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Anxiety can be created by the body, mouse heart study suggests

nature.com

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Re: Anxiety can be created by the body, mouse heart study suggests

#31

Post by kayodelycaon »

JohnBooty wrote: post #20

I didn't even know that this was a matter of debate. I had moderately serious heart problem (atrial murmur, sort of the less-serious cousin of afib/atrial fibrilation) and it was extremely clear to me that whatever was happening in my chest was also directly spiking my feelings of anxiety. To be clear, I mean a direct heart->anxiety link, as opposed to "I'm thinking about my heart problem and therefore my anxiety is…

As far as I know, it isn't. I have anxiety as part of the bipolar package. And every psychiatrist I've had says that increased blood pressure can trigger anxiety.

They can both feel like tightness in the chest and from what I was told, the brain isn't good at separating signals. So your body feeling anxious leads to your brain feeling anxious. It's a wonderful cycle. Throw in asthma for more fun. Now you have three possible problems that can all trigger each other! Get sick and feel short of breath? Now you have four! Aren't bodies fun? :D

Re: Anxiety can be created by the body, mouse heart study suggests

#32

Post by bitL »

graderjs wrote: post #13

Yes that's why yoga is so good at calming you down and making you healthy. It soothes and calms the parasympathetic nervous system, and helps relieve and release many held tensions in the body. It's no good just to do meditation and calm your mind if your body and nervous system is still holding on to so much stress. The body remembers many things and "embodies" many emotions. You can notice this if you do part-by-pa…

Wouldn't a nicotine patch to sync para- and sympathetic systems help?

Re: Anxiety can be created by the body, mouse heart study suggests

#33

Post by zug_zug »

mynameisvlad wrote: post #3
jedberg wrote: post #2

Ah, another "bad medical thing found! .... in mice".

> Mice and rats have long served as the preferred species for biomedical research animal models due to their anatomical, physiological, and genetic similarity to humans. Advantages of rodents include their small size, ease of maintenance, short life cycle, and abundant genetic resources. https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC3987984/ It's almost as if research is done on mice on purpose . Of course you're goin…

I think the iron-man argument is -- wouldn't it be much less a waste of everybody's time here if we never posted mice articles, and only waited until they go to the human stage to share/discuss them?

Of course it's a free community, people are welcome to post and upvote whatever they like, still we do have cultural norms here around high signal/noise and I understand the sentiment.

Re: Anxiety can be created by the body, mouse heart study suggests

#34

Post by code51 »

So obvious that it makes you question the effectiveness of medical research.

The association between mitral valve prolapse and anxiety is well-known. However this physical difference is completely ignored when it's mild. In the general population, mild prolapse is seen as a common thing.

However there are also diseases caused by genetic mutations which cause both mitral valve changes and also a whole set of body problems including chronic pain, elasticity, vascular problems etc. The underlying causes are so under-researched that an easily fixable problem tied to a gene becomes a progressive disease over a lifetime which is damn hard to diagnose. You suddenly see that too few resources are dedicated to actually understand and solve medical problems instead of treating symptoms when they get severe.

Plus... coffee is a pretty good way to kick off anxiety and we know it for at least a century I guess.

Re: Anxiety can be created by the body, mouse heart study suggests

#36

Post by corobo »

spython wrote: post #23
ehPReth wrote: post #14

I hope they can one day just dial down my anxiety... benzos are nice, but you become dependant on them and increasingly require more after a while :/

There are actually exercises where you imagine a dial, like a volume knob, and imagine dialing the emotion that you want to regulate down a bit. The astonishing thing is, it works quite well!

I picture sliders like on an audio mixing desk haha. Always good to see you're not (the only one who is) crazy!

Re: Anxiety can be created by the body, mouse heart study suggests

#37

Post by sirsinsalot »

renewiltord wrote: post #29

Makes sense. On days I skip eating for the whole day I will get a sense of impending doom later in the day. Just "something is going to really badly somewhere!"

When I over trained and under ate, it caused such existential doom ... words can't explain.

Re: Anxiety can be created by the body, mouse heart study suggests

#40

Post by corobo »

anonymouskimmer wrote: post #16
can16358p wrote: post #9

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Exactly. I have anxiety and panic attacks. When my heart beats faster for whatever reason, it triggers anxiety and in more extreme cases, panic attack. It's kind of obvious, really.

I certainly would start feeling anxious if my heart rate increased almost 50% for no discernible reason.

Same happens whenever it dips too, and if it stops completely you get a feeling of "impending doom" (infinite anxiety haha). For example using adenosine to turn the heart off and on again if it's acting wonky.

Maybe just messing with the heart causes anxiety lol. Brain there like "wait, I didn't tell you to do that.. red alert!"

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