YOU ARE NOT ALONE - A companion online community discussion board for The Mental Illness Happy Hour podcast with Paul Gilmartin

So I sometimes get these rashes on my hands and my arms that I tend to scratch when I'm nervous. I use sensitive skin soap and laundry detergent just in case, but the rashes don't seem to pop up in reaction to anything physical. In fact, I often wake up with them. They also don't last long, usually fading within the day if I don't scratch them. I've been getting them since I was about 10 or 11.

I believe that they are physical manifestations of my stress/anxiety/suppressed emotions. I've talked to a therapist about them and she seems to agree.

I was wondering, have any of you noticed any physical manifestations of your anxiety?

Oh, Pigeon, you are so not alone.

If I may include "tension" with the stress you mention:

I get tension headaches, in the back of my head. Just this past week the pain/tension migrated to my right jaw, perhaps aggravated by over-aggressive bagel chewing (?).

Speaking only for myself, I have come to appreciate stress/tension pain: much as they suck, they are signal from my body to love myself, to take care of myself.

If I listen to that wise voice, is another question. Progress not perfection.

Stress affects the immune system so there are a LOT of physical manifestations...I have allergies, and it turns out that they become more severe when I am stressed, including skin rashes due to eczema. I also tend to get more acid reflux when I am stressed. And canker sores. And herpes outbreaks. Any chronic sort of condition can develop worse symptoms or more frequent symptoms because of stress. When I know I'm under a lot of stress, I now increase my dose of allergy meds and valtrex (herpes, not fun but controllable with meds). It seems to help with physical symptoms. Doesn't cure the stress itself however. For that, I need therapy, sleep, good nutrition, and a lot of therapy, did I mention it? Yes. And good talks with friends and family. And therapy. Just clowning. But seriously.

1)I vomit. When I'm in the grips of a real serious bout of anxiety (usually caused by some sort of perceived problem in interpersonal relationships) I wake up every morning with the dry heaves. I lose all of my appetite. I have to force myself to eat. During my worst ever episode, I was down to 135 lbs. To put that in perspective, I'm 5'9" and 220 lbs now.

2) I sweat. Cold, clammy sweat, especially my palms.

3) IBS. Enough said.

4) When anxiety/panic hits me all at once, it's like someone dumps a bucket of cold water on my head, starting at the top and going down. I feel disoriented, dizzy, short of breath, tingling in hands and arms.

My anxiety starts with an allergy I get really congested and then start to have trouble breathing. Then comes the chest pain, light headedness, and palpitations. All this just compounds my problems until I can't do anything. Everything is overwhelming. Then come the waves of panic and fear. I concentrate on breathing but nothing really helps.

I was wondering, have any of you noticed any physical manifestations of your anxiety?

Oh. My. Dog.

You have no idea of the myriad ways my body has physically manifested my anxiety. I actually sat down one day and committed to a sheet of paper every example I could think of. This was many years ago (back in the '90s), and when I mentioned it to the therapist I was seeing at the time, he so amazed that he asked me if he could make a copy of it. (That always brings me a chuckle when I think about it.)

I've since officially been diagnosed with Generalized Anxiety Disorder, which I'd already unofficially diagnosed myself years earlier (thanks to much reading and personal research in my free time, some college courses in psychology, and having gotten my hands on a copy of the DSM). While I've—fortunately—only once ever had a full-on panic attack (and that was 20 years ago), I hope to never experience that awful feeling again. I have, however, had many other anxiety symptoms, ranging from banal to somewhat bizarre. When I was in college, I experienced insomnia, diarrhea, and very painful acne-like breakouts over my entire scalp, all during the same period. Boy, was that a fun time!

Over the many intervening years, I've often manifested anxiety in the more common ways, but the most interesting by far was a period twelve years ago when, for several months, I started breaking out in itchy, very visible red hives. They would come on in mere seconds out of absolutely nowhere, then just as suddenly disappear only to reappear at a moment's notice later the same day. This kept happening until, suddenly, the whole thing ended as unexpectedly as it had begun, as if someone somewhere had just pulled a lever. I've never had hives since. It was weird.

It led me to think: If only I could get my mind to work for me only a small portion of as much of the time as it works against me, I would probably be capable of moving mountains. The mind is a funny thing, and even though I consider myself a self-aware person, my own is a mystery unto me.

Now that I've reread your post, Pigeon, it sounds like the "rash" you mentioned getting is very similar to the hives episodes I had. Maybe it's hives that are popping up on your skin. Like I said in my earlier comments, it could happen in an instant, and then clear up just as quickly. I was always amazed at how my skin could change so dramatically in such a short time.

Peejums,
They very well could be! What did your hives look like? My... lets say, skin reactions? Are tiny little bumps that look like pin-prick sized blisters (they don't pop like blisters though) that break out mostly on my hands, sometimes on my arms and behind my knees. They itch like crazy, though only when I'm focused on them or nervous (another sign that they're anxiety induced).

It's seriously amazing what our minds are capable of doing to us and I think you're absolutely right that we could do so much if we could get them working in the right direction! But figuring out how to retrain mine has been incredibly difficult :/ I'm still working on it, but it's slow going.

Wow, this is interesting! I get the usual physical anxiety symptoms (dizziness, sweating, etc) but lately I have been waking up with something like hive along my jawline and neck, sometimes on my arms. They started in early September after I moved, so I assumed it was something to do with that, but I already take allergy pills so I didn't know what it could be from. I bought all sorts of creams too, but it wouldn't go away. I think it maybe from stress because I was feeling kind of icky and germaphobic after the move from all the dust, cobwebs, fruit flies, etc. We moved in to a floor of an old house, so it's not as sterile as the condo we came from. I love the place, but found myself feeling sort of, you know, icky. About a week ago, I caved and bought a little vacuum, now I vacuum daily and try to leave the windows open during the day. Now I have slowly started seeing the bumps subside. I don't know if it's anyway related, but it is interesting.

When I'm severely stressed or sad (which has been the case for the past few weeks) I get this awful feeling in the pit of my stomach, and I barely eat. I'll eat maybe one or two times, but I'll eat far less than what I normally eat. Lately I've been getting lower back pains too.