Common Anxiety Triggers: Reasons, Effects and Identification

Anxiety is a severe mental health issue that brings problems like worry, fear, and tension. While there is a lack of clarity regarding the causes of anxiety attacks, few triggers are commonly found to be responsible for these among most patients. If you are facing anxiety attacks, it will be beneficial to know about these triggers in advance.

Do you wish to know more about the common anxiety triggers? Then, keep reading this article for a comprehensive guide.

Anxiety is a mental health issue which can also result in panic attacks. This has some physical symptoms, like chest pain, nausea and dizziness. These are mostly unpredictable. However, you can try to identify some common triggers and avoid them. Here are a few common triggers of anxiety:

1. Social Situations

Anxiety disorder in social events and situations is known as social phobia. The reasons behind this attack include a feeling of concern and self-consciousness. Patients are usually scared of being judged by others. They are uncomfortable in a room full of strangers where they need to make small talk.

The main effect is an anxiety attack before or during attending a party or a social event. This will prevent them from attending parties or withdrawing from socialising during these events. Apart from that, such attacks can also cause rapid heartbeat and sweating palms anytime strangers approach such people.

2. Other Health Issues

Complicated diseases like cancer or a chronic illness can also trigger an anxiety attack. Usually, such diseases have long and depressing diagnoses and treatment procedures. Therefore, anytime a former patient comes across such discussions or topics, they are likely to feel anxious, negatively impacting their mental health.

This trigger causes nervous breakdowns, increases heartbeats and causes patients to feel dizzy. In addition, they might be distracted from any other work or conversation when this trigger starts attacking them. As these are connected to personal feelings, the attacks are usually strong and can last longer.

3. Certain Medicines

Few specific prescription and over-the-counter (OTC) medications can also trigger anxiety. The ingredients and components of these drugs might affect your mental health, making you feel uneasy and unwell in certain situations. Such feelings can set off various events, causing intense anxiety attacks.

Common medicines that can be triggered include birth control pills, medicines for weight loss and cough medications. Their regular consumption for a long time might affect your heart rate and nerves. In addition, the series of events will have an impact on your mind and body, causing anxiety symptoms.

4. Caffeine

Most people cannot survive without their morning cup of coffee. However, interestingly, caffeine can be one of the most common anxiety triggers. According to a study from 2022 reveals that when people with panic issues drink multiple cups of coffee, they will experience severe anxiety attacks.

Caffeine is a mood-altering trigger and might be responsible for increasing your heart rate and palpitations if you consume outside of limits. This way, it might be responsible for causing anxiety and nervousness in individuals. Mainly, those who already have properties of anxiety and panic are likely to be at higher risk.

5. Sleep Deprivation

One of the significant symptoms of anxiety is a lack of sleep. At the same time, an unhealthy sleeping pattern can trigger anxiety attacks. For example, you might not get enough sleep if you are worried about a social event the next day or simply out of insomnia. When you do not get sufficient sleep for a long time, feelings of anxiety intensify.

Feeling sleepy and drowsy during the day can increase stress and frustration. You might feel anxious even about completing regular tasks and activities. In addition, you might experience issues of nausea and dizziness, which hampers your work.

6. Stress & Tension

Stress and tension are common things that cause anxiety. Multiple factors can contribute to stress, which one fears will hamper their plans or peaceful survival. It causes them to overthink and thereby generate excessive tension. While stress is an external factor, it might sometimes exacerbate your anxiety.

External sources of stress require you to go over the same things repeatedly, which naturally triggers anxiety. It causes symptoms like an upset stomach, headaches, high blood pressure, chest pain, and others. Even though anxiety is more of an internal condition, external stress triggers it badly.

7. Home Environment

While a home environment might not generate stress or anxiety, a negative environment can trigger people who are already suffering from anxiety issues. For example, it generates from a messy home environment. As people return home at the end of the day, having a messy environment can lead to mental health issues and anxiety.

A cluttered or messy environment at home can trigger issues like insomnia, stress and a reduced ability to focus. In addition, there is always a to-do list to clean the house in their minds, which increases their stress levels. Moreover, the thought of returning to a messy home or a toxic environment can also trigger anxiety.

8. Work Environment

A stressful work environment can also trigger anxiety symptoms. As you have to go to work regularly, an unhealthy and toxic environment will cause fear in your mind. For instance, if the co-workers are not supportive or the management is being a bully, your anxiety issues will increase at the workplace.

Such anxiety will affect your ability to concentrate on work. It will encourage you to lose your job or take frequent leaves to avoid the workplace environment. Moreover, it will curb your ability to talk to your co-workers or even try to come up with a solution to the anxiety symptoms.

9. Skipping Meals

Individuals who fail to maintain a healthy routine of meals might unknowingly trigger their anxiety issues. A lack of energy might cause you to feel anxious and stressed out and have the urge to stay withdrawn from most activities. Food can affect your mood, and skipping it can hamper your mental and physical health.

Balanced meals are essential to maintain energy and essential nutrients. However, skipping meals causes a drop in blood sugar levels, leading to a rumbling stomach and jittery hands. In addition, it clearly reflects in the anxiety levels as individuals start feeling its symptoms.

10. Financial Trouble

Having debts and financial crises can often trigger mental health issues like anxiety. This is mainly because this trouble keeps on emphasising in your head, and physical evidence starts piling up. Also, with new bills and EMI alerts, your mind starts building fear and paranoia of the negative things that might happen when you fail to make payments.

The effects are the basic symptoms of anxiety, like headaches, chest pain, nausea, rapid heart rate, etc. Moreover, the anxiety attacks intensify every time a lender enquires, causing the individuals to experience fear while dealing with them.

11. Major Life Transitions

According to a study conducted in 2020, significant changes and transitions in an individual's life can trigger anxiety symptoms. Respondents stated that moving from hometown and marriage are two important transitions that caused stress. The reason for anxiety comes from the fear of moving out of their comfort zones to bring about significant changes.

The effects depend on the kind of transition. For instance, people often get cold feet before marriage, a sign of fear and anxiety. Moreover, it can cause them to freeze and create and check off actions. These things make them feel like they are in control of the situation.

12. Negative Thinking

Having negative thoughts and feelings can also trigger anxiety attacks and symptoms. These come from multiple incidents and feelings of depression. For example, when you are sad or disappointed for a long time, you tend to think and talk about things that upset your mental condition, triggering anxiety attacks.

Negative thinking contributes to low self-esteem, as individuals start believing in negative and false facts about themselves and their future. Moreover, it causes social anxiety, depression, and stress. Therefore, taking help from a therapist will be mandatory to recover from such problems.

13. Conflicts and Fights

Fights, arguments and conflicts with others often trigger anxiety attacks. This is mostly seen among patients who already suffer from anxiety issues. Constant arguments and differences of opinion can deeply pressure an individual's mental health. There can also be a fear of conflict, resulting in anxiety when individuals are around people who fought with them earlier.

The effects are increased heart rate, sweating, nausea, and blood pressure. In addition, conflicts are likely to cause increased nervousness, which results in jittery hands. Therefore, avoiding extreme levels of conflict or seeking professional help is essential.

14. Personal Triggers

Finally, there can also be some personal triggers causing anxiety. These are related to past incidents or experiences, which depend on an individual level. They can be a smell, song, place, or individual. Identifying these triggers can be difficult without a professional's assistance.

People who have post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD) are more likely to be affected by these personal triggers. These can cause severe anxiety or panic attacks with a mental breakdown. In addition, people can faint or feel extreme chest pain and other problems when they encounter these triggers.

It might be challenging to identify the triggers, as multiple common situations cause anxiety. However, the following tips might help you in this regard.

• Maintain a Journal: The best way to cope with your triggers is by keeping a journal and writing down all about your experiences of anxiety. Writing down your previous triggers and anxiety attack incidents will help you identify the common triggers and thereby avoid them.
• Identify Stressors: Life stressors vary on an individual level. These commonly include employment issues, relationship problems, death of family members, pregnancy, etc. Sometimes, these stressors can lead to anxiety attacks. Therefore, try to identify the things that cause you maximum stress.
• Analyse the Past: Past incidents usually have an essential part to play in anxiety and mental health issues. Reflecting on your past experiences can help here. Once you identify specific incidents that contribute to your anxiety issues, you can avoid getting into such situations in future.
• Consult a Therapist: A healthcare professional will always be the best person to identify your anxiety triggers and help you cope with the same. They mostly use talk therapy, where they help you reflect on your past and thereby identify the common triggers causing these issues.
• Watch Your Diet: As discussed earlier, caffeine can be a significant trigger for anxiety. Similarly, alcohol and sugary food can affect your heart health, resulting in anxiety. Watch your body's response to these foods and drinks. Avoid them if they show triggers of anxiety.

If you observe anxiety symptoms, you must visit a mental health expert for a complete check-up and examination. They normally use a psychological evaluation to identify anxiety. Here, they use talk therapy to discuss your thoughts, feelings and behaviour regarding certain incidents. Sometimes, they use the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders (DSM-5) criteria to identify anxiety symptoms.

Here are a few tips to help you cope with your anxiety triggers and keep them under control.

• Practise physical exercises and daily activities to bring down stress, which controls the anxiety triggers.
• Consider relaxation techniques like yoga, meditation, deep breathing and music therapies to deal with anxiety issues.
• Put a limit on your caffeine and alcohol intake to avoid any pressure on heart health or blood pressure.
• Maintain a healthy sleep routine and try to get adequate sleep at night.
• Schedule a short worry time in a day, and avoid thinking negatively for the rest of the day.

Therefore, as you can see, the common anxiety triggers can result in anxiety and panic attacks, which take a toll on your mental and physical health. It is, therefore, essential to identify these triggers in advance to avoid their severe impact. Then, you can follow the tips mentioned here to cope with these triggers.