Frustration, Frustrated, Easily Annoyed – anxiety symptoms
Frustrated easily and feeling annoyed, such as feeling like your patience has run out, disappointed more easily, and like even little things frustrate you more than normal, are common anxiety symptoms, including anxiety and panic attack symptoms.
Most anxious people feel easily frustrated due to their anxiety and hyperstimulation.
This article explains the relationship between anxiety and feeling easily frustrated and annoyed.
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Anxiety Frustration; Frustrated; Easily Annoyed Common Anxiety Symptom Descriptions
- Feel more frustrated and annoyed than normal.
- Your patience runs out more quickly.
- You are disappointed more quickly and more often than usual.
- Even what would normally be considered minor issues now make you highly upset, annoyed, and angry.
- Feels like you are overly quick to react.
- More easily disappointed.
- Your frustration is like a hair-trigger, with any little irritant setting you off.
- People frustrate you much more than usual.
- Things upset you much more than normal.
- Everything is more frustrating than usual.
- You are more likely to react negatively to any trigger than you would normally.
- Feel easily frustrated, annoyed, angered, upset, impatient, and overly quick to react.
Easily frustrated 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.
Feeling easily frustrated is often experienced as an “episode” where you feel fine one moment and easily frustrated the next.
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.
Anxiety and its effects can cause frustration symptoms for many reasons. For example:
1. The 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 affect our thoughts and emotions. For instance, the stress response:
- Stimulates the sympathetic nervous system (SNS), increasing nervous system activity to be more sensitive and reactive to danger. Heightened SNS activity can adversely affect emotional regulation.
- Increases activity in the amygdala (the brain’s fear center) and decreases activity in the pre-frontal cortex (the executive function area of the brain) so that our attention is focused on the threat and away from thoughts that could be distracting. Reduced executive function – higher-level cognitive processes that enable us to control and coordinate our thoughts and actions – can impact cognitive processing, reducing the ability to think clearly and rationally, which can lead to feeling frustrated more easily.
- Increases in amygdala activity also impact emotional regulation since the amygdala is an important part of the limbic system and is responsible for emotional control. Less emotional control can lead to feeling easily frustrated.
- Increases Limbic System activity, which increases a sense of urgency, causing impatience and frustration if things aren’t proceeding as fast as we prefer.
- Shunts blood to the brain to increase emergency awareness and reactivity, which can cause cognitive impairment, adversely affecting emotional regulation.
- Affects other hormones, which can impact cognitive processing and brain function, causing problems with thinking and emotional regulation and increasing the likelihood of feeling more easily frustrated.
The higher the degree of stress response, the more dramatic its changes.
Moderate to high-degree stress responses can make our emotions feel like a “hair trigger” due increased activity in the amygdala.
Furthermore, stress responses push the body beyond its internal balance (equilibrium), stress responses stress the body. As such, anxiety stresses the body.
Many anxious people feel overly reactive, including feeling easily frustrated when stressed, especially those in the moderate and above degree stress ranges.
Acute frustration is a common symptom 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].
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 frustration, hyperstimulation can cause chronic frustration.
Hyperstimulation can cause issues with frustration 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, cognitive impairment, and emotional regulation problems, such as feeling easily frustrated.
- 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, affecting the nervous systems, cognitive processing, and emotional regulation problems, such as feeling easily frustrated.
- Hormone changes: Hormones play a crucial role in homeostasis and many bodily functions, such as mood. Since stress hormones affect other hormones, hyperstimulation can cause cognitive impairment and emotional regulation problems, such as feeling easily frustrated.
- 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, cognitive processing, and emotional regulation [5][6]. In fact, emotional regulation is the first to be impacted when sleep is cut short and feeling tired, which can lead to feeling easily frustrated.
As long as the body is hyperstimulated, it can cause chronic feelings of frustration.
Hyperstimulation is a common cause of emotional regulation symptoms, including feeling easily frustrated.
3. Behavior
Many underlying factors cause issues with anxiety. Impatience, perfectionism, and “just right-thinking” are common behaviors that create issues with anxiety. Overanalytical thinking is another.
Many anxious people approach life overly analytically (how else could they avoid all the potential pitfalls and dangers in life).
Consequently, they typically think through issues and challenges quickly. When stress is normal, anxious people can be patient with others as they analyze at a “less effective pace.”
However, when anxiousness increases circulating stress hormones, a heightened sense of urgency can make anxious people feel more impatient with the “less effective pace” of others.
This heightened sense of impatience can make overly anxious people easily frustrated.
Combining impatience, perfectionism, and “just right-thinking” with elevated or chronic stress can frustrate an anxious person.
Many other unhealthy behaviors, such as Inward-Focused Thinking, can contribute to feeling easily frustrated.
Inward-Focused Thinking about a struggle with anxiety can make external challenges or interactions distracting, unimportant, and even bothersome.
Viewing them this way can make us impatient, irritated, frustrated, and angry when external challenges and interactions interfere with our internal “problem-solving.”
“Unrealistic expectations” is another common behavior that can create issues with anxiety.
Unfortunately, unrealistic expectations can fuel anger, impatience, irritability, and frustration if we don’t think a person, situation, or circumstance lived up to our unrealistic expectations.
As anxiety and stress increase, irritability, impatience, and frustration can also increase.
Feeling easily frustrated is a common symptom experienced by overly anxious people due to the many underlying factors that create issues with impatience and frustration.
4. Pain
Pain stresses the body [7][8]. If you live with chronic pain, the stress coming from that pain can contribute to hyperstimulation, making your emotions even more unstable and reactive.
The higher the degree and more persistent the pain, the higher the degree of hyperstimulation. As the degree of hyperstimulation increases, emotional instability increases, increasing feelings of irritability, impatience, and frustration.
5. Other Factors
Other factors can create stress and cause anxiety-like symptoms, as well as aggravate existing anxiety symptoms, including:
- Medication
- Recreational drugs
- Stimulants
- Hyper and hypoventilation
- Low blood sugar
- Nutritional deficiencies
- Dehydration
- Hormone changes
Select the relevant link for more information.
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Treatment: How to get rid of the anxiety frustration symptom?
When this symptom is caused or aggravated by other factors, addressing those factors can reduce and eliminate feeling easily frustrated and annoyed.
When this symptom is caused by an anxiety-triggered stress response, calming yourself will end the active stress response and its changes. This common anxiety symptom will subside as your body recovers from the active stress response.
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 shouldn’t be a cause for concern.
When this symptom is caused by hyperstimulation, eliminating hyperstimulation will end this anxiety symptom.
You can reduce and eliminate hyperstimulation by:
- Containing anxious behavior.
- Reducing stress.
- Regular deep relaxation.
- Relaxed diaphragmatic breathing.
- Regular light to moderate exercise.
- Getting regular good sleep.
- Eating a healthy diet of whole and natural foods.
- Avoiding stimulants.
- 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 read chapters 5,6, 7, and 14 for more ways to reduce stress.
As the body recovers from hyperstimulation, it stops sending symptoms of hyperstimulation, including feeling easily frustrated and annoyed.
However, eliminating hyperstimulation can take much longer than most people think, causing symptoms to linger longer than expected.
As long as the body is hyperstimulated, even slightly, it can present symptoms of any type, number, intensity, duration, frequency, and at any time, including this one.
Since worrying and becoming upset about anxiety symptoms stress the body, these behaviors can interfere with and stall 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.
When this symptom is caused by behavior, addressing Level Two recovery is the best way to eliminate issues with frustration. Working with an experienced anxiety disorder therapist is the most effective way of addressing Level Two recovery.
Keep in mind that being frustrated stresses the body. Being overly frustrated can interfere with stress reduction, hyperstimulation elimination, and recovery.
Rather than being frustrated and overly reactive, you want to passively-accept this symptom, learn to underreact to the disappointments in life, and do your best to be patient, which can help break the hyperstimulation and overreaction cycle.
For example, if you know your body is hyperstimulated AND that you tend to overreact emotionally when your stimulation is higher than normal, you can reverse the negative cycle by willfully choosing to “underreact” to disappointments rather than overreacting to them.
By choosing to “underreact,” you stop adding fuel to the hyperstimulation fire, which can help reduce it.
Choosing to underreact also helps you learn to contain your disappointments and emotions rather than letting them run rampant.
Containing emotions is also an important strategy for long-term anxiety disorder recovery. We’ll be discussing this in more detail in future segments.
Choosing to “underreact” removes unnecessary stimulation and breaks the negative cycle, which can help the body return to normal health.
That’s why acceptance (accepting that there will be disappointments), patience (remaining patient even though something has disappointed you), and stress reduction are important for recovery.
As stress diminishes, everyday challenges return to normal values instead of amplified values. Consequently, symptoms disappear, and emotional responses return to normal. All of which contribute to recovery.
Short-term strategies:
Even though eliminating stress and chronic stress (hyperstimulation) will eliminate this symptom, some people have found the following strategies help reduce feeling easily frustrated.
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 many natural stress reduction strategies in Chapter 14.
- Regular good sleep – Getting good sleep each night (6.5 to 8 hours per night) can significantly reduce stress, improving all anxiety symptoms, including feeling easily frustrated.
- 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 is proven to reduce stress and improve stress symptoms. However, we don’t recommend strenuous exercise since it stresses the body.
- Catnap – Research has found catnaps can rest the body and nervous system, quickly restore energy, and improve cognitive performance. Catnaps are a quick and easy way to assist with recovery and symptom elimination.
- Go for a leisure walk – Leisure walking is a great way to reduce stress and anxiety symptoms and loosen tight muscles due to hyperstimulation. Even short walks of 10 minutes can help reduce some anxiety symptoms, including this one.
- Warm bath – Warm baths reduce stress and relax the body and nervous system, all helpful in reducing hyperstimulation and its symptoms, including this one.
- Massage – Massage can help the body and nervous system relax, which can help muscles release and relax and help the nervous system become less reactive.
- Listen to soothing music – Soothing music can relax the mind, body, and nervous system, reducing hyperstimulation and its symptoms, including this one.
- Leisure swim – Leisure swimming can help the body, nervous system, and muscles relax. Many people find water therapy helps reduce stress and its symptoms.
- Float on a water device – Lying on an inflatable water raft can be soothing and relaxing, and so can leisurely floating in a boat. Some people find the gentle rocking of the waves enjoyable and relaxing.
- Spend time in nature – Research shows that spending 15 minutes in nature dramatically reduces stress and cortisol. A reduction in stress and cortisol can cause a reduction in symptoms of stress, including feeling easily frustrated.
- Enjoy a hobby – Research has shown that spending time with your hobby also dramatically reduces stress.
- Avoid stimulants – Stimulants stimulate the body by secreting stress hormones. We need to decrease stimulation, not increase it to reduce stress and symptoms.
- Eat a healthy diet – An unhealthy diet of high sugar, high fat, and fast foods can fuel anxiety symptoms and hyperstimulation symptoms. Eating a healthy diet of whole and natural foods can help the body recover.
- Take a break – If you feel easily frustrated in a specific situation, you might want to take a break from it and go for a walk to cool down. Anything you can do to keep your emotions in check will help to prevent unwanted emotional outbursts and the stress they can cause the body and others.
- Give loved ones a “heads up” - Let loved ones know you are dealing with anxiety issues, but you are working on it. Consequently, you might be more reactive than normal. Sometimes, an apology and this understanding alone can help others better understand what you are dealing with, reducing your frustration overall.
There are many other natural and practical ways to reduce stress and anxiety symptoms. Again, Recovery Support members can visit chapters 4 and 14 for more ideas.
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.[9][10][11]
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.[12][13][14]
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Frequently Asked Questions
Can an increase in frustration cause anxiety?
Yes, an increase in frustration can cause anxiety if you believe uncontrollable frustration is dangerous. Increasing anxiety can increase episodes of feeling frustrated since anxiety stresses the body, and stress can increase episodes of frustration.
Is feeling frustrated all the time dangerous?
No, feeling frustrated is an emotion, and emotions come and go. If you are often frustrated despite reducing stress, speaking with an experienced therapist is wise to help you better manage your thoughts and emotions.
If I reduce my stress, will that help me be less frustrated?
It can, since stress, especially chronic stress (hyperstimulation), is a common cause of feeling easily frustrated.
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 Frustration, Frustrated 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. 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.
5. Hirotsu, Camila, et al. "Interactions between sleep, stress, and metabolism: From physiological to pathological conditions." Sleep Science, 28, Sep. 2015.
6. Leproult, R, et al. “Sleep Loss Results in an Elevation of Cortisol Levels the next Evening.” Current Neurology and Neuroscience Reports., U.S. National Library of Medicine, Oct. 1997.
7. Abdallah, Chadi G, and Paul Geha. “Chronic Pain and Chronic Stress: Two Sides of the Same Coin?” Advances in Pediatrics., U.S. National Library of Medicine, Feb. 2017.
8. AHMAD, Asma Hayati, and Rahimah ZAKARIA. “Pain In Times Of Stress.” Advances in Pediatrics., U.S. National Library of Medicine, Dec. 2015.
9. 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.
10. Leichsenring, Falk. “Is Cognitive Behavioral Therapy the Gold Standard for Psychotherapy?” JAMA, American Medical Association, 10 Oct. 2017.
11. 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.
12. Kingston, Dawn.“Advantages of E-Therapy Over Conventional Therapy.” Psychology Today, Sussex Publishers, 11 Dec. 2017.
13. Markowitz, John, et al. “Psychotherapy at a Distance.” Psychiatry Online, March 2021.
14. Thompson, Ryan Baird, "Psychology at a Distance: Examining the Efficacy of Online Therapy" (2016). University Honors Theses. Paper 285.