The Coach SpaceHyper-arousal is a condition that affects many people. For those who live in crowded areas, this condition can cause significant daily struggles. Many people are not aware that they are experiencing hyper-arousal and are confused by their own lack of interest in leaving the house, their irritability, and their feelings of anxiety and stress each day.
What is Hyper-Arousal?
First of all, let’s define what hyper-arousal is. This is a state of being that happens when your body’s stress response has become over-stimulated. This is also a common feature of PTSD disorder and the two can be closely linked for many patients.
Hyper-arousal is much more common in populous areas where noise, activity, and daily interactions are the norm. Combine these demands with small and cramped living spaces, the high cost of living, and the struggle of daily commuting and you have a recipe for extreme stress.
These are the common symptoms of hyper-arousal:
- Feeling “on edge”
- Experiencing angry outbursts
- Feeling under threat at all times
- Being irritable and grumpy
- Trouble sleeping
- Having panic attacks
- Having an excessive startle reflex
- Being easily scared or startled
This is effectively your fight, flight or freeze response operating overtime. No matter what triggers this reaction, it can be almost impossible to control these symptoms solely by “trying to calm down”. That is why many people need to seek the support of a skilled therapist to help them tackle these problems.
You do not need to be experiencing all of these symptoms to be struggling with hyper-arousal. In fact, you might experience a single one of the items on the list but still be struggling with the condition. This is something that a skilled therapist can assess to help you create a care plan that will allow you to break the cycle of hyper-arousal stress.
How Can Living in a Crowded Area or a Big City Cause Hyper-Arousal?
All of the items that trigger hyper-arousal are present in populous areas. It is common to deal with loud noises, large crowds, busy transit and commute experiences, and constant contact with other people. For those who are triggered by these kinds of environments, even stepping out onto the street can lead to PTSD and hyper-arousal symptoms. Even if you love living in a place like NYC, you probably don’t love feeling scared to leave your home.
For some patients, hyper-arousal leads to generalized grouchiness or over-reactive behavior which can be tough on relationships with family, friends, and coworkers. This is one of the lesser-recognized symptoms of this condition. You do not have to have full-fledged panic attacks due to hyper-arousal. You might just feel tired, worried, and grumpy every day.
While hyper-arousal can be more strongly triggered by specific sensory experiences, crowded and busy city living can lead to a baseline of daily stress that makes hyper-arousal far more likely to be expressed. It can be almost impossible to avoid the kinds of stimuli that lead to hyper-arousal when you live in a place like NYC. That is why you need to understand the right ways to diffuse and reframe your innate reactions so that you don’t have to feel stressed, anxious, or scared on a daily basis.
Can Hyper-Arousal Symptoms and Stressors be Treated with Therapy?
Thankfully there are services available like somatic therapy in NYC that can help you with your hyper-arousal and make it easier for you to navigate life in a populous area. There is no reason to suffer in silence with hyper-arousal when there are so many options out there to help you to deal with this condition and minimize its impact on your daily life.
Somatic therapy provides coping mechanisms that can break the cycle of stress responses, allowing those who suffer from hyper-arousal and PTSD to be able to enjoy their daily experiences without stress, fear, or anxiety.
The therapy can take many forms, from meditative practices to movement therapy to talk therapy. Its flexibility is part of what makes it so effective compared to other treatment modalities. Somatic therapy is also very approachable for those who are experiencing trauma and stress, which can help break the cycle of stress responses even early in the therapy process.
Grounding, mindfulness, and efforts to control and shape your environment to eliminate stressors can also help quite a bit when it comes to PTSD and hyper-arousal. Seeking peace and helping to prevent unnecessary chaos in your daily life can allow you to better cope with the stressors that you cannot avoid.
Often, simply identifying that stimuli are causing you stress is essential to the process of coping better each day. So many people are not aware that they are stressed by their entire environment, which is why they have been struggling to attend to their concerns and start feeling better on a regular basis.
A skilled somatic therapist can help you to tackle the issues related to your hyper-arousal so that you can get to feeling happy and confident every day.
Living in the city comes with a variety of stresses, but you don’t have to be miserable each time you leave your home. Getting support for your hyper-arousal can be simple once you start working with a skilled somatic therapist.
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