Muscle tension tends to be a symptom of anxiety disorder. This is when you feel like your muscles are tight or strained when you are in constant pain. By going into treatment for your anxiety, your muscles will be more relaxed as well as your mental state.
Muscle Tension From Anxiety
Muscle strain resulting from anxiety can make the pain in your muscles so debilitating that it prevents physical activity and causes you to be bedridden. Pain medications may be required if your muscles ache very badly. The muscle pain may last briefly, for a few hours, or even be persistent. Muscle pain may affect just one part of the body, shift to another part, or your whole body can ache all over. The pain can also occur in waves where you are in pain one minute, goes away the next minute, and then the pain comes back again. The muscle tension may not just exist in your arms and legs but also in your face, your head, and even the muscles in your digestive system as well.
The Reasons Behind Anxiety Causing Muscle Tension
When muscle tension is caused by stress, our body secretes hormones into the bloodstream and allows us to experience changes when we feel threatened, called the fight or flight response. Our muscles tend to tighten when we feel prepared to fight against any threats that come our way. When we are stressed very frequently, our body puts itself in a state of emergency response called stress-response hyperstimulation. As long as the body is hyperstimulated, one or a group of muscles can be tight.
How to Get Rid of Anxiety Muscle Tension
When your muscles are tightening as a result of your anxiety, finding ways to calm yourself down will relieve the muscle tension. It may take your body 20 minutes or more to recover from the stress response, but there should be no cause for concern. Relaxed breathing, increasing your rest, and not worrying about your muscles tensing will help your body unwind. Some short-term techniques can be things like having someone give you a massage, gentle stretching, a warm bath, light to moderate exercise, going for a nice walk, and getting a good night’s sleep. Speaking to a therapist can be a long-term approach to helping your muscles in figuring out the underlying causes of your anxiety and working through them.
Anxiety can make you feel very tense, which often leads to muscle aches. If your anxiety continues to go untreated, your tightened muscles can prevent you from having a full range of motion. At Alta Loma, we understand how overwhelming anxiety can be on your body, and we are here to show you what can be done about it going forward. Located in Georgetown, Texas, we can provide you with individualized treatment, therapeutic recreational activities, coping skills education, medication management, and much more. Please give us a call at (866) 457-3843 to learn more about our services.