Exploring the Connection Between Anxiety and False Memories

Life tends to feel a bit out of control when stress and anxiety are thrown into the mix. You may notice changes to your eating habits, sleeping schedule, and other aspects of your daily life and routine. You may even notice that you’re having a hard time remembering certain details of your life.

Where did you place your keys? Did you lock your front door? Was the garage door closed? Where did you park? Did you send that email before you left work?

While it’s normal to experience scatterbrain or brain fog from time to time, people with anxiety tend to have these experiences more often. They can even experience chronic memory problems to the point where they may start to create and believe false memories.

Let’s explore this connection between anxiety and false memories.

What Is a False Memory?

A false memory is a distorted or completely fabricated recollection of a past event. These memories are completely untrue and are often imagined or false. They may contain certain elements of truth, but over time, they have become skewed by conflicting information and memories.

The Cause of False Memories

False memories can range from forgetting when you put your key after you got home from work to completely rewriting a past event and believing that new narrative. Several different factors can influence false memories. These are some of the most common factors of false memories:

• Anxiety
• Existing knowledge
• Misattribution
• Misinformation
• Time
• The power of suggestion

Anxious Thought Patterns

When you’re experiencing anxiety, thoughts and emotions tend to spiral. Anxiety can even cause us to get stuck in negative thought patterns that can alter the way that we think and what we believe. Let’s learn more about some of these negative thought patterns and how anxiety can impact our memories.

All-or-Nothing Thinking

All-or-nothing thinking is a negative thought pattern where people only see choices or thinking as black vs. white or only having two options of right or wrong.

Catastrophizing

Catastrophizing is when a person tries to predict the worst-case scenario. This catastrophic thinking can occur no matter what situation they’re involved in. This means that they can worsen a situation that may be going smoothly or they could start to think, worry, and stress about a future event going wrong.

Personalization

Another negative thought pattern that can occur with anxiety is personalization. This happens when a person takes full responsibility for things that go wrong, even if the event is out of their own control.

The Connection Between Anxiety and False Memories

Anxiety can distort how the brain receives information. The body and brain will go into hyper-drive to try to defend and protect themselves against any perceived threats. False memories are more likely to be formed during these types of situations due to the information that was received when you were experiencing anxiety not being properly processed at the moment.

This means some of the details aren’t as clear to you. To piece together the information, you may make associations with people or certain places that aren’t entirely true. Over time, these false memories will replace one’s actual memories and will start to be seen as the truth.

How to Move Forward

You’re not alone if you’re experiencing anxiety, false memories, or a combination of the two. Just because you’re experiencing anxiety or false memories now doesn’t mean that it’s your new normal. It is possible to overcome anxiety and false memories and be able to move forward.

You’re not trying to change your memories on purpose. Plus, you’re not the problem. The culprit is anxiety. The best way to reduce false memories is to try to better manage those signs and symptoms you’re experiencing from anxiety. Reach out today to see how anxiety therapy with a mental health professional can help you reduce both your anxiety and false memories.