Delayed Anxiety?

Is there such a thing as delayed anxiety? I woke up this morning and all morning, my heart rate has been 10-20bpm above resting.

I can feel a small ache in my sternum, which I associate with anxiety, but I can't for the life of me figure out why I'm feeling anxious?

Only thing a couple mornings ago, a workman came to my flat instead of the one next door and was almost inside when I shouted out at him. Later that day I went out for a walk came back and got changed as I was quite sweaty and then it dawned on me that I hadn't sanitised the door handle nor washed my hands when I came in. Started to panic then about the workman possible being asymptomatic.

Things are calming down a little now, but I'm at a loss why it came on all of a sudden.

[LoveBear]

I’m not sure any or every episode can be explained. Do your best to care for yourself

[Hidden in reply to LoveBear]

Thank you, I've just got back from a walk outside, which may or may not have helped ha ha, but I felt I needed to do it.

[LoveBear in reply to Hidden]

Congratulations on your accomplishment. Celebrate it 🙂

[Hidden]

Hi Capt

This happens to me a lot - I call it delayed reaction but I think it's the same thing?

I've never analysed this with a medical expert or anything so this is just my uninformed view. Following a panic (which can be called an amygdala hijack because of the part of the brain which is affected) it's almost as if the thinking (frontal) part of the brain needs to catch up and process what's happened.

Your raised heartbeat is almost like the 'hangover' from this episode as you had to go into fight and flight mode to deal with this workman.

Sorry this happened to you but I think you did well to get out for a walk. I gather from my reading that this is the best thing to do following this type of panic.

I'm quite hypervigilant so I am kind of familiar with this sort of thing.

I expect others can explain the physiology better than me!

Hope you feel better soon.

[Hidden in reply to Hidden]

Thank you, this body sure works in mysterious ways but I’ll keep an eye out in future and try and record what set things off

[Hidden in reply to Hidden]

Sounds good and you might start to notice patterns of behaviour, often takes me ages to work out...I might wake up with a bad back and then have to think back what might have caused it/was I triggered?

Speaking for myself I grew up in a family where I wasn't allowed to feel anything but obviously I did through my body sometimes weeks later.

Them my emotions caught up! Weird or what but I'm on a site for people with complex ptsd and I read this is pretty typical.

[Hidden in reply to Hidden]

That’s encouraging to know it’s pretty common, but not in a way ha ha

[Eagledove]

This has happened to me several times. The most recent was 2 months ago.

My daughter was having an emergency C section, and it took 2 hours to find out if she and the baby were ok. The anxiety was extreme, I was thinking the worst.

When I found everything was ok, it was a huge relief. I thought everything was ok.

But then a few days later I started to get strange physical symptoms and severe anxiety again, on the verge of panic. I was pretty sure it was stress related, but eventually I went to the ER. Chest pain, pulsing head, ringing in ears, pain in neck jaw and back. Thankfully nothing serious found.

I’m still dealing with some of these symptoms 2 months later.

There were two or three other times in the past where similar things happened, delayed symptoms after stressful or traumatic events. I was able to stave off a breakdown with the knowledge of what it was and how to cope with it.

[Hidden in reply to Eagledove]

Coping is key, I needed the walk to just get the fresh air it’s all I have at the moment

[Hidden in reply to Hidden]

calmer-you.com/technique-be...

This explains it far better than I can!

[Hidden in reply to Hidden]

Thank you, muchly appreciated

[Hidden in reply to Eagledove]

Glad your daughter's ok Eagledove, A very stressful experience for you.

I find that sometimes my brain can't register what's happening at the time when going through an intense experience and as you say it comes out later in physical symptoms - especially if you had to stay strong for someone else.

Due to my past I've worked out this is how my brain works and I have many strange examples! Sometimes I get nightmares whereby my brain re-enacts the situation. One time on waking I was just able to ask my husband how he would be feeling if he was in this nightmare and he replied he'd be feeling such and such and I realised I'd be feeling the same (yeah I know) So I've learnt from this particular experience about 10yrs ago how to access my feelings even though I may not actually 'feel' them. Just acknowledging them as in "I feel...." can be enough.

Good luck