Anxiety while exercising

[jlauren1]

I have suffered from panic attacks/GAD for six years now and even though I have been able to control these issues for the most part I have recently developed strong anxiety while exercising. I have been to the cardiologist and everything was fine but it gets so bad sometimes that I have to stop immediately and get to a "safe place." One of the biggest symptoms is that my left arm will go numb and tingle and I begin to have chest pains and the butterfly feeling. I have always been athletic and it seems pretty unfair to have something that is good for you make you feel so helpless. Does anyone else experience this and if so any advice on coping?

[ThePhoenix]

I have suffered from panic attacks/GAD for six years now and even though I have been able to control these issues for the most part I have recently developed strong anxiety while exercising. I have been to the cardiologist and everything was fine but it gets so bad sometimes that I have to stop immediately and get to a "safe place." One of the biggest symptoms is that my left arm will go numb and tingle and I begin to have chest pains and the butterfly feeling. I have always been athletic and it seems pretty unfair to have something that is good for you make you feel so helpless. Does anyone else experience this and if so any advice on coping?

I have heard of this a few times, what I believe happens is that when we exercise we become hot, sweaty and heart poundsing, shortness of breath....symptoms people commonly feel anxious about because they relate them to heart problems. So exercise creates these normal bodily responses but our anxious state turns them into something else thus creating greater anxiety and creating a circle of fear.

I would tell you the best advice is to press on because its ultimately harmless but I can appreciate the fear that is attached to it makes it worse. What I can tell you is this, you have had the symptoms checked over and nothing was found, therefore you don have a heart problem and your sensations are merely fear and normal bodily responses. If you can reassure yourself with that and press on then in the end you can beat it.

Good luck! :)

[mhdwjw]

Yes I too experience high anxiety whilst exercising. My psych says we are confusing the physical effects of vigourous exercise and that of anxiety (to which they are the same really - adreline pumping etc). She told me that when you are exercising just remind yourself that these are normal physical sensations of vigourous exercise. If you think about it, prior to having GAD, I would go running all the time and always felt sweating, dizzy, heart pounding and sometimes even sick if I went to hard but the once I cooled down and stopped running the sensations would go and I wouldn't think twice about it. Its only because our bodies and mind are in a constant anxious state that we start to panic about these normal body reactions from exercise. keep going may be try and keep the exercise low impact for a while and then build up.