Can Anxiety and Panic Attacks Come from a Head Injury?
If you have anxiety or experience panic attacks, you probably think it’s all in your mind. If you’re like most people, you likely assume it’s psychological or emotional issues that are causing the problem. In many cases, however, the root cause lies in the biology of your brain. Head trauma—even mild head injuries that don’t make you lose consciousness and aren’t diagnosed as a concussion—are a major factor in the development of psychiatric illnesses, including anxiety disorders and panic disorder.
Head trauma—even mild head injuries that don’t make you lose consciousness and aren’t diagnosed as a concussion—are a major factor in the development of psychiatric illnesses, including anxiety disorders and panic disorder.
Having multiple head injuries puts you at increased risk. Just ask Tyler Fernengel, a professional BMX rider who has had over 20 concussions during his extreme biking career. In one of those accidents, the 25-year-old’s bike broke in half and he did a face plant, damaging his orbital socket and cheekbone. Although the visible harm to his face healed, other internal, psychological issues worsened.
“The main issue is severe anxiety,” Fernengel says to Amen Clinics naturopath Dr. Kabran Chapek in an episode of Scan My Brain. “The absolute worst and hardest thing I had to go through,” the pro BMX rider says, happened when he was mid-conversation with some friends. “Out of nowhere, I couldn’t remember what I was trying to say. I went into a full-body panic.” He says it was like an out-of-body experience, something psychiatrists call depersonalization or dissociation.
Could it be related to all those crashes he experienced? And could your anxiety, panic attacks, and other issues be associated with head injuries from your past? Consider that brain SPECT imaging, which measures blood flow and activity in the brain, shows that 40% of Amen Clinics patients have prior head trauma. Surprisingly, many of them don’t recall getting hurt.
HIDDEN EFFECTS OF HEAD TRAUMA
When Dr. Chapek showed Fernengel his brain SPECT scan, he pointed out the aftereffects of all those head injuries. A healthy brain SPECT scan shows full, even, symmetrical activity. Fernengel’s, on the contrary, revealed numerous areas of low blood flow, a flattened effect on the frontal lobes, and a scalloping or bumpy appearance that’s associated with exposure to toxins. Dr. Chapek called it “one of the worst brains I’ve seen in a 25-year-old.” Your brain doesn’t have to be one of the worst, and you don’t have to have sustained 20-plus concussions to experience brain-related conditions like anxiety, panic disorder, or post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD). A single head injury or a series of sub-concussive repetitive blows to the head from activities like heading a soccer ball can be enough to create changes in the brain that make you more vulnerable to mental health conditions.HEALING THE BRAIN AND OVERCOMING ANXIETY AFTER HEAD TRAUMA
In providing a comprehensive treatment plan for Fernengel, Dr. Chapek explained that “when it comes to the brain, it’s seldom one thing.” There are typically multiple factors involved. It’s common for head trauma to be combined with stressful life events, a chaotic upbringing, unhealthy daily habits, and/or substance use—all of which ramp up the likelihood of problems. Fortunately, decades of neuroscience research show that the brain can change through neuroplasticity. And the Amen Clinics database of over 300,000 brain scans from tens of thousands of patients confirms that even if you’ve been bad to your brain, you can make it better. Here are some tips to help put the brain in a healing environment and calm anxiousness and panic.- Hyperbaric oxygen therapy: HBOT is a non-invasive treatment that involves breathing pure oxygen to speed the healing process and can be beneficial in recovering after a concussion or traumatic brain injury (TBI).
- Avoid toxins: Reduce or eliminate your exposure to toxic mold, alcohol, and drugs to enhance brain health. This includes prescription benzodiazepines, anti-anxiety pills, which SPECT scans show are harmful to the brain.
- Breathe: A randomized controlled trial found that alternating between slow, deep breaths and quick breaths lowered anxiety as well as depressive symptoms in people with depression.
- Meditate or pray: Research from Johns Hopkins shows that daily 30-minute meditation practice may improve symptoms of anxiety, as well as depression. A study in the International Journal of Psychiatry in Medicine indicated a reduction in anxiety following 6 weekly 1-hour prayer sessions. Meditation can also be helpful during a panic attack because it triggers the body’s relaxation response, which counteracts the fight-or-flight mode experienced during panic attacks.
- Supplement your brain: To calm an anxious brain, consider nutritional supplements such as GABA and magnesium. For overall brain health, take omega-3 fatty acids and a full-spectrum multivitamin/mineral.
