Hello there! Been suffering from some bad anxiety for the past 2-3 days, normal heart racing and difficulty eating (due to a strong gag reflex that comes on during my “attack” days). I’m a female, 19 years old, and in otherwise healthy condition.
I’ve always had anxiety but it seems to have truly taken on physical manifestations since October of 2016. Stomach issues (digestion problems mostly, nothing serious), body aches. But the one that sticks out to me the most and has my anxiety going haywire is my one warm and red ear. It is not painful, it is not swelling, and does not turn crazy colors like purple or even reddish purple; it’s just a regular bright pinkish red. It’s my left ear and encases nearly the whole thing, and some lobe included, save it for a small portion of where the lobe connects to the side of the head. It’ll feel hot around the area too, and my neck included. I also feel my pulse very strongly in my ear.
It started about February or March of 2017, and when I first googled it I was so scared because Relapsing Polychondritis kept popping up! I have not had any symptoms pertaining to that disease (it’s only been one ear, not bilateral, and no swelling or pain so I don’t believe I have the specific ear symptom) but my mind keeps going , “what if”. I have asked my mom who said she has also had red ear in the past and it was random, sometimes brought on by anxiety (which would make sense as the new job I started in January right before the attacks stressed me out as I had an abusive manager, now no longer a problem as she is gone), but sometimes it would randomly appear. I have noticed mine appears nearly always with anxiety attacks (big or small), and when I fret about it (constantly touching it, thinking and worrying hard about it, etc), but once or twice it has been random. Again, no pain whatsoever when it becomes warm and red (no “burning” sensation, either). I have had an uncomfortable minor ache in my inner ear where the wax is, but I have always had that ache from my allergies ever since I was a kid, so it is not something I connect to this. The red ear will last for no more than 2 hours at a time (usually it will be about an hour), and has never happened more than once a day, and never more than twice a month (if it happens more than once a month, it happens the next day). It always, without fail, happens either on my way home from work or when I get home from work in the afternoon (after 6pm). Has anybody had this one specific symptom? Is it commonly connected to anxiety or is it just a circulation issue? I feel as though I merely need reassurance that I will be okay, as all the research I’ve done points to me being okay (as well as my fathers opinion who said without doubt I did not have it when I consulted him over the phone after about three attacks, which I value medically because he has been a general physician doctor for almost 30+ years). Sometimes I feel the anxiety before the attack, always during, and nearly always after. Sorry for the long post, anxiety has been high.