Latest / Internal Insights / The Hidden Alarm Inside You That Keeps You Awake at 2 a.m.
Transcript
- Ted Thao: Welcome to Internal Insights, a quick, honest conversation about mental health in about five minutes or less. I'm your host Ted Tao, a licensed professional counselor, and the owner of Internal Insights Therapy in San Antonio, Texas. Every episode, we take one idea from therapy, trauma, anxiety, relationships, identity, and talk about it plainly. No jargon, no fluff, just something real. Let's get into it. Have you ever laid in bed at 2 a.m.? Heart racing? Mind replaying a conversation from three years ago and thought, why is this happening? Nothing's even wrong right now. Yeah, let's talk about that. Anxiety is one of those words we throw around so often that it almost stops meaning anything. Someone says, I'm so anxious about this meeting. The same way they'd say, I'm so hungry. But anxiety as a real experience happens in your body and your mind. It's actually pretty specific. At its core, anxiety is your body's alarm system going off. It's built to protect you. Thousands of years ago, that alarm system kept your ancestors alive when there was an actual threat nearby. Something with teeth. Your heart would race, your muscle would tense, your mind would sharpen. Also you could run, fight, freeze, or appease until the danger has passed. The problem is that same alarm system doesn't know the difference between a tiger and an email from your boss that says can we talk? It reacts the same way though, bracing heart, tight chest, a mind that won't slow down, except there is no tiger to run from. So all that energy just sits there, looping with nowhere to go. That looping is a big part of what makes anxiety feel so exhausting. It's not just the worry itself, it's the worry about the worry. You start noticing your heart racing and think, why can't I relax? Which makes your heart race even more. It becomes a bit of a snowball. And here's the thing. People don't always realize. Anxiety isn't just a mental experience. It also shows up in our shoulders, in our stomach, in our jaws. Some people feel it as dread. Some feel people feel it as irrit irritable. Some feel it as this restless energy where sitting still feels impossible. There's no one right way to feel anxious. And The funny thing is someone recently asked me, how do I know if this is anxiety I'm feeling or is or am I just stressed? And that's a fair question. Because I feel most of the time they feel identical in the moment. Here's how you should think about the difference though. Stress tends to have a clear source and a clear endpoint. You're stressed about a presentation, and once it's over, your body settles back down. Anxiety is stickier. It often lingers even after a stressful thing has passed. Or it shows up when nothing is actively wrong. It's less I'm worried about this specific thing. And it's more like the alarm system got stuck on the on position. Another way to tell how much it's running a show, stress usually stay in its lane. You feel it about the thing, and then you move on with your day. Anxiety tends to spread. It starts to affect your sleep, your appetite, your ability to focus on the things, even though you don't have anything to worry about. Honestly though, the exact labels don't really matter that much. What matters more is that whether your feeling is starting to get in the way of your life, your relationship, your rest. If it is. That's worth paying attention to, regardless what you call it. If there's one thing I want you to take from this, it's that anxiety isn't a personal failing or a sign that something is wrong with you. It's your body trying to protect you. Just using an alarm system that's a little out of date for modern life. Noticing this pattern is often the first real step towards feeling steadier. That's it for this episode of Internal Insights. If this gave you something to sit with, or just made you feel a little less alone, that's the whole point. This isn't a replacement for therapy, but if you're looking for support, you can find me at Internal Insights Therapy in San Antonio, Texas. Thank you for spending five minutes or less with me. I'll see you next time.