Odd Emotions, Feelings, Thoughts and Anxiety
Odd emotions, feelings, and thoughts, such as those that seem unusual, uncharacteristic, and not something you’d normally have, are common anxiety symptoms, including anxiety attack and panic attack symptoms.
Not surprisingly, many anxious and hyperstimulated people experience odd emotions, feelings, and thoughts.
This article explains the relationship between anxiety and having odd emotions, feelings, and thoughts.
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Odd Emotions, Feelings, and Thoughts Common Anxiety Symptom Descriptions
- You have emotions, feelings, or thoughts that seem odd and out of character.
- Your emotions, feelings, or thoughts seem highly unusual and not something you’d normally have.
- You have fleeting emotions, feelings, or thoughts that are unsettling, unusual, and disturbing.
- These emotions, feelings, and thoughts can be about any subject, topic, person, situation, circumstance, or event.
- These emotions, feelings, or thoughts can seem so out of character that they bother and might even frighten you, thinking that you might be on the verge of a complete mental and emotional breakdown.
- These emotions, feelings, and thoughts can resemble sudden flashbacks of moments you’ve had or parts of dreams you think you’ve had.
- These odd emotions, feelings, and thoughts can be mentally and emotionally disturbing because of their unusual nature.
Odd emotions, feelings, and thoughts 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 they are strong one moment and ease off the next.
- Occur for a while, subside, and then return for no reason.
- Change from day to day and moment to moment. They can also persistently linger in the background for extended periods.
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.
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 to learn how it can affect the body.
Some of the stress response changes include:
- Quickly converts the body’s energy reserves into “fuel” (blood sugar) to instantly boost energy.
- Increases heart rate, respiration, and metabolism due to the boost in energy, increasing blood pressure.
- Stimulates the sympathetic nervous system, increasing nervous system activity to be more sensitive and reactive to danger.
- Heightens most of the body’s senses to be more aware of danger.
- Increases activity in the amygdala (the brain’s fear center) and decreases activity in the prefrontal cortex (the rationalization area of the brain) so that our attention is focused on the threat and away from thoughts that could be distracting.
- Shunts blood to parts of the body vital to survival, such as the brain, arms, legs, muscles, and vital organs, and away from parts less essential for survival, such as the stomach, digestive system, and skin. It accomplishes this by constricting blood vessels in certain parts of the body and dilating them in others.
- Tightens muscles to make the body more resilient to injury.
- Suppresses the immune system so that most of the body’s resources are used for emergency action.
- Creates a sense of urgency to take action to fight with or flee from the perceived threat.
- Taxes the body’s energy and nutritional resources harder and faster than usual.
Many stress response changes affect how the brain perceives and processes information, causing unusual emotions, feelings, and thoughts.
An active stress response is a common cause of acute odd emotions, feelings, and thoughts.
2. 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][6].
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 odd emotions, feelings, and thoughts, hyperstimulation can cause chronic odd emotions, feelings, and thoughts.
As long as the body is hyperstimulated, even slightly, it can cause symptoms of any type, number, severity, frequency, duration, and at any time, including this common anxiety symptom.
But that’s not all. Hyperstimulation can cause this symptom in other ways. For instance, hyperstimulation can cause:
- Nervous System Excitation and Dysregulation: A chronically stimulated nervous system can act erratically and cause all kinds of nervous system, sensory system, and cognitive and emotional processing symptoms, including odd emotions, feelings, and thoughts. Even mild degree hyperstimulation can cause this symptom.
- 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 system, sensory system, and cognitive and emotional processing. Odd emotions, feelings, and thoughts are commonly caused by hyperstimulation-caused homeostatic dysregulation.
- Hormone changes: Hormones play a crucial role in homeostasis and many bodily functions, which can affect the nervous system, sensory system, and brain function. Since stress hormones affect other hormones, hyperstimulation can cause nervous system, sensory system, and cognitive and emotional processing problems, resulting in a variety of odd emotions, feelings, and thoughts.
- Sleep disruption and fatigue: Hyperstimulation can interfere with sleep and tax the body’s energy resources harder and faster than normal. Sleep disruption and fatigue can affect the nervous system, sensory system, and brain function, causing a host of odd emotions, feelings, and thoughts.
As long as the body is hyperstimulated, it can exhibit chronic odd emotions, feelings and thoughts.
Hyperstimulation is a common cause of odd emotions, feelings, and thoughts.
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Other Factors
Other factors can create stress and cause anxiety-like symptoms, as well as aggravate existing anxiety symptoms, including:
- Medication
- Recreational drugs
- Stimulants
- Sleep deprivation
- Fatigue
- Hyper and hypoventilation
- Low blood sugar
- Nutritional deficiencies
- Dehydration
- Hormone changes
- Pain
Select the relevant link for more information.
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Treatment
When other factors cause or aggravate odd emotions, feelings, and thoughts, addressing the specific cause can reduce and eliminate this common anxiety symptom.
When an active stress response causes odd emotions, feelings, and thoughts, ending the active stress response will cause this acute anxiety symptom to subside.
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 odd emotions, feelings, and thoughts, eliminating hyperstimulation will end this anxiety 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.
However, eliminating hyperstimulation can take much longer than most people think, causing symptoms to linger longer than expected.
As long as the body is even slightly hyperstimulated, it can present symptoms of any type, number, intensity, duration, frequency, and at any time, including this one.
Even so, since odd emotions, feelings, and thoughts are common symptoms of stress, including anxiety-caused stress, they are harmless and needn't be a cause for concern. They will subside when unhealthy stress has been eliminated and the body has had sufficient time to recover. Therefore, there is no reason to worry about this common anxiety symptom.
Since worrying and becoming upset about anxiety symptoms stress the body, these behaviors can interfere with recovery.
Passively accepting your symptoms – allowing them to persist without reacting to, resisting, worrying about, or fighting them – while doing your recovery work will cause their cessation in time.
Acceptance, practice, and patience are key to recovery.
Keep in mind that it can take a long time for the body to recover from hyperstimulation. It's best to faithfully work at your recovery despite the lack of apparent progress.
However, if you persevere with your recovery work, you will succeed.
You also have to do your recovery work FIRST before your body can recover. The cumulative effects of your recovery work will produce results down the road. And the body's stimulation has to diminish before symptoms can subside.
- Reducing stress.
- Increasing rest.
- Faithfully practicing your recovery strategies.
- Passively accepting your symptoms.
- Containing anxious behavior.
- Being patient.
These will bring results in time.
When you do the right work, the body has to recover!
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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 odd emotions, feelings, and thoughts 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. Elbers, Jorina, et al. "Wired for Threat: Clinical Features of Nervous System Dysregulation in 80 Children." Pediatric Neurology, Dec 2018.
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. Kinlein, Scott A., et al. “Dysregulated Hypothalamic–Pituitary–Adrenal Axis Function Contributes to Altered Endocrine and Neurobehavioral Responses to Acute Stress.” Frontiers In Psychiatry, 13 Mar. 2015.
6. Marks, David. "Dyshomeostasis, obesity, addiction and chronic stress." Health Psychology Open, Jan 2016.
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.