Tightness in Chest with Anxiety

By Trevor Mosley

Tightness in the chest with anxiety usually ensues after a panic attack. Chest tightness happens to victims who suffer from mild levels of anxiety too. Due to the similarity in the sensations, one often confuses chest tightness with heart attack. However, this sensation is typically less suffocating if its lead on by anxiety compared to a heart attack.

Chest tightness is often described as compression or pressure on the chest cavity area, and it goes together with faster heart beat and shortness of breath. Fear of unknown or impending danger is also experienced together with tightness in the chest due to a panic attack.

Difference between panic tightness and heart attack

Chest tightness led on by panic attacks are often mistaken for a heart attack. In reality, there is a difference in the intensity of the episodes. The former is of course less severe. The patient may be rushed to the hospital. Typically, when he arrives at the emergency room his symptoms will subside. Being able to distinguish between the two will help to save one from a misdiagnosis and allow him/her to deal with his anxiety sooner.

Heart attacks usually crush and squeeze at one's chest and one feels excruciating pressure from the sensation. The symptoms are very different from chest tightness caused by anxiety attacks. The physical pain first begins at the heart and quickly spreads to the rest of the body. One may feel lightheaded or even blackout. These symptoms are not felt during a panic attack.

How tightness in the chest happens

Panic attacks in general begin in the central nervous system when a person enters the fight or flight response to threats, whether real or imagined. When the body enters this response phase, the tightness occurs because the mind perceives the threat and exaggerates the level of threat, causing a fight or flight response to even small insignificant stressors. In this case, one should seek help for the panic attacks.

Chest tightness usually does not go away until after the anxiety attack though in some cases it strikes sporadically. The pain that one feels is equivalent to the excruciating pain of being stabbed in the chest. The pain spreads quickly to the oesophagus, and the victim is advised against lying on his back.

A cure for chest tightness

The most effective treatment for chest tightness is exercising relaxation techniques. This includes sitting down and just breathing in through the nostrils and out through the mouth. Sufferers should focus on the act of breathing and try to keep their thoughts from the fear or threat that triggers the anxiety.

Prescription drugs can help fight the symptoms of panic attacks and alleviate the chest pain. Most victims bring along an inhaler that they can use when their chest tightness acts up.

Prevention is always better than cure, so it is imperative that victims living with tightness in the chest caused by anxiety realise that their fears are sometimes imaginary and that they have to control the situation. Through understanding and analysing the different causes of his anxiety he will be able to head down the road of recovery eventually. - 32530

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