Anxiety Symptoms: Dizziness & Lightheadedness (Episode 135)
Disordered: Anxiety Help
Josh Fletcher and Drew Linsalata
4.9 • 665 Ratings
🗓️ 5 December 2025
⏱️ 41 minutes
🧾️ Download transcript
Summary
In this episode of Disordered, the guys delve into the common anxiety symptoms of dizziness and lightheadedness. They share personal experiences, discuss the impact of these symptoms on daily life, and explore coping mechanisms such as interoceptive exposure and mindfulness.
The conversation also highlights community wins, listener questions, and the importance of awareness in managing anxiety. The hosts encourage listeners to challenge their fears and practice being present in their experiences.
Takeaways
- Dizziness and lightheadedness are common anxiety symptoms.
- The threat response often amplifies feelings of dizziness.
- Changing behaviors due to dizziness can reinforce anxiety.
- Mindfulness practices can help in recognizing anxiety triggers.
- Interoceptive exposure can desensitize the fear of dizziness.
- Community support plays a vital role in recovery.
- Challenging the narrative of anxiety is crucial for progress.
- Practicing being dizzy can reduce fear over time.
- Awareness of thoughts and feelings is key to managing anxiety.
- It's important to focus on what matters most in life.
---
Want a way to ask questions about this episode or interact with other Disordered listeners? The Disordered app is nearing release! Visit our home page and get on our mailing list for more information..
---
Struggling with worry and rumination that you feel you can't stop or control? Check out Worry and Rumination Explained, a two hour pre-recorded workshop produced by Josh and Drew. The workshop takes a deep dive into the mechanics of worrying and ruminating, offering some helpful ways to approach the seemingly unsolvable problem of trying to solve seemingly unsolvable problems.
-----
Want to ask us questions, share your wins, or get more information about Josh, Drew, and the Disordered podcast? Send us an email or leave a voicemail on our website.
Transcript
Click on a timestamp to play from that location
| 0:00.0 | I think dizziness, lightheadedness, like, yeah, it's a really common, common, common occurrence. |
| 0:06.1 | We even have common language that we all understand. I heard the news and the room started spinning. |
| 0:10.6 | Like, we all understand that. That's a common experience. What if I fall down? Some of them are more |
| 0:15.6 | catastrophic. Like, what if I collapse? What if I faint? My brain also interpreted it as something wrong with my brain. If I'm feeling a little bit lightheaded or dizzy, that could mean that something really bad is happening to me medically right now. If it's attuned to health, if it's attuned to bodily and somatic sensations, it feels 10 times worse. I possibly couldn't drive and feel dizzy because it's dangerous. There is such thing as like keeping an eye on symptoms, |
| 0:39.5 | and then there's the disordered way of keeping an eye on symptoms, |
| 0:42.5 | which is all the time. |
| 0:44.1 | Legitimately like I was in the Blue Angels. |
| 0:46.7 | Like now I can laugh about it, |
| 0:48.2 | but at the time it felt like a really good idea to do that. |
| 0:53.0 | Welcome to Disordered. This is episode 135 of the podcast. Today we are talking about |
| 0:57.5 | anxiety symptoms in the form of dizziness and lightheadedness, which are two of the big five, I think. |
| 1:04.4 | I am Drew Linzalata, one half of disordered. I am a therapist that specializes in the treatment |
| 1:09.3 | of anxiety and anxiety disorders, |
| 1:16.2 | located in the state of New York, on Long Island, to be specific, former sufferer of the very problems we talk about here on disorder, but much better now for many years, a three-time author on the |
| 1:20.7 | topic, psychoeducator, advocate, social media dude. And as always, I am joined from across the pond |
| 1:26.5 | by... |
| 1:27.7 | I'm Joshua Fletcher, also known as Anxiety Josh. |
| 1:30.9 | I'm a psychotherapist based in the UK who specializes in anxiety and anxiety disorders. |
| 1:37.1 | I'm a previous sufferer of many anxiety disorders. |
| 1:41.5 | Can you hear that ambulance in the background or police or something like that. It's the mean streets of Manchester. Yeah, yeah, I think they're coming after us because we're, because of our bold music choices. I think you might be. And yeah, dizziness is one of, uh, something that I used to struggle with. So, yeah, welcome back and thanks for tuning in again. Yeah, I think dizziness, lightheadedness, like we can lump it all into one thing. |
| 2:17.5 | It was a big symptom for me. I know it was for you. I still can feel it. There are certain things that I know are stress responses for me. That's one of them. So, you know, yeah, it's a really common, common, common occurrence. Whether you're an anxious person in the form of a disordered, anxiety disorder or chronic forms of anxiety, but anybody that gets some big news or is |
| 2:24.9 | angry or gets really upset or whatever might experience that. We even have common language that we |
... |
Please login to see the full transcript.
Disclaimer: The podcast and artwork embedded on this page are from Josh Fletcher and Drew Linsalata, and are the property of its owner and not affiliated with or endorsed by Tapesearch.
Generated transcripts are the property of Josh Fletcher and Drew Linsalata and are distributed freely under the Fair Use doctrine. Transcripts generated by Tapesearch are not guaranteed to be accurate.
Copyright © Tapesearch 2026.