Free-floating anxiety is a general sense of uneasiness that is not tied to any particular object or specific situation. The term is often used to describe feelings of discomfort, nervousness, worry, and anxiety that appear for seemingly no reason.
The American Psychological Association defines free-floating anxiety as “a diffuse, chronic sense of uneasiness and apprehension not directed toward any specific situation or object.” To put it another way, you might simply feel worried, nervous, and fearful for no clear reason.
But what is floating? "Floating builds on acceptance and involves moving through the sensations of anxiety without offering tense resistance, as one would when floating on gently, undulating water." - Claire Weekes, M.D.
Scientists believe that the areas in the brain responsible for dizziness interact with the areas responsible for anxiety, and cause both symptoms. The dizziness that accompanies anxiety is often described as a sense of lightheadedness or wooziness.
People with Generalized Anxiety Disorder may experience feelings of dread, distress, or agitation for no discernible reason. Psychiatrists refer to this unexplained, trigger-less, general feeling of anxiety as "free floating anxiety".
Strategies such as meditation, mindfulness, deep breathing, and visualization may help take your mind off your worries and lower your overall stress levels. Stop smoking and limit caffeine: Caffeine and nicotine can exacerbate feelings of anxiety, so limiting these substances may be helpful.
The floating sensation or feeling unbalanced is often associated with vertigo or an inner ear infection that can cause imbalance. Other causes of a floating feeling include atrial fibrillation or temporomandibular joint dysfunction disorder.
Causes of lightheadedness may be dehydration, medication side effects, sudden blood pressure drops, low blood sugar, and heart disease or stroke. Feeling woozy, lightheaded, or a little faint is a common complaint among older adults.
Inner ear and balance
Dizziness has many possible causes, including inner ear disturbance, motion sickness and medication effects. Sometimes it's caused by an underlying health condition, such as poor circulation, infection or injury. The way dizziness makes you feel and your triggers provide clues for possible causes.
Are you always waiting for disaster to strike or excessively worried about things such as health, money, family, work, or school? If so, you may have a type of anxiety disorder called generalized anxiety disorder (GAD). GAD can make daily life feel like a constant state of worry, fear, and dread.
You can have anxiety symptoms when you don't feel anxious because: You're behaving anxiously and don't realize it. Your body has become hyperstimulated. Your stress is elevated even though the level of stress you are used to “feels” normal.
Anxiety has also been linked to chemical imbalances in the brain and body. Scientists have found connections between anxiety and some strange physical, cognitive, and emotional sensations that seem to mainly affect the head.
Typically, situational anxiety symptoms can present as distinct mind and body responses to the specific, bothersome situation such as the following: Intense nervousness. An overblown sense of embarrassment. Irritability preceding and around the event.
Yes, hallucinations can be caused by anxiety and anxiety disorder. Since anxiety stresses the body, and stress can cause hallucinations, hallucinations are a common anxiety symptom. Many anxious people have hallucinations as part of their symptom mix.
In most cases, dizziness associated with heart problems is accompanied by other symptoms. These may include shortness of breath, swollen extremities, frequent fatigue or chest pain. In the event heart disease is suspected, you will undergo one or more tests to get to the root of your problem.
Causes of pressure include allergies, sinusitis, upper respiratory infections, and headache disorders. More serious causes include ICP, brain aneurysm, and brain injury.
When people feel anxious, they can hyperventilate. This type of breathing changes the balance of gases in the blood and causes the brain to feel weak and faint. Hyperventilation is associated with anxiety disorders and often causes lightheadedness, one of the main categories of dizziness.
Loss of balance or unsteadiness
Losing your balance while walking, or feeling imbalanced, can result from: Vestibular problems. Abnormalities in your inner ear can cause a sensation of a floating or heavy head and unsteadiness in the dark. Nerve damage to your legs (peripheral neuropathy).
If you get dizzy only when you lie down for bed, your peripheral vestibular system is the likely culprit. Benign Paroxysmal Positional Vertigo (BPPV) occurs when the crystals in your inner ear become detached from the otolithic membrane that normally holds them in place.
Panic disorder
Panic attacks are intense, overwhelming and often uncontrollable feelings of anxiety. Physical symptoms can include trouble breathing, chest pain, dizziness and sweating. If someone has repeated panic attacks they may have a panic disorder.
- The average age of onset is 19, with 25% of cases occurring by age 14. One-third of affected adults first experienced symptoms in childhood.
Anxiety becomes more common with older age and is most common among middle-aged adults. This may be due to a number of factors, including changes in the brain and nervous system as we age, and being more likely to experience stressful life events that can trigger anxiety.