Doomscroll Remedy

Why am I like this? What happens to our bodies and brains when anxiety takes over

April 06, 2022 The University of Queensland Season 1 Episode 3
Doomscroll Remedy
Why am I like this? What happens to our bodies and brains when anxiety takes over
Show Notes Transcript

What’s been keeping you up at night lately? 

Is it the pandemic? Has work been stressing you out lately? Or the fact your Great Aunt thinks the world is run by lizard people? Oh, or maybe it’s the fact that the ocean’s full of plastic – that seems like something you should probably be worried about, doesn’t it? 

And now you’re probably not feeling great – maybe your chest is a little tighter than before. 

How do you usually get over that feeling? What’s really happening in our body when anxiety takes over? 

Lots of us don’t even need a reason to feel anxious: some of us are just built like that.  

Turns out, humans actually evolved with this anxiety thing to help us survive as a species, and our brains learned some pretty neat ways to use fear in order to keep us alive.  

But what use is it to us now? And how can we manage it, so it still serves a purpose in our modern world? 

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Doomscroll Remedy is a University of Queensland podcast, produced by Deadset Studios. 

Hosted by Stephen Stockwell. Produced by Grace Pashley, Krissy Miltiadou and Rachel Fountain at Deadset Studios, in partnership with consulting producer Zoe McDonald and commissioning editor Greta Usasz at The University of Queensland.

We acknowledge Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander peoples as the First Australians and Traditional Custodians of the land on which this show was made.

Stephen Stockwell:

What we're talking about in this episode contains descriptions of anxiety and panic attacks. So please do what you need to do before listening, you can write the lifeline number down 1311 14 And keep it handy if the episode brings up any issues for you.

Amy Brandon:

The first time I ever experienced it, or was even aware that I had any kind of anxiety was a panic attack. And that was in physics in grade 12. And I think I'd been really behind in school for quite a while. And this just kind of made it like very clear that I was beyond catching up. So I experienced the cramping in my hands, they sort of, you know, my thumbs and my fingers came together. I remember the teacher was asking a question, and she asked me, and I must have had a look on my face that just, you know, told the story because she quickly said, Oh, don't worry, and when someone else inside theater, if you need to go outside, go outside, I went out and, and had the shortness of breath and the really sort of tense muscles and didn't know what was happening. And I walked to the nurse's office. And I think there was just like a random visitor at the school that walked past and saw me and I and she like was like, Oh, just, you know, sit down. And so I sat on the grass and kind of went through it there with just this random person that passed by, which was nice. I didn't really have more panic attacks like that for a while. It was sort of isolated. But yeah, it wasn't until years later that I started having them like every day. Yeah.

Stephen Stockwell:

A quarter of us have experienced an anxiety condition at some point in our lives, according to Beyond Blue. That's one in four of us. Which means if it's not you, it's probably one of your mates, that anxiety could be coming from something stressful that's going on, maybe it will kind of hang around, it doesn't necessarily need to be connected to the reality around us. It might be a base level, but it's that constant scan of what's around you for a threat, or it could escalate into a full blown panic. Or in Amy Brandon's case, it might be both.

Amy Brandon:

I think he's experiencing general anxiety all the time with like little just cherries of panic attack on top.

Stephen Stockwell:

I'm Stephen Stockwell. And this is Doom scroll remedy, where we meet the people living through the existential threats that keep us up at night and the people from the University of Queensland trying to solve them. In this series, we're diving into direct threats to how we live and some things that are a little harder to pin down like anxiety. That feeling you get when you spend too long thinking about bushfires, and how there's just kind of plastic everywhere. It's the thing that quite literally keeps me up at night. Sometimes, I can get caught up in work, trying to solve problems worrying about how things might go. So in this episode, we are magic school, busting it into the brain and back in time to figure out why we like this. But first, I want to chat to Amy a bit more because her situation got much worse before it got better. This is back when she was managing a music venue.

Amy Brandon:

I was working from usually about three or four in the afternoon to set up and then you know the doors would open at eight you get your stuff on you do your writers you have your soundcheck, you do all that so that's all before doors even open and then I would wouldn't leave until after we would close. So sometimes getting home at five or 6am. So it's about 12 hours, the anxiety would build before I had to go so it would be being at home and knowing like you know, you look at the clock and you'd think I've got about an hour and a half till I have to be at work and it would just start to creep then of just the the dread of having to go and then yeah, it would sort of work up and I would always tend to have the panic attack around five o'clock at at the venue. At that point there's still not very many people around so it's all right now I'd go and isolate and kind of a case of it being you know, the thought of something worse than the actuality of it. So the thought of having to go to work the thought of the doors opening the thought of you know, people could odd people could get too drunk people could get in a fight. Oh, like all of that was worse beforehand. And then as the night rolled out, it would it would be better because it would just pan out how it panned out and you deal with it as it comes. But yeah, it was predicting it ahead of time really made me anxious.

Stephen Stockwell:

I would have real mom question as well like how well were you kind of eating and sleeping?

Amy Brandon:

I was eating Get so well I would eat a family block of chocolate and a bag of jellies every shift I was eating so much sugar to get through it and sleeping, not sleeping great at the time I was in this like very dodgy flat and had no curtains and it was Queenslander with very poor installation. So this is going into December us when it started. So yeah, it was hot. I wasn't sleeping. Yeah, you know, when you put it all down, right? Very obvious.

Stephen Stockwell:

How bad did it get?

Amy Brandon:

It got particularly bad in a week where we had four international acts every night of the week. And I think they're all sold out. So it was knowing that it was going to be really, really long days really high pressure, international tour managers like had to be tight kind of thing. And I think that just was the end of it for me. Like there was too much pressure. I went to my GP. And I think I was kind of looking for when you're a kid and you're just feeling sick, and you go to your parents and they say like, Okay, it's alright, you can stay home and you and you feel like safe and someone's like, Oh, you're sick, I'll take care of you. I think when I went to my GP, I just wanted him to like, look at me and be like, it's okay, you can't do it. We're like, don't worry. And that's what I got. He said, You need to go to the hospital. And I don't want you to drive yourself there. So I'm going to call your parents 27 year old woman at this point, I'm going to call your parents and they can drive you because I don't think you should be driving your car was how you are at the moment I was crying and having a panic attack at the doctor's office during the consultation. So I think I presented a quite a scary picture. I was admitted into the hospital. Yeah, in the psych ward. And they take away your phone. You know, like to have your phone at the cycle. And so I was sort of my boyfriend at the time, told work that I was at the hospital for endometriosis, which I have. And they knew that he was sort of communicating with work. And Sarah, Amy's me sick, she's at the hospital. And it was totally fine. They just covered for me. I wasn't there and it was fine. Must have only been three nights because as soon as I got out of the hospital, and had a nice little rest, I'd talked to psychologists that started, they started me or medication at that point, got out of hospital and I went to work and said I'm back. And they were like, oh, you know, in your home. We thought we thought you were out anyway. So we've got people and I was like, no, no, I'll do it.

Stephen Stockwell:

The next day, Amy, after all of that, you've gone out of hospital, and you went straight back to work. Amy stayed in that job as well, for another nine months, things didn't really get any better either. The short break helped for a little bit. But in the end, she realized that it really was quite bad for her. I imagined this moment as some kind of huge relief, the most satisfying of deep breaths and exhales but it was kind of bittersweet, Amy was really proud of what she'd accomplished her her job. But no one at work, really knew the toll that had taken on it.

Amy Brandon:

We got interviewed for the birthday of the venue and I did the interview after I'd already given notice or anything. And I just you know, or you read the interview and all the questions. I'm just like frothing on how much like I love it, and how good it is. And they say like, oh, what's been the hardest thing? And I think I answered like trying to get the karaoke microphone out of the hands of you know, insert local indie musician, and it's so funny that that was what I said at the time. And then in reality, it's like the hardest bit was probably, you know, the daily panic attacks, and the breakdown in my relationship and the hospitalization but yeah, I'll just make a gag instead.

Stephen Stockwell:

I've known Amy for a while and it's always a bit of a shock to hear when someone you know has been through a rough experience like this. But then you remember just how common this is. Thankfully though, her life has changed a lot since

Amy Brandon:

I get sleep at nighttime. It just has changed completely. I got another job. I don't work nights. I don't have the pressure of the financial success of a venue on my shoulders. I don't have the you know, risk sponsibility for people's health or well being on on my shoulders, yeah, it's having less responsibility, which is really good. I don't get anxious before I have to go

Stephen Stockwell:

to work. Do you still get anxious? Yes.

Amy Brandon:

But generally, if I treat my self right, I generally don't get it. And when I do, I'm much more able to just talk myself down and talk myself through it. And yeah, don't experience panic attacks like that at all.

Stephen Stockwell:

So that's what anxiety and panic attacks are like to live with. Sometimes it can feel like such an overwhelming even alien experience that it's hard to imagine that your own body your own brain even is causing it. But I don't like to think that our brain is deliberately working against us. So to find out what's happening up there, we caught up with Dr. Su Tae Soo is a group leader at the Queensland Brain Institute researching the neurobiology of stress.

Dr. Su Tae Soo:

When we experience anxiety, it's usually a situation that has caused us to feel vulnerable or exposed. And a sense of stress sort of can come over somebody so they feel a sense of fear. So immediately during that response, adrenaline is released from the adrenal glands, cortisol surges, and the brain has very rapidly to trigger all of that the brain has rapidly recognized that there's a potential threat in the in this situation. And that triggers the amygdala to become activated, and that initiates this circuit of physiological changes, and then the whole body responds.

Stephen Stockwell:

Let's think back to Amy, when she's feeling the cramping in her hands,

Amy Brandon:

the thing that I would always notice first was the hand turning into like little crab claws, your fingers would cramp up, and I wouldn't be able to like, open my palm out flat.

Dr. Su Tae Soo:

So that can be because of the overload of adrenaline and cortisol. So the brain and the body is preparing you, as I said, to escape. But if you're standing still, you've got all of this energy available to you. And it's not being utilized. So it's ultimately trying to get, get the body moving and get it out of that threatening situation. So even things like blood glucose will become rapidly elevated under these conditions, that's something that the body does to fuel this escape response. And when that's not being utilized, if somebody is is sort of stuck in that situation can't escape, there's no outlet for that. So it really builds up inside

Amy Brandon:

the chest tightness is a big one,

Dr. Su Tae Soo:

that can often happen because of the rapid effects that are happening on the heart itself. So it's rapidly changing its rate of, you know, how rapidly it speeding, blood flow is changing. And there's a tightening in the chest that comes with changes to how people are breathing and using oxygen. So there's, there's a lot of overlap in the symptoms that somebody has experienced in those two moments. And it's just something that I think people can learn to recognize. And I think because they're in a state of overwhelming fear, it's natural to sort of go to worst case scenario as well. You know, what might be happening here is potentially life threatening, because the body is looking in that moment for something that is life threatening.

Stephen Stockwell:

How does the body start to deal with that? How does it start to clear out the adrenaline the cortisol and get itself back to normal.

Dr. Su Tae Soo:

So the key thing here is for the body to know that it is safe. So that is something that can be very hard to fight mentally. So to think through that situation, it's it's possible, but as I mentioned that, that alarm system is on and it's shouting so much louder than any other sort of higher order thinking that somebody could do to telling themselves and learning that they're in a safe situation can often come over time. But more acutely, actually, physiologically shutting it off, is perhaps the fastest way to shut down that response. And deep breathing is actually the body's way of knowing it's safe. So if you're in a in an actual threatening position, or situation, that, as I said before, that breathing rate becomes very short, shallow and rapid to really try to get as much oxygen into the system. But that low, deep breathing, switches off that stress response, the body knows that it's in a safe situation. And it starts to wind everything else down. And that can feed that in Back to the brain. And the brain can again sort of shut down that alarm signal.

Amy Brandon:

Yeah, you just need to be able to bring your breathing down. And once I'd had seen like psychologists, I had like a little mantra thing, which was the you know, I am safe, I am calm. And that was to try and you know, it gets your brain to realize there was no issues. So like, yeah, that would be something that I used after I was aware of it, and just be like, Yeah, I'm safe. I'm calm. I'm safe. I'm calm.

Dr. Su Tae Soo:

It is Very simple. And it said, I have come to this understanding or it makes so much sense from that evolutionary perspective of what this system is here to do. So it really is here to help you escape from that saber toothed Tiger. And it provides that rapid response to it allow you to either fight it head on or flee from it as fast as you can. And then when you're safe, you can have that deep breathing, you can relax, you can rest, you can recover, and all the other systems can come back online, you've, you've essentially survived that threat. But in our day to day life, we're not faced with these threats. And often they're chronic, or they're repetitive, or there's no way to really know when you're safe, and just switch that off. So we have to then leverage our understanding of the evolutionary basis of this stress system, and essentially sort of attempt to reprogram it ourselves.

Stephen Stockwell:

I've been thinking a lot about that saber toothed Tiger recently, it's actually really helped me put a lot of my problems in perspective. And while this is a brain thing, the root cause of anxiety can be traced back to when that Tiger was an actual problem that we had to worry about.

Bill von Hippel:

Human beings are unique to the best of our knowledge on this planet by virtue of our capacity to live in the future. Now, this capacity is super important. And I could give you examples about how our chimp cousins are hamstrung by their inability to live in the future. So there's enormous gains that come about by living in the future, the primary one being that we can simulate what might happen and then plan for it. And in fact, try to adjust it try to change the future to make it more suitable for us. But there's a cost to living in the future. And that's envisioning all the things that can go wrong. So my dogs live in the present. And they're not the slightest bit worried about tomorrow, because they're not capable of conceiving it. We live in the future. And so we're very capable of conceiving the myriad of things that could go wrong. And of course, the most important one, which we know is going to go wrong, and someday we won't be here anymore. And so human beings are subject to knowledge that no other animal to the best of our knowledge has. And that knowledge is really scary stuff. And that's where anxiety comes from.

Stephen Stockwell:

Bill von Hippel is a professor of psychology at the University of Queensland, and you know, he's good, because he's written a whole book on this exact topic, our ability to imagine the future is outrageously useful, it unlocks so much potential for humans, but like all superpowers, it carries a curse.

Bill von Hippel:

By to hamstring your ability to live in the future, you'd be devastated. You couldn't even get by, especially in the complex human world that we live in now. But you pay an emotional cost. And remember, evolution is isn't focused on how you feel it's focused on getting used to surviving and reproducing all other animals they live in today. And then when they find a mate, they're great. And, and so but they don't think they're they don't sit there going on What if I never find a mate, because they're not capable of thinking that thought, right. And so we have sources of anxiety that they can't even imagine those sources of anxiety, play an important role. You know, we tend to think about emotions, the good ones are good, and the bad ones are bad. But evolution gave us these bad emotions, these unpleasant emotions for a reason, they motivate you away from doing the wrong thing. And so when you go to a party, and you make a complete fool of yourself, and then you go home, you go, Oh, my God, I can't believe I said that, or did that. And then the next part is coming up where you've learned your lesson, you won't do it again, the cost might be anxious feelings, Oh, I gotta get back together those people and they remember what a schmuck I was or what I did when I was drunk, or whatever the case might be. So evolution is pushing you in these ways. We feel guilt, we feel shame, we feel embarrassment. Those are super important emotions. Humans who can't experience those are called psychopaths. So they really matter. This is super important. But of course, they're not pleasant for the person feeling it. And that's where we get caught up as we want to minimize those things. But of course, we need those things, we need to leverage them to make ourselves better humans. But part of the problem here is this mismatch between the world we live in now and the world that we evolved in.

Stephen Stockwell:

So anxiety is against all odds, actually quite useful. But as I sit on the top floor of this flash building in a studio with microphones and gadgets all around me, it is quite obvious that a fair bit has changed since our primary concern was running away from that saber tooth tiger. Basically, these problems got smaller, or actually not smaller, they just sort of changed shape. But even then, that doesn't make me feel any better. Because now I'm just anxious about what I'm going to be worrying about next decade. And then the decade after that,

Bill von Hippel:

it's human nature that everything is relative. And so as the really really big problems go away by which I mean something wants to kill me, then I don't ever think cheese something wants to kill me, but I'm bothered that something wants to hurt me. And then when nothing wants to hurt me, but it wants to hurt my feelings. I'm bothered by that. Right. So it and it looms just as large like I probably just as bothered by the kid in my fourth grade class who wants to hurt my feelings as my Australopithecines ancestor was by the Sabretooth who wants to eat him right. So that that relativity is part of human nature. You know, we always experience things not as they are at an absolute level, but how they change from the environment. That was the moment before we've evolved to do that for very good reason. But does that mean we'll never be happy? No, most humans are happy most of the time. Now we all have this base rate happiness. And unfortunately, it's its genes play a big role in that. So about half the story of how happy you are is, is your genetic endowment. The other half the story is environment that you could fortunate to live in a good one or unfortunate to live in a bad one. The key issue there is that we also evolved and this is what throws people for a loop, they, most people are happy most of the time, but most people still want to be happier.

Stephen Stockwell:

I mean, I'm happy now. I think I mean, what is happening? No way, the mind, not the time. Let's think about this evolutionary stuff. Instead, we now know where this comes from the body and the brain adapting together to survive a threat. So we just need to figure out how we stayed in mental shape to run from that tiger. For some people, a mental fitness routine might involve psychologists, medication or other strategies to manage anxiety. But if we talk super basic, the starting point could actually be keeping your body clock or circadian rhythm in check.

Dr. Su Tae Soo:

Some of our research really focuses on just how changing the way that the stress hormones are released over the course of the 24 hour circadian cycle can have a simple effect on how the body is primed to respond to stress and how it utilizes energy during stress, and how it then in turn copes under those circumstances. And so even things like getting a really good night's sleep is really important for allowing that physiology to know that it's safe. So doing everything you can to switch off anything that's disruptive. So whether it's worrying thoughts, whether it's looking at a iPad, or a screen that's releasing blue light, that's also triggering that HPA access to be online is also really important. Making sure that you're not having coffee at the end of the day, because that's stimulating cortisol and adrenaline to be released as well, there's a lot of little things we can do to even just the normalization of that circadian rhythm to really help manage that or build resilience to that anxiety, things like some people will feel a lot of anxiety if they drink a couple to have coffee in the morning, because that's stimulating that adrenaline extremely stimulating that cortisol, and that may prime them to be on alert. And so maybe less of a trigger is needed to activate that system under those conditions. And so it is very individual. And there are a lot of little things that can be done over the course of a day to to enhance your physiological resilience to stress.

Stephen Stockwell:

As Sue was telling me this, I really started to think about my life and reflected on a number of things that I do, which are probably pretty unhealthy. And when you think about Amy, who was working through the night and stressing when she should have been sleeping, you start to see some of those contributing factors. When I spoke to Amy about this, it wasn't the first time she thought about a lot of she spent time with psychologists trying to understand what was causing her anxiety and found the explanations actually pretty satisfying.

Amy Brandon:

It's it's actually really fun to become more aware of what feels good to think what feels bad, think what ideas you hold that you're not that cognizant of like, it's, it's actually really fun when you start breaking it down, because you obviously learn about yourself, but then you realize that you can add or change, change it as well. Like, I've found so much satisfaction in being able to work out what makes me feel bad, I find it really interesting.

Stephen Stockwell:

I really hope that this has been as helpful for you as I found it. Maybe not. I mean, understanding why you're feeling bad isn't exactly a cure, but maybe it's got you thinking in a different way. Finally, though, I am so glad that Amy is in a good place now. And if this is something that you're working through or living with, there are plenty of people around to chat to about it. Remember, one in four of us are going to deal with this at some point. There's also lifeline on 1311 14 Who can help us well. Make sure you follow dream score remedy in your favorite podcast app. So you can join me on the Magic School Bus to solve our biggest problems like bushfires and climate change and why people get caught up in conspiracy theories.

Molly:

I think he's looking for a reality that makes sense to him. Maybe I think he's looking for something that he can understand. Like I think that he's maybe looking for something that makes him feel like he has a place has like people around him who have the same beliefs as him. I think he's just looking for connection. Like I don't think that he's looking to start a fight with me and I think don't think he was Looking for people to call them crazy? Certainly not, you know,

Stephen Stockwell:

Doom scroll remedy is a podcast from the University of Queensland. It's produced by deadset studios. It's hosted by me. Steven Stockwell, produced by Grace bashley executive producer is Rachel fountain. The sound design is by Chrissy Milty Otto the consulting producer is Zoe MacDonald and the commissioning editor is ready assess