Is It Ambition or Anxiety? 30 Signs You Might Have High-Functioning Anxiety

If you look calm and capable on the outside but constantly feel like a wreck inside, you’re not alone. This episode dives into the hidden world of high-functioning anxiety—the stress that hides beneath productivity, perfectionism, and people-pleasing.

I review 30 signs you might have high-functioning anxiety. You’ll learn how this type of anxiety can disguise itself as motivation and achievement, where it comes from, how it differs from classical anxiety, why it’s so hard for high-achieving moms to rest, and everyday warning signals that your nervous system is in unhealthy overdrive.

BY THE TIME YOU FINISH LISTENING, YOU'LL DISCOVER:

• Why I was furious when I first learned high-functioning anxiety was a thing
• The emotional, physical, and signs of high-functioning anxiety so you can recognize it for yourself
• The difference between drive and dysregulation, and where the need to perform actually comes from
• Why rest feels unsafe for ambitious moms
• Why you can’t out-organize or out-achieve your anxiety until you address the real, root cause

FOR MORE:

Download my FREE checklist of “30 Signs You Might Have High-Functioning Anxiety”

HOMEWORK:

Email me or DM me on Instagram @solutionsforsimplicity to let me know which, if any, of these signs surprised you and what you felt in your body hearing all these “symptoms” for perhaps the first time. Your homework for today is to gently reflect on whether any of this hit home for you and, if so, which parts and why.

COMING UP NEXT:

Join me back next episode to delve into the vicious ways high-functioning anxiety gets worse with motherhood and the many tell-tale ways it shows up in mom life.

Did you know your nervous system secretly shapes your thoughts, emotions, choices, relationships, and life? My 1-hour masterclass, "Finally Understanding Yourself, The Missing Manual for Your Brain and Body," gives you foundational wisdom and practical tools to feel calmer, more connected, and more in control no matter how chaotic things are around you: https://solutionsforsimplicity.thrivecart.com/ns101/

CONNECT WITH AMBER: Website | Instagram | YouTube | LinkedIn 

Ready to finally get to the root of your problems and change your life FOR GOOD? Book your free 60-minute consult to learn more about working 1:1 with Dr. Amber.

Transcript

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If you're the strong, productive, organized person that everyone else is always asking how you do it, this episode is for you. We are diving even deeper into what high-functioning anxiety is and some classic signs that you might have it. Welcome to More Time for Mom. where overwhelmed moms get science-backed strategies to overcome the hidden sources of stress stealing your time and joy. I'm your host, Dr. Amber Curtis. Ready to make more time for you? Let's dive in. ever wondered why you can't seem to relax, maybe you are productive, organized, and everyone is always saying they don't know how you do it all, but you constantly feel on edge, exhausted, or one unexpected change away from falling completely apart. That's the tricky thing about high-functioning anxiety. It hides behind achievement, control, and competence, especially in motherhood. It is often the very people who seem to have it all together that I find, in my own experience and in several years of working one-on-one with clients, are the people who are wrestling with this the most. If you haven't yet caught the previous episode where I interviewed Dr. Hayden Finch on high-functioning anxiety, definitely listen to that one. You can either pause this and go listen to it first or listen to it after this episode. They are quite interchangeable. But I really, really wanted to dive deeper into what high-functioning anxiety is and how you might know if you have it. I vividly remember the moment years ago where I was looking for something online and had a little media ad pop up in the sidebar with the headline, Signs You Have High-Functioning Anxiety. I remember just rolling my eyes in that moment, thinking, oh, they have come up with a diagnosis for everything. Good grief. What in the world is this? And then curiosity, of course, got the best of me. I clicked on it. And I was just astounded. I couldn't believe how every single thing that was on that list described me to a T. And it was describing the things that I had always prided myself on, the things that I would have touted as my biggest strengths, the things that I've been praised for and that I would credit for getting me all of the life and career and even home success that I have. So it really threw me for a major identity crisis. And still, it was easy to push aside and just scoff at it back then, but it has kept showing up for me personally year after year. I've been on this personal growth journey, as you know if you've listened to prior episodes. I just keep exploring more and more about myself and what makes me the way I am, why I have some of the tendencies and wounds that I do. and how to get to the root of those so that I can heal and overcome my trauma. It's all helped so much, but it really does still come down to what I now know is high-functioning anxiety. Now, I of course need to underscore that nothing in this podcast should substitute for professional medical or psychological advice In fact, it's important to know that high-functioning anxiety is not a formal diagnosis. You won't find it in the DSM-5, which stands for the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders, 5th edition, that all of the counseling and therapy psychologists use to determine what you have or how to know what you have. However, high-functioning anxiety describes people who appear outwardly successful, organized, high-achieving, yet internally struggle with persistent anxiety, worry, restlessness, and overall just feeling like it's never enough. Can you relate? Someone with High Functioning Anxiety appears super productive and is often praised by and admired by so many other people for their ambition and their achievements, how they keep everything together. But inside, they feel anxious and the classic thing is worrying that it's never enough. Here's the kicker, right? Because High Functioning Anxiety looks like functional behavior, achievement, It so often goes unrecognized. I know I never would have known unless I had randomly found this article and then sought out more information about it. The key difference between high-functioning anxiety and classical anxiety, which is an official medical and psychological diagnosis, is that with classic anxiety disorders, you might see paralysis or avoidance and someone literally can't function in their daily life. They can't get things done. They can't move forward, make a decision. They are so gripped by fear and worry. But with high-functioning anxiety, you see the opposite. You push through, even when you are flooded internally with those high stress hormones of adrenaline and cortisol that make you feel so frenetic and supercharged. I don't even know how to describe this feeling in my body, but it is just more and more apparent to me that it's not normal. It's incredibly common, especially among the classic type A perfectionist, people-pleasing, eldest daughters like me. But there are no hard and fast rules, we don't want to stereotype people, and I'm not trying to get you necessarily worried about something that you don't have. I just want to offer this list of potential symptoms and reflect on my own experience on this journey, recognizing that I really, really think this explains so much of my life. The great thing about having words to put to these symptoms is that it really does open up that healing opportunity and give you more of a path forward where you can catch yourself in the moment displaying these behaviors and over-functioning and leading yourself down the same old path where you know you're just going to end up distraught and pulled in a million different directions and ultimately burning out. I want to help you avoid that. I am now going to run through an extensive list of different kinds of signs you might have High Functioning Anxiety. So just listen along, see which ones resonate with you. I invite you to really get in tune with your physical body and notice what sensations and vibrations come up for you when you hear each statement. Notice if you have a positive or a negative reaction to that thing. Then, to hopefully be even more helpful, I have also compiled a shortened checklist of many of these symptoms so that you can go through and see for yourself how many boxes you tick to help you determine whether you are someone who wrestles with high-functioning anxiety like me. If you do find that you relate and you think you might have high-functioning anxiety, then continue to follow along on this podcast. We will keep unpacking this I will keep researching and offering helpful solutions and bring on expert guests that can really help us make our lives better so that you're not so controlled by these default tendencies. But I also want to offer that there isn't an instant fix right? There's no switch you can flip to just stop having your brain fire off the way that it has for so so long. These patterns are very often wired into your brain from a young age and then it requires some really deep intentional neurosomatic coaching work To break these tendencies, you can also, of course, also work with a therapist or another medical professional. There are so many benefits to both therapy and coaching. I would say that if you think you just, quote unquote, just, wrestle with high-functioning anxiety, getting a coach could really, really help. If you think that your high-functioning anxiety also goes along with or manifests in other types of psychological or mental disorders, then that's where therapy could be very, very beneficial. Maybe even medication is in that toolkit. We don't ever want to close ourselves off to a solution that could help. I also need to underscore that this is not an exhaustive list. I have compiled it from all kinds of medical studies and very professional psychological help websites. But again, like I just want to run through these things to plant the seed that maybe, maybe, not saying for sure, but just maybe, some of your struggles are due to this tendency to be a high-functioning anxious person. Again, I never, never would have labeled myself as such until I've just seen how this plays out in my own life over and over again. So treading very gently then, let's start with internal, emotional, and cognitive signs you might have high-functioning anxiety. Constant worry, or what-if thinking, where you are ruminating over decisions, conversations, future possibilities. Basically that classic overthinker, where you are constantly going back over conversations, worrying about what you said, or suddenly thinking of things you could have said or done better. Feeling like you always need more information in order to make a decision. PERFECTIONISM, setting extremely high standards and criticizing yourself when those standards aren't met, feeling like you should have done more. IMPOSTER SYNDROME, which is where even though you have evidence of success or you have plenty of credentials and experience to back up why you are a good person to speak on your subject matter, you feel like you're not good enough or that you'll be quote-unquote found out. People-pleasing, difficulty saying no, fear of disappointing others or of being judged, need for control or rigid routines, thinking that if I don't manage X, Y, or Z, things are going to go wrong. It's on the one hand a beautiful desire to have everything predictable and orderly, but on the downside, it really is this compulsion to control and a subconscious feeling that you are unsafe if you are not in control. If that one resonates with you, don't miss one of the upcoming podcast episodes where I am bringing Dr. Finch back to talk explicitly on this element of control. Difficulty relaxing. Even in downtime, your mind is on, right? You feel like you can't ever turn your brain off. You might feel restless and unable to just sit and be in the present moment. You're scanning your environment, seeing things that are out of place, remembering things that need to get done, and feeling antsy, like maybe there's something you forgot. underlying fear of failure, where you are so afraid of things going wrong that you procrastinate or have trouble getting started, especially on big things that feel so important and vulnerable. Inner tension. Even though you're going through the motions, you're functioning, you're doing all of the things you need to be responsible for, you might feel like you're always on edge or living in hypervigilance and then making your worth or your value tied to your productivity, thinking that when I've done enough or when I'm productive, then I'm worthy, as if your productivity is a prerequisite for earning love and belonging. If you've listened to this podcast before, you know the outgoing message is this refrain that nothing you do changes how wonderful and worthy you are. And in case it's not obvious, the reason I have to repeat that message over and over and over to myself is because of how much I wrestle with this. And now I know it is just one of many signs of my high-functioning anxiety. Let's move on to physical or physiological signs you have high functioning anxiety because it's not just a mental thing. That chronic internal stress really takes a physical toll and shows up in your body too. But what I have seen over and over again, not just in myself but in my clients, is that we have trained our brains to ignore these physical symptoms and to keep pushing through until it's too late and we burn out, we've so ignored these signs that we really end up in a very bad place. The first one is a racing or elevated heart rate even in normal situations. Muscle tension, maybe in your neck, your shoulders, your jaw. Every time I go to the chiropractor, she's always telling me, like, you carry so much stress in your neck and shoulders. And I'm like, yeah, doesn't everybody? Or is it just because I sit at a computer so much of the day? And she's like, no, no, it's not. Getting lots of headaches or migraines or other stress-related pain, digestive issues like nausea, irritable bowel symptoms, stomach aches. Sleep disturbances, like trouble falling asleep or staying asleep, waking up a lot at night, or feeling unrested no matter how much sleep you get. Let me insert a quick side note here that if you, like me, are in the glorious throes of perimenopause, it's really hard to know whether some of these symptoms are because of perimenopause or because of your high-functioning anxiety. And I want to encourage you to reflect back and think about when you first recall experiencing any of these signs or symptoms, are they things that you have almost always experienced? Or do they feel like they are relatively new or sudden-onset kinds of things? If they are symptoms that you can remember way back when, they are probably due to high-functioning anxiety and then getting exacerbated by perimenopause. But if they do feel new and you haven't experienced them before, then it's probably just, quote-unquote, just perimenopause. But really, like, the larger point here is that if you are someone who has had high-functioning anxiety and maybe never knew it, this is the critical moment where we need to self-diagnose and become aware all the more because we reach this point in midlife where you can't push through the same way. your body and your brain literally can't tolerate as much stress as you used to. And as high functioning anxious people, we are used to a lot of stress, but now it's biting you in the butt. It really, really, really takes a very vicious negative toll. So we have to be all the more mindful and all the more careful that we are managing our stress, eliminating the sources of our stress to the extent that we are able, and giving ourselves that much more grace. This is one of many, many things I love to help my clients with. So remember, you can always reach out through the link in the show notes and book a free 60-minute consultation. I would love to talk more and personalize all of this for you. OK, back to the list. Sweating, trembling, lightheadedness, achy or restless legs, especially when you are trying to relax, And then, of course, fatigue, where you have been doing so much, but your underlying energy is just gone. You feel so depleted and empty, as if you have nothing left to give. Now let's talk about external or behavioral signs of high-functioning anxiety, things that others might be able to see, which can make you all the more self-conscious. The reality is that even though high-functioning anxiety is so carefully masked by those of us who have it, there are often observable behaviors that tend to accompany it, like a high achiever profile. You're very reliable. You always meet deadlines. You're super detail-oriented, organized, proactive. I mean, don't these sound like all the best qualities that an employer wants in their employees? These are the very traits of success. And yet, it's really, really powerful to realize that those traits are perhaps a trauma response. Going back to the way your brain got wired, based on stressful or traumatic situations in your past. But I digress. Constant busyness. A to-do list that never ends. Never feeling like you are off duty, as in there's always something you could or should be doing. Procrastination despite productivity. where even though you're doing a lot and checking off a lot of to-do list items, you're actually delaying the most important tasks, perhaps out of fear of imperfection or inadequacy, or as we've talked about in previous episodes, your brain is just so addicted to the dopamine hit of the feel-good activities that are much more easy and quick to cross off. Difficulty delegating or asking for help. You feel like you are the only one who can do something. You feel like you have to hold the reins in order to keep things safe or right. You look fine on the outside. Your job is going well. Your home appears in order. Your appearance looks fine or even gets complimented. But inside, you feel drained, disconnected, unsure, anxious. And then this one gets me every time because again, it is so opposite of classic anxiety. But high-functioning anxiety really presents as avoidance of classic anxiety behaviors, meaning that when you feel unsettled, you don't freeze or withdraw the way that someone with classical anxiety does. You actually double down and try to do that much more and go that much harder because you are, you know, all you've ever known is doing, doing, doing, and you're afraid of what not doing something will cost you. So never mind the toll on you physically, you're just determined to get it done. Now that you've heard all of these symptoms, I really want to come back and remind you to be so, so gentle with yourself. This may be the first time you are realizing you have High Functioning Anxiety and I can again very vividly remember how it felt in my body when I realized that about myself. I really want to also remind you that High Functioning Anxiety isn't bad. We're not trying to berate you or make you feel inadequate because you have this. If anything, I want to praise you and applaud you all the more because look at what you have done. Look at all of the ways you have pushed through at the expense of your sweet self. And then we just have to keep reminding ourselves. We're learning for the first time. We don't have to do that. Things don't have to be that way anymore. High-functioning anxiety isn't a problem. It's not a failure. It's about recognizing that that unrelieved worry, that deep-down anxiety and perceived worthlessness or fear of failure has just been disguised all along. By doing, doing, doing. By trying to control and achieve worth through productivity. I have also compiled a very long list of how high-functioning anxiety shows up in mom life, but as I am recording this episode, I realize I want to split this into two different podcasts because I don't want you to be any more overwhelmed than you might already feel while this podcast is specifically for moms, I think it's really helpful to just take some time and reflect on these general signs of high-functioning anxiety before we reflect on what it could be doing to you as a mother and how motherhood makes high-functioning anxiety so much worse, right? How it brings all of these underlying tendencies to a head to a critical apex that you probably never, ever experienced before then and wouldn't perhaps have experienced had you not been given the gift of motherhood. So join me back next week for the sequel episode to this one, where we will continue unpacking high-functioning anxiety. For now, I really, really invite you to simply reflect on which of the many signs and symptoms we covered today hit home for you. Remember that this is all about your nervous system, about the way that your brain got wired from a very, very young age to scan your environment, look for threat, and then meet that threat with a stress response. One of the five Fs, which we will cover in detail in future episodes, but they are the fight, flight, freeze, fawn, and fix responses. Every single one of us meets threat in a different way. But when you grew up in an environment that felt unsafe or out of control, and again, we're not even talking big T trauma, we're simply talking about uncertain situations where your nervous system was naturally attuned to those of your caregivers. and then you took on a sense of responsibility or a determination to fix things and make things better and fix yourself so that you could feel safe in that moment, that's what is still, to this day, showing up when you engage in any of the signs and symptoms that we have mentioned here. This is such big, deep work, and it's, again, such beautiful work. I can't even begin to convey how powerful and eye-opening it has been for me. I would never want to have not realized that I have high-functioning anxiety, and I feel so called to build a tribe of other women who can relate to one another and can, you know, be that source of strength and support, because so often, in my personal experience and with the women I work with, When you're struggling, when you're doing all of these things and have the signs we discussed, you feel like you're the only one, right? You feel so alone and you're so afraid to ask for help because you don't want anyone to know you're struggling. But the reality is that you are not alone. There is a significant percentage of women who have high-functioning anxiety, and again, it just compounds in motherhood. So we need to talk about this. I invite you to reach out so that we can talk more. Until then, remember nothing you do changes how wonderful and worthy you are. Have a great day. I know more than anyone how precious your time is, so the fact that you spent it listening to this podcast means the world. Make sure to subscribe, and if you got value out of this show, I would be so honored if you'd leave a review and share this episode with another busy mama who needs to hear it. We've got this.