{"id":18521,"date":"2020-01-15T16:56:32","date_gmt":"2020-01-15T21:56:32","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/thepapergown.zocdoc.com\/?p=18521"},"modified":"2023-03-06T11:24:33","modified_gmt":"2023-03-06T16:24:33","slug":"some-anxious-people-get-more-anxious-when-they-try-to-relax","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.zocdoc.com\/blog\/healthcare-trends\/some-anxious-people-get-more-anxious-when-they-try-to-relax\/","title":{"rendered":"For Some People, Relaxing Makes Anxiety Worse"},"content":{"rendered":"

If you feel a little panicky a lot of the time, you\u2019re hardly alone. <\/span>Nineteen percent of American adults<\/span><\/a> have an anxiety disorder, and <\/span>almost one-third<\/span><\/a> will be diagnosed with one at some point in their lives.<\/span><\/p>\n

As we\u2019ve collectively become more anxious, we’ve also embraced a growing list of activities to <\/span>help us block out worries and<\/span> just relax: We\u2019re signing up for goat yoga, squeezing in subway meditation sessions and going on digital detoxes. For many people, these calming pastimes supply much-needed moments of relief. Yet, for others, efforts to unwind actually trigger more anxiety.<\/span><\/p>\n

An <\/span>estimated <\/span>17 to 53 percent of adults report having<\/span><\/a> what\u2019s called relaxation-induced anxiety. Although psychologists have known about this paradoxical phenomenon since <\/span>at least 1983<\/span><\/a>, they’ve only recently begun to investigate why it happens. Given that relaxation is so valuable for our health, researchers are hoping to develop treatments for anxiety caused by it \u2014 so that everyone can reap the benefits of, say, sunset vinyasa classes. For now, though, there are steps to take to make relaxation less scary.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

The traditional antidote to anxiety<\/h2>\n

Anxiety is a state of heightened alertness. When you start to feel on edge \u2014 even about nothing in particular \u2014 your brain sends out a distress signal to trigger your stress response. Your body responds by amping up levels of stress hormones and spiking your heart rate and blood pressure, among other physiological changes. Essentially, you go into survival mode.<\/span><\/p>\n

\u201cChronic worry or chronic muscle tension creates wear and tear on your body and psyche,\u201d says Michelle Newman, professor of psychology and psychiatry at Pennsylvania State University. Chronic anxiety has been linked to a wide variety of physical and mental health problems, including <\/span>heart disease<\/span><\/a>, <\/span>gastrointestinal symptoms<\/span><\/a>, insomnia and <\/span>cancer<\/span><\/a>.<\/span><\/p>\n

The yin to anxiety\u2019s yang is the relaxation response. When you no longer feel like you\u2019re in harm\u2019s way, your parasympathetic nervous system takes charge, facilitating vital processes that don\u2019t take place in survival mode, including <\/span>sleep and digestion<\/span><\/a>.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

Learning relaxation techniques has been a standard part of treatment for chronic anxiety since the 1970s. One technique is called diaphragmatic breathing, a deep-breathing exercise during which your chest remains fairly still while your stomach expands on inhale and slowly falls on exhale. There\u2019s also progressive muscle relaxation, which involves tensing up a group of muscles for a few seconds and then relaxing it for longer. Working your way from your toes to your head, or vice versa, and tense and then relax every muscle group in this way.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

In the 1980s, researchers noticed that although relaxation techniques helped many people achieve a sense of calm, or at least feel less anxious, they had the opposite effect for others. In a small 1983 <\/span>study<\/span><\/a>,\u00a0<\/span>about half of participants said their tension grew during a deep-breathing exercise, while almost one-third felt increased anxiety while practicing progressive relaxation.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

\u201cWe assume that when some patients [with relaxation-induced anxiety] try these exercises, they feel their bodies begin to relax, and that’s a trigger for more anxiety,\u201d says Sandra Llera, associate professor of psychology at Towson University. \u201cTheir bodies start to let go of tension, relax and calm down, and they react to that as if it were a threat\u201d and tense up again.<\/span><\/p>\n

Some people with relaxation-induced anxiety may be able to fully relax at times, Newman says. For others, any relaxation might be a temporary sensation. <\/span><\/p>\n

When worry brings comfort<\/h2>\n

Newman recently ran an experiment to investigate the basis of relaxation-induced anxiety. <\/span>She hypothesized that\u00a0<\/span>contrast avoidance, a <\/span>concept she developed in 2011 with Llera, played a role in the issue.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

People who experience contrast avoidance have a hard time shifting from positive or neutral emotions to<\/span> negative ones. In other words, they really<\/em> don’t like feeling content one second and then unexpectedly becoming scared or sad the next, so they <\/span>try to protect themselves against the possibility of that happening.<\/p>\n

“If they\u2019re fully relaxed,” Newman says, “it feels like they are more vulnerable and less in control, and if something bad happens, they’re more likely to experience a strong spike in anxiety.”<\/p>\n

For Newman’s study, published in the\u00a0Journal of Affective Disorders<\/i>\u00a0in December<\/a>, 96 participants practiced a relaxation technique and then watched a video that, unbeknownst to them, was designed to elicit either fear or sadness. Next, they answered a questionnaire to measure contrast avoidance; i.e., researchers wanted to figure out whether the relaxation exercise made it easier or harder for participants to cope with emotions triggered by the video. Participants then did a second relaxation exercise followed by a questionnaire. This time, the goal was to measure how anxious they felt while trying to relax.<\/p>\n

As Newman suspected, contrast avoidance was strongly linked to relaxation-induced anxiety.<\/p>\n

\u201cThe worry and chronic anxiety might actually feel protective to them,\u201d Llera says. \u201cThat sense of already being upset, worked up, or anxious makes it less surprising \u2014 there’s less emotional contrast \u2014 to then have a bad thing happen. It’s the thought that, ‘If I keep myself in this negative emotional state all the time, then I can’t be caught off guard if a negative event happens.’\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n

They may associate worry and physical sensations like muscle tension with the sense that they are \u201cready\u201d for unexpected threats, like someone sneaking up on them.<\/span> Whereas, Newman explains, \u201cif they stop worrying, relax, let their down guard, or are just in the moment enjoying it and not anticipating what could go wrong, they can feel as though they’re setting themselves up for being more vulnerable if something happens.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n

Practicing relaxing<\/h2>\n

We all know people who find it difficult to lie on a beach, sit down and read, or otherwise just <\/span>be<\/span><\/i>. Newman says these can\u2019t-sit-still types would benefit from learning how to enjoy downtime:\u00a0<\/span>\u201cThe take-home of all of this isn’t that people should not try to relax.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n

Both Newman and Llera believe that relaxation-induced anxiety is treatable. Llera sees potential in exposure therapy, which hasn\u2019t yet been studied as a treatment for people with a clinical aversion to kicking back. Exposure therapy entails gradually exposing yourself, under the guidance of a therapist, to whatever makes you scared until you overcome your fear of it. The method could be used, Llera believes, to help patients make that transition from feeling calm to experiencing a negative emotion.<\/span><\/p>\n

\u201cOver time they may realize it’s not so scary and they don’t need to walk around all the time with this emotional armor on,\u201d she says. \u201cThey see that they are capable of handling these emotional shifts.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n

Another option, Newman says, might be to practice relaxing, either with a therapist or on your own: \u201cOver time, you can become habituated to the anxiety if you continue to try to relax despite the anxiety, and with repeated practice you can learn to do it.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n

The bottom line is that everyone needs to find ways to let go of stress, anxiety and worry. \u201cYou need to get out of the habit of holding onto muscle tension and practice letting go across your day,\u201d says Newman. \u201cIt’s better for our mental, physical and emotional health.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n

Research shows that a lot of what people worry about doesn’t happen<\/span><\/a>, you may be missing out on the joys of life \u2014 or even making yourself miserable \u2014 in an attempt to head off situations and feelings that will never come to pass.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

\u201cStart to trust yourself,\u201d Llera says. \u201cYou could be in a perfectly good mood, and even if something bad did happen, you would still be capable of coping with it in the moment.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n

\n

Ready to book a therapy appointment? Visit Zocdoc.<\/span><\/a><\/span><\/h1>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Relaxation-induced anxiety is a real thing.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":40,"featured_media":18522,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[229],"tags":[12,41,71],"class_list":["post-18521","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-healthcare-trends","tag-anxiety","tag-mental-health","tag-therapy","reviewer-dr-nassim-assefi","specialist_by_city-therapists"],"yoast_head":"\nFor Some People, Relaxing Makes Anxiety Worse - Healthcare Trends<\/title>\n<meta name=\"description\" content=\"Relaxation-induced anxiety is a real thing.\" \/>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/www.zocdoc.com\/blog\/healthcare-trends\/some-anxious-people-get-more-anxious-when-they-try-to-relax\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"For Some People, Relaxing Makes Anxiety Worse - 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