I'm not sure if this should go in the PTSD or Anxiety forum, but since it's anxiety induced I'll try here.

From events in my past I've been left with PTSD, and unfortunately there are parts of my work that cause PTSD-related anxiety symptoms to flare up. For years avoidance has been the biggest resulting problem of those symptoms. Through sheer will I have been able to push through it and minimize my amount of avoidance, but a new symptom emerged a few weeks ago.

It began after a particularly bad week where in all my dreams I was reliving the source of my PTSD. Upon waking, those memories relentlessly pushed themselves to the forefront of my mind... all day, every day, for that whole week.

Ever since then, whenever I now push through my avoidance issues I begin to experience a physical sensation that feels like bugs crawling all over my body and through my hair.

This only occurs when I am attempting to do the parts of my work that cause those PTSD anxiety problems. If I stop, the sensation slowly goes away over about 30 minutes, at which point it goes away completely and I'm fine.

This only occurs when I approach the parts of my work that cause the PTSD. If I avoid that, I'm completely unaffected, but avoiding it is really not an option. As you can imagine, it is extremely distracting when I'm trying to concentrate but am constantly brushing my face, arms, legs, hair etc in a futile attempt to rid myself of that sensation.

Has anybody experienced this before? Anxiety induced bug crawling sensation? If so, how did you manage to rid yourself of it?

I should mention that I'm not on any medications, so it's not a side-effect of anything. And it's not real bugs... if it were, there would be signs on my body, and it wouldn't only occur with (and stop after) the anxiety flare ups.