, but I learned to basically answer that with, I don't know. Why is this happening? Is this something? Why is it still I don't know. I don't know. I'm petting the dog right now. I don't know. Thanks for asking, but I don't know. And I had to practice that again and again and again. And one day I remember looking back and saying, Oh, yeah, I don't really have twitches anymore. I still get eye twitches now and then.

SPEAKER_04 21:02

It's just yeah, it's freaking annoying. Yeah, the attention thing's so important though, isn't it? Like I yeah, the one of the biggest differences between me being in my most anxious and me now is attention. But it's having the confidence to change your attention on a foundation of psychoeducation, knowledge, assurance, and the ability to roll the pentamillion gone. That's right. I don't know what that is. What is that? 20 million sided dice or something. I can't remember. No, 50 million. Five million sided, oh of course, pent. Yeah. Uh where like it could be true, but this is a five million sided dice. One of the sides, yeah, that's the catastrophe. I'm gonna roll the dice and I'm not even gonna check to see what side it's gonna fall on because I know the probability is in my favor.

SPEAKER_03 21:54

That was the sure enough thing. When I had Sally Winston on the anxious truth, she talked about, you know, listen, when I'm done with This recording, I'm gonna go home, or at least I think I am. I don't actually know for sure that I'm gonna make it. There could be a tornado or a hurricane or could hit who knows. But I'm sure enough so that I guess I'll take a chance and get in the car and drive home. I don't you don't think about it. Same thing holds true with the like Corey's neck tension and muscle tension. Like, well, I'm gonna have to roll the dice that I have a migraine or a headache or my neck hurts right now, and I'm gonna roll the dice that I don't have to try and solve it. Of course, we always have to say, especially if you knew, you get medically checked out. And if after you've been checked out or checked out 10 times, well, then you kind of know where you are, you know. And your anxious brain will be like, Yeah, but those four doctors might have missed something. True, it's gonna say that, but I can only be sure enough. That's what all of us can ever be. We can only ever be sure enough so that we can function.

SPEAKER_04 22:48

Yeah, yeah. I just I I just just talking now. I remember it brings back the memory back. I remember muscle tension was responsible for things like pulsing. So when I was obsessed with my pulse, my heart rate, and stuff like that. Because the muscle tension in my ears, behind my ears, in my neck was so tight and bringing everything together, I would hear the pulsing of my pulse, yeah, uh, my heart rate, whatever, in my ear, and like a whoosh sound. And I realized that was down to tension because everything's tense, everything's pulling together. I've got muscles pulling down on my eardrum, you know, and and and then again I'm misinterpreting that too.

SPEAKER_03 23:31

I would I would have that not so much in my ear, which is disturbing when that happens. If you're terrified of your heartbeat, and you can hear it, you can hear your pulse in your ear. That's really tough. I used to have it where I would try to go to sleep, and I would feel like my heart was hammering on my spine. It would be thumping, not racing, but like thump, thump. And it was all the tension. Yes, it was so disturbing. It was so disturbing, it was really making me uncomfortable. That was such a big practice to just lay there. I remember thinking I would try everything to stop it, lay on my side, move over, like no. And the funny thing about it is now, if I'm particularly tense and stressed, I will experience that again. And that now I can say, uh, I just don't care. Right. I'm not taking now. It's a signal like, oh yeah, I need to take a little bit of care of myself. I'm stressed to the max and not doing anything about it.

SPEAKER_04 24:29

We've also rewired our amygdalas to not fire up to not fire off when this happens. Because you immediately it can be a trigger. It used to be trigger, particularly when you're in the cycle of panic and misinterpreting symptoms. Yep. It used to be the trigger, but through behavior, habits, go listen to the neuroplasticity and habits uh episode if you've not tuned in. Through our behavior and repetition, we have rewired our brains. So all these old triggers that literally would put my life on hold and have life or death attention given to it, are just like, oh, that's a minor inconvenience.

SPEAKER_03 25:13

Yeah. Or now for me, it is, and by the way, amygdala. I had to get it in there. I can't have a messed up amygdala. But for now, when I feel that I would have the ability to say, Oh, and I have had it at one o'clock in the morning, and I'm like, oh, hang on a second here. And I'll sometimes get out of bed and go get my foam roller and foam roll for a little while to just loosen my backup. And sure enough, I'm like, yeah, I should have done that before I went to bed, or I should have taken some time to do some stretching and chill out and listen to some music. Like it now, I know that it's like, oh yeah, I'm I'm not I'm not taking care of myself. As now back in the day, I was taking evasive action, like safety action. I need to be saved from this. And now it's just, oh yeah, no, I I could probably let me see if I can roll my back out a bit. Feels good.

SPEAKER_04 25:55

I love stretching as well. Do you know why I love stretching? Because it makes you mindful, puts you in the moment, you kind of take you out of rumination because you are concentrating on what you're doing. Yep. There's almost like a sensory distraction as well, particularly when it's a good stretch and you get really getting in there. Um I it's just got all the benefits. It's meditative, things like that. Uh, particularly now, but most of my stress and tension actually comes in my hips. And because my hips are very tight or they're getting looser actually, but because I used to get abdominal pains from tension from my hips, so I get stabbing pains. And yeah, and it would used to come in and I used to attach to my rib cage, and I got all these pains down my side again because of this tension.

SPEAKER_03 26:44

Yeah, and what are you gonna do about that? You know, nothing. You're gonna kind of let it be there, and it's the attention, like you said before. But the let's talk about the other thing where so I I when you hear in Corey's question, like for him, it's focused in his neck and he gets migraines. And so a lot of anxious people will wind up in a situation where they'll hear us talk about this, and yeah, Josh talked about being tense in his his his neck and Corey's tense's neck, and Drew talked about chest. But I have tension in eh what but what about that tension? Or another one that I fell victim to was okay, fine, but what but what about muscle weakness? Because I feel my my muscles are weak, and so I could not apply the general principles. I wanted specific, but what about when your muscles fail? Well, what about that? Can you tell me about that?

SPEAKER_04 27:30

I I remember when my having this exactly, and the I just used to come to this conclusion in my mind and then leave it alone. It's like I'm anxious, so I'm gonna be really tense, and that does weird stuff to the body, and then I'd leave it alone.

SPEAKER_03 27:45

Yeah, I started using my body as doing scared body things. I still I still use that to to describe it to people sometimes. Oh, when my when I'm scared, my body does scared things. I lied that. Yeah, it let me off the hook a little bit. There was a little bit of, and I know, oh my goodness, Drew was self-compassionate. How could that be? But I in retrospect, I could see that I was because that little reframing that I don't know, I stumbled upon. Maybe I didn't invent it, maybe I heard it, I don't know. But it let me off the hook a little bit. Oh, that's my body doing scared things like it's supposed to. It just doesn't know, it doesn't need to do that now.

SPEAKER_04 28:17

Gym goers, you know, if you like going to the gym and you're lifting weights and you're anxious sometimes, expect yourself to have you know tension, stuff like that. Gym's good because it's also it's tension relieving, but also it's got direct physical literal tension on your muscles. Yeah, so if you're Drew and I in the gym bench pressing 270 kilograms with one arm, I'm gonna go home and be like, that arm might might have might have taken a little bit of tension there. You know, I was throwing it up and catching it, but still, you know, you're gonna you're gonna you're gonna look out there. But yeah, you're you're particularly susceptible to the muscle twitches, things like that. You know, of course you are. You know, your muscle is tired.

SPEAKER_03 28:58

Yeah, I'm so tense after that alarmingly impressive workout that I just did. Like with the ridiculous two of us. You know, it's interesting too. Like, uh, you know, I love to lift and whatnot. Doms if you're into weight training, delayed onset muscle soreness. That's where you go to the gym and you lift really heavy and you're cool the next day. But the day after that, oh god, please don't make me walk down the stairs because everything hurts. How come that was cool? Like that I I liked because that's that was like, oh yeah, look at me. I'm feeling it, man. I'm feeling it. I was working hard. Oh, that when I was an anxious person would have freaked me out. Like it literally hurts if I have to like sit on the kitchen chair or somewhere else. We all know we're all set. Like, but as an anxious person, I wouldn't deal with it. But as a non-anxious person, well, you know, this has happened because I just left it heavy two days ago. I get it, it's supposed to happen. Really weird. Yeah, yeah.

SPEAKER_04 29:46

I'm I'm disappointed you the DOMS was a nod to the gym community. I thought you were giving a nice nod to the to the king community. Hey, everybody's welcome here. Yeah, of course, of course. I'll introduce the gym. This is getting good. It's all good. Yeah, it's done.

SPEAKER_03 30:02

Yeah, see this language, it's a wonderful thing. Context means everything, doesn't it?

SPEAKER_04 30:07

Uh absolutely, yeah. Yeah, I think so. The overall message of of this episode is yes, do not underestimate how much stress the body, uh the anxiety can do to the body. Not saying be afraid of that stress, it's fine, it's just physical stress. Look out for your posture, do things like particularly if it manifests in your chest. I love the door frame exercises where you put a little hand on each side of the door and lean through, put your hand at different parts of the doorway as well to stretch little bits of your chest. I still do that if I'm tense, and it's just a little helpful thing and and realizing ah, you know, I don't need to ruminate, keep scanning compulsively checking here. I know I'm anxious, so I therefore I will be tense. Would you agree with that? If I'm anxious, I'm gonna be tense. Yeah, it's it's a physiological outlook for all that adrenaline and cortisol. We what we don't want to do is keep that carousel going, that that hamster wheel where we're just going round and round because you you have self-perpetuating symptoms. I'm head, I have a headache, I worry about my headache. Well, that's gonna make me tense, so it's not gonna get rid of my headache. I have palpitations, so I worry about my palpitations, it's gonna keep me tense, so I'm probably gonna get palpitations. I have chest pains, I worry about chest pain. 12 seconds later.

SPEAKER_03 31:24

Yeah, so anyway, we're back after there's not gonna be no good edit there because you froze in the middle of a sentence. So we're back after that little edit. And I think the point is, yeah, know that you acknowledge that this is what your body's gonna do. Give yourself a break. You can't control, we can't make your body not do its natural functions. And the best I the best I could do right now is to just do the best I can do with my neck tension or my headache. Or my migraines are super disruptive, don't get me wrong, but I'm just gonna have to do the best I can right now with this situation. And when my brain demands that I explain it, solve it, get rid of it, fix it, I'm gonna have to shrug my shoulders and say, I I don't know how to do that, man. Like, thanks for trying to help me. But like, I don't know. Let's do we're just let's just do the best we can. Thank I appreciate you, amygdala, but like let's just do the best we can. Yeah, I like that. I like that. Cool.

SPEAKER_04 32:13

Um, can we have some community wins? Have we got oh, I heard a good did it anyway this morning. This is a good one.

SPEAKER_03 32:20

Yeah, let's play that one. Ready? Here we go.

SPEAKER_00 32:24

Hi Drew and Josh, this is Alex from Canada. And after a month of listening to your podcast, I'm excited to share my first I Did It Anyway. Uh in January, I got hit over the head with panic disorder. And since then, I've been struggling with uh even day-to-day things. My husband and I decided to try to book a little mini give getaway with our two kids, four and six. And leading up to it, I started panicking. And the day of, I had a debilitating panic attack and said I couldn't go. Luckily, my husband is very supportive, so I went. I asked him to do all the water slides with my eldest because I don't need any more adrenaline in my life, and he did that. And at the end of day one, my son ran up to me and said, Mommy, mommy, all I want to do is this one water slide with you. I am struggling with right now confined spaces, not knowing what's gonna happen next and heights. So every part of my being wanted to say no. But there was a small part of me that really wants to be that mom and make those memories with my son. So I told myself, you can do this even if you have a panic attack. You can do 30 seconds and make this memory with your son, even if you panic at the end. Up the stairs, I was shaking, racing heart rate. I would have turned around if my son wasn't there. But we went down the water slide together and I was laughing because the truth was, it ended up being so fun. I was proud of myself, and when I got to the bottom, I thought about your podcast and both of you and wanting to share this amazing did it anyway. Thanks with thanks for everything you guys do. I love your podcast so much, especially The Eagle, Craig the Critic. And I was laughing so hard at the inward compulsion episode in the music. Your humor really breaks my uh stress, and I'm so grateful for every episode you release.

SPEAKER_03 34:02

Come on, I know you're going for it.

SPEAKER_04 34:06

That one was for you.

SPEAKER_03 34:08

Thanks, Alex. That's a red, that's the eagle just for you, and also some applause.

SPEAKER_04 34:13

Standing.

SPEAKER_03 34:14

Good job.

SPEAKER_04 34:15

I love that. Value-driven exposures as well.

SPEAKER_03 34:18

That's exactly right. While we were listening to Alex, I wrote a note episode 59 should be values-driven recovery because we don't we haven't talked about that yet. The role the role of value. So Alex was able to connect to a thing that's important to her. I value interacting with my kids or my family, and I'll do a scary thing to move me closer to what I actually value.

SPEAKER_04 34:37

Love that. Very good. Absolutely love that. Yeah, um, I've got a written one. Do you want to hear it? Yeah, bring it. Uh hi, Josh and Drew in brackets. Josh's name came first this time. See podcast episode 57 for reference. Love that. Thank you. Uh some astute listeners out there. I am so grateful to have come across your podcast as I was simply searching for anxiety on Apple Podcasts. Well, tell you what, it's because the listeners of this podcast keep providing reviews for us and it helps us to grow organically. So thank you for everyone who's listening who's provided reviews and stuff. I really appreciate that. Anyway, in a sudden time of seemingly debilitating anxiety. Uh, yours has been by far the best. Thank you. I mean, so gonna agree with that. Uh, this this this time of year tends to be a big trigger for my anxiety. And I found myself in a very crippling anxious state. I feel scared, overwhelmed, frustrated, and even sad at times. Seemingly small things like taking a walk, which I used to enjoy and take one every day to decompress, have magnified my anxiety and spurred OCD thoughts. Since finding your podcast, Andrew's, I have pushed myself to go on walks, even if it's just half a mile at a time. Up until yesterday, the walks made me feel even more frustrated because feeling anxious on a walk seems so silly to me. There's a bit of Craig the critic there. Yesterday I had a huge win. I walked two miles while listening to the entire latest podcast. P.S. Episode 57 resonated with me so much. Even better, I started out anxious and did deep breathing techniques, but before I knew it, I was walking like I normally would without giving it a second thought. The sun came out and I smiled. I realize I may very well have had more hard days with anxiety, but that was a huge win for me, and your podcasts have been so honest and helpful. I can't express my gratitude enough. Thank you so much. I'm not going to say your name out because you didn't give me permission, but thank you.

SPEAKER_03 36:46

Love it. I'm going to take a chance that instead of trying to fix my anxiety or run away from it, how about I just try and breathe a little? That's a brave thing. Very brave thing to do.

SPEAKER_04 36:58

Absolutely love it. And you're making some good progress. Keep going, keep going, keep going, keep us updated. It sounds good. Thanks for the kind words for sure. Thank you so much for everyone who keeps tuning in. Thank you for the reviews. If you don't follow us on social media, you can follow Drew at the DocPanxious.truth on Instagram and TikTok and AnxietyJash on Instagram and TikTok. And yeah, we're looking forward to recording more of these episodes, and we really appreciate you listening and engaging. Thank you.

SPEAKER_03 37:27

Yeah, thanks for coming by, guys. We will see you next week. We are out.