Joint Pain, Stiffness, Tenderness anxiety symptoms
Joint pain, stiffness, and tenderness, which can affect one or many joints, is a common anxiety disorder symptom, including anxiety and panic attack symptoms.
Joint pain, stiffness, and tenderness can affect any age group and often is more severe as the degree of hyperstimulation increases.
This article explains the relationship between anxiety and joint symptoms, such as pain, stiffness, and tenderness.
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Joint Pain, Stiffness Common Anxiety Symptom Descriptions
- One or many of your body’s joints are sore and stiff.
- There could be swelling in the sore and stiff joint, or no swelling and the joint looks normal.
- One or many joints feel unusually painful, stiff, and difficult to move.
- One or many joints are swollen, painful, and stiff.
Joint pain and stiffness can affect one joint only, shift and affect another joint or joints, or affect many joints.
Joint pain and stiffness can:
- Occur occasionally, frequently, or persistently.
- Precede, accompany, or follow an escalation of other anxiety symptoms or occur by itself.
- Precede, accompany, or follow a period of nervousness, anxiety, fear, and stress, or occur "out of the blue" for no reason.
- Range in intensity from mild, to moderate, to severe.
- Come in waves where it’s strong one moment and eases off the next.
- Occur for a while, subside, and then return for no reason.
- Change from day to day, moment to moment, or remain as a constant background during your struggle with anxiety disorder.
This symptom can seem more noticeable when undistracted, resting, trying to sleep, or waking up.
All the above combinations and variations are common.
To see if anxiety might be playing a role in your symptoms, rate your level of anxiety using our free one-minute instant results Anxiety Test, Anxiety Disorder Test, or Hyperstimulation Test.
The higher the rating, the more likely anxiety could be contributing to or causing your anxiety symptoms, including feeling like impending doom symptoms.
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Causes
Medical Advisory
Talk to your doctor about all new, changing, persistent, and returning symptoms as some medical conditions and medications can cause anxiety-like symptoms.
Click the link for Additional Medical Advisory Information.
Anxiety can cause joint pain, stiffness, and tenderness in many ways. For example:
1. Anxiety-Activated Stress Response
Anxious behavior, such as worry, activates the stress response, which secretes stress hormones into the bloodstream, where they travel to specific locations to immediately prepare the body for emergency action – to fight or flee. This instinctual survival reaction is often referred to as the Fight or Flight Response.[1][2]
Visit the “Stress Response” article for the many ways it can affect the body.
Some of the stress response changes can cause joint pain, stiffness, and tenderness. For example, the stress response:
- Tightens muscles to make the body more resilient to injury. Tight muscles can put pressure on the joints, causing joint pain, stiffness, and tenderness.
- Heightens most of the body’s senses to be more aware of danger. Heightened senses can increase awareness of joint pain, stiffness, and tenderness due to increased joint pressure from increased muscle tension.
Acute joint pain, stiffness, and tenderness are common symptoms of an active stress response.
2. Stress-Response Hyperstimulation
When stress responses occur infrequently, the body recovers relatively quickly from its changes. However, frequently activated stress responses, such as from overly anxious behavior, can prevent the body from completely recovering. Incomplete recovery can leave the body in a state of semi-stress-response-readiness, which we call “stress-response hyperstimulation” since stress hormones are powerful stimulants.
Hyperstimulation is also often referred to as “hyperarousal,” “HPA axis dysfunction,” or “nervous system dysregulation” [3][4][5].
Visit our “Hyperstimulation” article for more information about the many ways hyperstimulation can affect the body and how we feel.
Hyperstimulation can cause the changes of an active stress response even though a stress response hasn’t been activated.
Just as an active stress response can cause acute joint pain, stiffness, and tenderness symptoms, hyperstimulation can cause chronic joint pain, stiffness, and tenderness symptoms.
Hyperstimulation can cause this symptom in other ways, too. For instance, hyperstimulation can cause:
- Nervous System Excitation and Dysregulation: A chronically stimulated nervous system can act erratically and cause all kinds of nervous, muscular, skeletal, and sensory system symptoms, including joint pain, stiffness, and tenderness.
- Homeostatic Dysregulation: Homeostasis is the body’s ability to automatically maintain a stable internal environment despite changes in the external environment. Hyperstimulation can cause homeostatic dysregulation, leading to internal regulation problems, which can affect the nervous, sensory, muscular, and skeletal systems, causing joint pain, stiffness, and tenderness symptoms
- Hormone changes: Hormones play a crucial role in homeostasis and many bodily functions, which can affect the nervous, sensory, and vestibular systems. Since stress hormones affect other hormones, hyperstimulation can cause nervous, sensory, muscular, and skeletal problems, such as joint pain, stiffness, and tenderness symptoms.
- Chronic inflammation: Hyperstimulation can chronically suppress the immune system and cause inflammation problems [6], which can affect the joints, causing joint pain, stiffness, and tenderness symptoms.
As long as the body is hyperstimulated, it can exhibit chronic joint pain, stiffness, and tenderness symptoms.
Hyperstimulation is a common cause of chronic joint pain, stiffness, and tenderness.
3. Other Factors
Other factors can stress the body, causing and contributing to this symptom, such as:
Medication
Prescription and over-the-counter (OTC) medications can mimic, cause, and aggravate anxiety symptoms.
Talk with your doctor and pharmacist about your medication if you aren't sure if its playing a role in your symptoms, including joint pain, stiffness, and tenderness.
Visit our Medication article for more information.
Recreational Drugs
Many recreational drugs can cause and aggravate anxiety symptoms. Especially those that affect the nervous system.
Visit our Recreational Drugs article for more information.
Stimulants
Stimulants bring about their stimulating effect by causing the secretion of stress hormones.
Increasing the body’s stimulation can cause and aggravate existing anxiety symptoms.
Visit our Stimulants article for more information.
Sleep Deprivation
Going without adequate sleep can affect the body in many ways, such as:
- Prevents the body from sufficiently refreshing itself
- Stresses the nervous system
- Impairs brain function
- Increases blood pressure
- Increases blood sugar
- Increases moodiness
- Increases cortisol to compensate for feeling tired (cortisol is a powerful stress hormone)
These effects can cause and aggravate anxiety symptoms.
Visit our Sleep Deprivation article for more information.
Fatigue
Fatigue can cause and aggravate many anxiety-like symptoms, such as:
- Difficulty thinking
- Foggy head
- Lightheadedness
- Dizziness
- Unsteadiness
- Pain
- Heart palpitations
- Trembling
- Memory loss
- Muscle weakness
- Shortness of breath
To name a few.
Visit our Fatigue article for more information.
Hyper and Hypoventilation
Over and under breathing can also cause anxiety-like symptoms and aggravate existing symptoms.
Visit our Hyper And Hypoventilation article for more information.
Low Blood Sugar
Low blood sugar, even within the normal range, can cause anxiety-like symptoms. Low blood sugar can also aggravate existing anxiety symptoms.
Visit our Low Blood Sugar article for more information.
Nutritional Deficiency
Nutritional deficiencies, such as low vitamin B and D, can cause anxiety-like symptoms. Nutritional deficiencies can also aggravate existing anxiety symptoms.
Visit our Nutritional Deficiency article for more information.
Dehydration
Dehydration can also cause anxiety-like symptoms and aggravate existing anxiety symptoms, such as:
- Concentration problems
- Lightheadedness
- Dizziness
- Fatigue
- Headaches
- Involuntary panic attacks
- Muscle twitching
- Heart palpitations
To name a few.
Visit our Dehydration article for more information.
Hormone Changes
Hormones affect the body in many ways and can affect each other. Hormone changes can cause anxiety-like symptoms and aggravate existing anxiety symptoms.
Visit our Hormone Changes article for more information.
Pain
Pain stresses the body, especially chronic pain. If the pain is in the high degree range, it can cause and aggravate hyperstimulation.
If you are anxious, hyperstimulated, and symptomatic, pain can aggravate them all.
Visit our Pain article for more information.
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Treatment
When other factors cause or aggravate this anxiety symptom, addressing the specific factor(s) can reduce and cause this anxiety symptom to subside.
When an active stress response causes this symptom, ending the active stress response will end this symptom.
Keep in mind that it can take up to 20 minutes or more for the body to recover from a major stress response. But this is normal and needn’t be a cause for concern.
When hyperstimulation (chronic stress) causes joint pain, stiffness, and tenderness, eliminating hyperstimulation will end this symptom.
You can eliminate hyperstimulation by:
- Reducing stress.
- Containing anxious behavior (since anxiety creates stress).
- Regular deep relaxation.
- Avoiding stimulants.
- Regular light to moderate exercise.
- Eating a healthy diet of whole and natural foods.
- Passively accepting your symptoms until they subside.
- Being patient as your body recovers.
Visit our “60 Natural Ways To Reduce Stress” article for more ways to reduce stress.
Recovery Support members can view chapters 5, 6, 7, 14 and more for more detailed information about recovering from hyperstimulation and anxiety disorder.
As the body recovers from hyperstimulation, it stops sending symptoms, including this one.
Symptoms of chronic stress subside as the body regains its normal, non-hyperstimulated health.
But eliminating hyperstimulation can take much longer than most people think, causing symptoms to linger as long as the body is even slightly hyperstimulated.
Even so, since this is a symptom of chronic stress (hyperstimulation), it's harmless and needn't cause concern.
Short-term strategies
Even though eliminating stress and chronic stress (hyperstimulation) will eliminate this symptom, some people have found the following strategies helpful.
However, keep in mind that each person can have a unique symptom experience since each person is somewhat physically, chemically, psychologically, and emotionally unique. What might work for one person might not for another.
- Reduce stress – Since all anxiety symptoms are stress-related, reducing stress can alleviate this symptom. There are many ways to reduce stress. You can read about many natural stress reduction strategies in Chapter 14 in the Recovery Support area.
- Regular good sleep – Getting good sleep each night (6.5 to 8 hours per night) can significantly reduce stress, which can improve all anxiety symptoms, including this one.
- Regular deep relaxation – Regular deep relaxation is a great way to reduce stress and overall stimulation. As stress and stimulation diminish, so will anxiety symptoms, including this one.
- Regular light to moderate exercise – Regular exercise reduces stress and improves stress symptoms. However, we don’t recommend strenuous exercise since it stresses the body. Moreover, regular exercise can maintain healthy muscle tone, important for healthy joints.
- Massage – Massage can help the body and nervous system relax, which can help muscles release and relax, as well as help the nervous system become less reactive.
- Keep well hydrated – Dehydration is a common cause of stress-like symptoms. Keeping your body well hydrated can prevent and reduce anxiety-like and anxiety symptoms. Some doctors recommend drinking 2 liters of water per day.
- Muscle relaxants – Can help release and relax tense muscles.
- Pain management – If pain has become great, which can further stress the body and aggravate pain, over-the-counter pain medication can be helpful.
- Prescribed pain medication – If anxiety-caused pain becomes too much for over-the-counter pain medication to alleviate, talk with your doctor about something stronger. Then follow the directions or talk with a pharmacist to avoid addiction problems.
- Tens machine – If you have a specific muscle or muscle group causing persistent pain or pressure, using a Tens machine can help reduce muscle-related pain and pressure. It can also help diffuse the pain and pressure, so the nervous system stops engaging them. A Tens machine can also disrupt pain neural pathways, preventing them from resonating.
- Stretching – Gentle stretching is a good way to release tight muscles. As muscle tension is relieved, there is less tension on the joints.
- Eat a healthy diet – An unhealthy diet of high sugar, high fat, and fast foods can fuel anxiety and hyperstimulation symptoms. Eating a healthy diet of whole and natural foods can help the body recover. Moreover, eating an anti-inflammatory diet can relieve inflammation, causing a reduction in pain and stiffness.
- Ice – Some people found that icing sore and stiff joints can help reduce inflammation-caused pain and stiffness. Talk with a physiotherapist for more information about ways to reduce sore and stiff joints.
The above short-term strategies are just a few of the many ways we can reduce stress, causing a reduction in anxiety and hyperstimulation symptoms.
Recovery Support
The Recovery Support area of our website contains thousands of pages of important self-help information to help individuals overcome anxiety disorder, hyperstimulation, and symptoms.
Due to the vast amount of information, including a private Discussion Forum, many of our Recovery Support members consider it their online recovery support group.
Therapy
Unidentified and unaddressed underlying factors cause issues with anxiety. As such, they are the primary reason why anxiety symptoms persist.
Addressing your underlying factors (Level Two recovery) is most important if you want lasting success.
Addressing Level Two recovery can help you:
- Contain anxious behavior.
- Become unafraid of anxiety symptoms and the strong feelings of anxiety.
- End anxiety symptoms.
- Successfully address the underlying factors that so often cause issues with anxiety.
- End what can feel like out-of-control worry.
All our recommended anxiety therapists have had anxiety disorder and overcame it. Their personal experience with anxiety disorder and their Master's Degree and above professional training give them insight other therapists don't have.
If you want to achieve lasting success over anxiety disorder, any one of our recommended therapists would be a good choice.
Working with an experienced anxiety disorder therapist is the most effective way to treat anxiety disorder, especially if you have persistent symptoms and difficulty containing anxious behavior, such as worry.[7][8][9]
In many cases, working with an experienced therapist is the only way to overcome stubborn anxiety.
Research has shown that therapy is the most effective treatment for anxiety disorder, and distance therapy (via phone or the Internet) is equally, if not more effective, than face-to-face in-person therapy.[10][11][12]
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Common Anxiety Symptoms
Additional Resources
- For a comprehensive list of Anxiety Disorders Symptoms Signs, Types, Causes, Diagnosis, and Treatment.
- Anxiety and panic attacks symptoms can be powerful experiences. Find out what they are and how to stop them.
- How to stop an anxiety attack and panic.
- Free online anxiety tests to screen for anxiety. Two minute tests with instant results. Such as:
- Anxiety 101 is a summarized description of anxiety, anxiety disorder, and how to overcome it.
Return to our anxiety disorders signs and symptoms page.
anxietycentre.com: Information, support, and therapy for anxiety disorder and its symptoms, including joint pain and stiffness anxiety symptoms.
References
1. Chu, Brianna, et al. “Physiology, Stress Reaction.” StatPearls, 7 May 2024.
2. Godoy, Livea, et al. "A Comprehensive Overview on Stress Neurobiology: Basic Concepts and Clinical Implications." Frontiers In Behavioral Neuroscience, 3, July 2018.
3. Teixeira, Renata Roland, et al. “Chronic Stress Induces a Hyporeactivity of the Autonomic Nervous System in Response to Acute Mental Stressor and Impairs Cognitive Performance in Business Executives.” Current Neurology and Neuroscience Reports., U.S. National Library of Medicine, 2015.
4. Yaribeygi, Habib, et al. “The Impact of Stress on Body Function: A Review.” EXCLI Journal, Leibniz Research Centre for Working Environment and Human Factors, 2017.
5. Liu, Un-Z-, et al. "Inflammation: The Common Pathway of Stress-Related Diseases." Frontiers In Human Neuroscience, 20 June 2017.
6. Davis, Mary, et al. "Chronic Stress and Regulation of Cellular Markers of Inflammation in Rheumatoid Arthritis: Implications for Fatigue." Brain Behavior and Immunity, 15, Aug. 2007.
7. Hofmann, Stefan G., et al. “The Efficacy of Cognitive Behavioral Therapy: A Review of Meta-Analyses.” Cognitive Therapy and Research, U.S. National Library of Medicine, 1 Oct. 2012.
8. Leichsenring, Falk. “Is Cognitive Behavioral Therapy the Gold Standard for Psychotherapy?” JAMA, American Medical Association, 10 Oct. 2017.
9. DISCLAIMER: Because each body is somewhat chemically unique, and because each person will have a unique mix of symptoms and underlying factors, recovery results may vary. Variances can occur for many reasons, including due to the severity of the condition, the ability of the person to apply the recovery concepts, and the commitment to making behavioral change.
10. Kingston, Dawn.“Advantages of E-Therapy Over Conventional Therapy.” Psychology Today, Sussex Publishers, 11 Dec. 2017.
11. Markowitz, John, et al. “Psychotherapy at a Distance.” Psychiatry Online, March 2021.
12. Thompson, Ryan Baird, "Psychology at a Distance: Examining the Efficacy of Online Therapy" (2016). University Honors Theses. Paper 285.