Anxiety Symptoms that Cause Excessive Worry

Hi there to everyone, this is my first post on here. I've answered some questions but haven't posted one yet, so this is my first.

For a few months, I have had some serious anxiety tendencies, I'm not sure why exactly but it could be because I'm 20 and getting ready to start on my career fairly soon.

I've had a few panic episodes (the last one was about a month ago) and they really shook me up, I had one and experienced my first palpitation which caused me to halt in my tracks and thought something was seriously wrong (it was that fluttery kind of feeling) with me, but it passed quickly and after a couple minutes I felt fine, but it put me on edge and made me weary of them. Before that, I had experienced high anxiety before, but I never felt my heart palpitate, so I guess it was just a new, harmless but slightly unpleasant learning experience. But what got me uptight about my cardiovascular health (and how anxiety can make some us worry over it) is that I have been fairly sedentary over the past two years because of some "familial problems" and my mother and I have come to live with my grandparents, who live in a community where no one under 55 is allowed to live - so essentially I have to stay hidden from view, LOL. Except for the weekends. But it is tiring, because sitting indoors five days out of seven is kind of hard. Before I came out here, I was very physically active - jogging, swimming, weightlifting four to five days per week and felt none of the "consistent anxiety" that I have recently had. Could this be stemming from me not exercising?

Even though I do know my heart is healthy, my rythym is normal, when I am calm my pulse rate is around 64 BPM and last time I checked my blood pressue it was 115 / 66. When I exercise (I've recently began doing jumping jacks) I feel just fine, I can breathe fine, and afterwards even though I'm a little tired, I feel great. Plus I don't know of any heart disease in the family (and many of them are not the pro-exercise type), my grandparents are 80 and 87 years old, my grandfather still going as strong as ever even though he has mild emphecema from smoking for several years, my mother is nice and healthy even though a tad overweight, other family members are healthy with no issues and my great grandparents lived to be 91 and 94. As for me, I'm about 5'10, weigh 145 pounds and eat healthy, and have never smoked. I just haven't been as active as I should be.

I was weary of exercise (and still am to an extent) because one day, I went for a brisk walk around the park where I live and felt great, so I ramped up to a jog. However, since these stupid anxiety attacks I sometimes am very aware of my heartbeat, so when I began to jog and go up a hill, my heart started beat faster and harder and this feeling of just sensing my own natural heartbeat put me into a panic attack, which just felt horrible, it gave me that sense of terror you get from them. I kept my composure (although challenging) and it stopped after a couple of minutes. I brisk walked back to the house and felt fine the whole way, but shaken up from that episode. For a while I stopped exercising from the fear of having another one. I am now exercising again, and yesterday had a minor anxiety episode following the exercise, but what caused it was an intrusive thought that came to mind. Even if I wanted to, I can't see a doctor because of no insurance.

Anybody know of what I can do to stop worrying over something that is entirely mental in nature? Has anyone had panic attacks while out running and whatdid you do stop them, or get yourself to think differently?

Again my anxiety has certainly tapered off, occasionally I get a moment of feeling quite anxious but that is from me conditioning myself to respond to it. Any replies would be greatly appreciated, thank you for reading my post.

[remar]

Does the new job you're starting come with insurance? It does'nt sound to me like you need meds because you seem to have your anxiety under control for the most part. Some counseling may really help though.I think once you can start getting out of the house more and also exercising you will feel so much better. Try to hang in there, okay. We're here to listen and help anyway we can.

[Gulfstream2]

Well actually, I'll be going into flight training fairly soon, and I know once I do, a lot my anxiety will go away, I think its the "wait" that sometimes gets me worked up possibly.

Thanks for the support though, I appreciate it a lot. I will see if I can get into some sort of counseling.

[HesAPooka]

Keep up the exercise it will help you a lot. I started having anxiety about a year after I stopped exercising, and have had a tough time getting over my anxiety because of being unable to exercise, and I have a couple health conditions that make my anxiety 10 times worse than it should be.

Start of slow with just some walking, keep your heart rate around 120 for a few weeks and then increase to 130, 140 so forth until you get used to the sensation. After a couple years of little to no exercise it's no surprise you're more sensitive to the increase in heart rate.

[Gulfstream2]

Hey, thanks for the comment - I really, really appreciate the feedback.

I've noticed the exercise has a positive effect on me, I have begun to just jog in place (when I can't get out) and I have gotten my heart rate up to about 125 BPM, so I will follow your advice and continue to increase upwards to the proper level.

Thank you very much for answering my question, best regards.