Can anxiety cause indigestion or heartburn?

A burning chest, a sour taste, a full, uncomfortable stomach. Indigestion and heartburn are common, and if you live with anxiety, you may notice they get worse when you’re stressed. You may also have wondered whether that tight feeling in your chest is heartburn, anxiety, or something more serious.

Call 911 straight away if you have chest pain that feels crushing or squeezing, or spreads to your arm, neck, jaw or back, or chest discomfort with breathlessness, sweating or feeling sick. A heart attack can feel like indigestion. It’s always better to check.

How anxiety causes indigestion

The NHS lists stress and anxiety among the common triggers of indigestion, alongside things like coffee, alcohol, and fatty or spicy food. Anxiety can:

• make your gut more sensitive, so normal digestion feels uncomfortable
• change how quickly your stomach empties
• lead to habits that bring on heartburn: eating quickly, skipping meals then eating a lot, more coffee, more alcohol, smoking or eating late at night
• make you swallow more air, which can cause burping and bloating

Indigestion and heartburn symptoms

According to the NHS, indigestion can cause:

• heartburn: a burning feeling in your chest, often after eating
• feeling full or bloated
• feeling sick
• burping or passing wind
• bringing up food or bitter-tasting fluid

Why heartburn can feel like anxiety

Heartburn and anxiety share a lot of symptoms: chest tightness or burning, a lump in your throat, a fast heartbeat and feeling uneasy. That overlap can create a loop. Heartburn causes a strange chest feeling, you worry it’s your heart, anxiety rises, and anxiety then makes the heartburn and chest tightness worse.

Knowing your own pattern helps. Heartburn is often linked to meals, lying down or bending over, and eased by antacids. Anxiety often comes with worry, a racing heart and other body symptoms, and eases with slow breathing. But if you’re ever unsure about chest pain, get it checked.

What helps

The NHS suggests:

• cutting down on tea, coffee, cola and alcohol
• not eating for 3 to 4 hours before bed
• avoiding rich, spicy or fatty foods if they set you off
• raising your head and shoulders in bed
• stopping smoking
• asking a pharmacist about remedies like antacids

Calming anxiety helps too:

• Eat slowly, sitting down, and stay upright for a while afterwards.
• Breathe slowly when anxiety rises, with a longer out-breath.
• Notice the loop. When a chest feeling sparks worry, remind yourself of your pattern, and give it time to settle.

How Breatheasy can help

Breatheasy can help you calm the anxiety side of the loop. Its guided breathing exercises pulse your phone as you breathe in, so you can slow down after a meal or when worry spikes, and ten-second check-ins and a journal help you notice whether symptoms follow stress, certain foods or late meals. If chest feelings turn into panic, tap “I’m feeling anxious” and Luma walks you through it. Breatheasy is coming soon to iPhone and Android.

When to see a doctor

See a doctor if you keep getting indigestion, or remedies from a pharmacy aren’t helping. Get help urgently if you:

• have lost weight without trying
• have difficulty swallowing
• keep being sick
• are being sick with blood in it, or have blood in your poo
• feel a lump in your stomach
• have severe pain

And for any chest pain you’re unsure about, especially with the warning signs at the top of this post, call 911.

Sources

• Indigestion, NHS
• Heartburn and acid reflux, NHS
• Heart attack symptoms, NHS