Anxiety and accumulated gas: what is the relationship between these types of discomfort?

Can the accumulation of gas in the belly be caused by anxiety? And vice versa?

Anxiety is a very common emotion, associated with all kinds of symptoms such as tremors, irritability, lack of concentration and even hair loss.

However, this psychological problem can sometimes be responsible for something that, at first glance, does not seem to have much to do with it: gas.

Anxiety and gas are relatedWhether in the form of belching, wind, or both. Next we are going to see how it is possible that a problem to psychological level can induce to a stomach problem so curious but annoying as it is the accumulation of gases.

The relationship between anxiety and gas

Excessive anxiety is a very common problem.It can manifest itself in the form of many symptoms and behaviors. Each person can experience it in his or her own way, and there are many who feel this emotional instability in their own flesh, specifically in the stomach area. In fact, it is quite likely that on more than one occasion we have felt the nerves in our stomach, since the digestive and nervous systems are connected.

When we feel nervous, it is normal to feel pain in the stomach, heartburn, nausea, a feeling that our stomach is closed, as well as gas. That's right, there is a relationship between anxiety and gases, as strange as it may seem that a psychological problem has an impact on the amount of wind and belching that we can produce. Being mentally upset affects our stomach, causing physical pain, discomfort and twinges, but also changing digestion and producing gas..

Gas may be the lesser evil of all the symptoms associated with anxiety, but the truth is that it can be very uncomfortable. Not only because the person who suffers from them can suffer a lot if the meteorism (accumulation of gases) is very intense, but also because in many cultures, mostly Western ones, releasing flatulence and belching is not well seen in public. But sometimes they are so many and so intense that there is no time to let them escape in the bathroom...

The enteric nervous system

The fact that we feel anxiety in our stomach has led many researchers to put forward the idea that we have a kind of second brain in our stomach.

Naturally, it is not as complex as the one we have in our skull, but it is true that it has been shown that the digestive tract has many nerves. the digestive system has many nerveswhich constitute the enteric nervous system. This system is a subdivision of the autonomic nervous system, which explains why anxiety affects us so directly in the stomach area.

The enteric nervous system is composed of a network of one hundred million independently acting neurons, capable of sending and receiving impulses and also registering emotions.They are capable of sending and receiving impulses and also of registering emotions. This is why the stomach and the digestive system in general is so sensitive to anxiety, which is the neurobiological explanation behind why we feel a knot in our stomach when we are nervous. It is also what allows us to understand why when we fall in love we feel butterflies in our stomach.

Why does anxiety make us gassy?

When we feel anxiety our stomach can be very sensitive to this emotion. There are some people who experience a complete shutdown, while others have a terrible urge to eat everything in their path. There are also those who notice very intense pains, pins and needles, the urge to vomit and general stomach discomfort. But why does anxiety cause us to feel gassy, and what happens?

Actually it is not only that gas can be produced by anxiety, but also that anxiety itself can be a consequence of gas, since the relationship between anxiety and gas can be very similar.The relationship between anxiety and gas is close and bidirectional. Gases may be due to an overstimulation of the enteric nervous system caused because our nervous system is suffering from anxiety, which alters the intestinal flow and digestion. This results in heartburn, heavier digestion and gas accumulation, producing stomach disturbances such as meteorism.

The fact that we have so much accumulated gas and it bothers us can increase anxiety. Instead of realizing that we have a lot of gas because we are emotionally unstable, the fact that we feel discomfort in our stomach makes us think that we might have some kind of health problem, the fact that we feel discomfort in the stomach makes us believe that we may have some kind of health problem, such as colon Cancer or irritable bowel syndrome.such as colon cancer or irritable bowel syndrome. This causes us fear, uncertainty because we do not know what to do in case we are really sick and insecurity about what might happen.

It can also happen that we feel a very intense pain in our chest.. As the chest is a delicate region, the fact that we feel something there makes us worry about our heart health, thinking that we could be having an attack. However, what usually happens is that we actually have a lot of gas accumulated in the neck of the stomach, so much that our chest hurts. Fortunately, these discomforts will disappear after burping.

In other cases, anxiety produces gas indirectly. It is frequent that, being so nervous, we make bad dietary decisions that alter our stomach health. that alter our stomach health. When we are in full nervousness we do not eat salads, but prefer fast food, sweets and all hyper-palatable food, with a lot of fat and sugars, as well as certain types of legume and cruciferous vegetable derivatives (e.g. hummus). These foods cause a lot of gas.

Excessive gas accumulation may be due to eating too fast, in a very anxious way. By eating fast and gulping we swallow not only the food, but also air. Added to this, as we hardly chew the digestion becomes much heavier, which is not only accompanied by more gas but also heartburn and stomach pain. All the air we have swallowed will have to come out, either the way it went in or the other way.

In addition, anxiety causes us to gas partly because we move around so much, anxiety causes us to be gassy partly because we move around a lot.. It is common for people who are victims of a lot of nervousness not to stop still, so much so that they need to go back and forth to calm down a little or even practice a lot of exercise, which, although healthy, does not stop moving our organs too much. By constantly moving the stomach and the large intestine, the gases resulting from digestion are released more frequently. This is not bad, but it is an aspect to take into account in case you suffer a lot of gases and do not know very well the cause.

How to avoid gases associated with anxiety?

To prevent anxiety from causing gas, it is essential to try to reduce this psychological problem.If you do not have any symptoms, you should consult a mental health professional who will provide you with the necessary guidelines to help you manage your nervousness. However, it is essential to make sure that the gases are not caused by a real medical problem, whether it is meteorism or a serious illness such as cancer or irritable bowel syndrome.

If what is causing the gas has to do with how we eat, we should tell our psychologist, who will evaluate the possibility of an eating behavior problem. Sometimes what we call food anxiety can actually be a problem of food addiction, an excessive consumption of food that even though we know that it is harmful to us we cannot avoid continuing to take it.

Whatever the problem is that causes us anxiety and gas, it is very important to eat calmly, chewing the food well and enjoying and enjoying savoring them. We should try to follow a rich and varied diet, eating five meals a day, without forgetting breakfast and watching which foods may make us more prone to produce gas. Healthy foods such as legumes provoke wind, so their intake should be accompanied with plenty of water and consulting a nutritionist to know how often we recommend taking them according to our case.