What are you're personnal experiences with anxiety/panic attacks? What situations cause you to have them?
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Hi, sorry to hear you are feeling so bad. Panic attacks can seemly come 'out of the blue' - others have a clear trigger (e.g. a particular person or fear). The symptoms can be very diverse and include dizziness, nausea, a 'detached' feeling, panic, heart palpatations and trembling. Your doctor should be accustomed to diagnosing panic attacks, especially in his line of business. Just tell him your symptoms and suggest you think they could be anxiety related.
The following steps will eliminate (or at least significantly reduce) your panic attacks:
1.Breathe properly - if you control your breathing, you control panic. As soon as you notice the signs of anxiety, check your breathing: breathe in slowly through your nose pushing your tummy out (to the count of 5 or so). Breathe out slowly and for a bit longer (to the count of 7 or so) through your mouth. Do not breathe rapidly or shallowly (in the chest area). This will soon restore the balance of oxygen and you will feel a lot better.
2. Cognitive Behavioural Therapy! CBT is proven to be the most effective thing for panic attacks, OCD and anxiety etc. It takes a bit of work, but it is super effective. (After 15 years of panic attacks, mine stopped completely). You can speak to your doctor about taking a course or you can take a course for free online at: www.livinglifetothefull.com
3. Try relaxation exercise tapes (progressive muscular relaxation). They really help if you practise often enough. You can get free downloads in you put "progressive muscle relaxation" into Google (e.g. lots of universities have them as free downloads)
With each step practise makes perfect. (i.e. practise the steps every day, not just when you are feeling bad). I hope you feel better soon. Best of luck!
It feels like somoene sitting on my chest and it happens when I get in large crowds of people. Or if I am in an extremely stressful environment. I get really bad ones if someone yells at me and it gets really hard to breath.
My triggers are caffine and pot so I quit both! I felt as though I was on a roller coaster it would just hit me out of the blue anywhere and at any given time. Anxiety doesn't wait for me to be at home and alone, it just sneaks up on me, anxiety doesn't care if you have a job you have to walk out on b/c you are freaking out -seriously roller coaster ride all the way! Maybe it would be different if I liked roller coasters but I don't! But now I have no issues with it only during PMS when I take midol and of course wouldn't you know it has caffine in it! So Dr. gave me Ativan and I haven't even needed to fill the script yet! and that was three mos. ago!
If you are extremely upset about a situation and you cry uncontrollable and get to the point where you are hyperventilating, and yawning, this is the beginning of a panic attack. I would go to see your Chaplain before the Doctors at the base. You don't want to jeopardize your career. Please keep me informed though. I just experienced them back to back before I went to my Doctor and Therapist. I did have to be put on medication, my husband is in the Military and I am his dependent so what I go through doesn't effect his career. Please go to the Chaplain and keep in touch with me. I could answer you more in private-just e-mail me. Good Luck.
It does feel like you can't breath, and like someone is sitting on your chest and also you don't have to be crying. But crying does cause you to loose the oxygen in your system so it doesn't help either.
I think there's a difference between an anxiety attack and a panic attack. My SO has panic attacks. He can't breathe, feels pressure in his chest, feels weak...it's almost like a heart attack. His are brought on by really bad stress, like his mother being ill, so he doesn't have them often and he doesn't take medication.
I have anxiety attacks, and I get restless/hyper and can't stop worrying or dwelling on something. I can't sit still, sleep, or focus. They last longer than panic attacks. I'm bipolar, and my anxiety attacks seem to always precede a mood swing. I don't take medication specifically for them.
Just be honest with your doctor and be specific when you're explaining your symptoms to him/her. Try to keep a list of when they happen and what seems to set them off.
An anxiety/panic attack is the result of high stress.
Many years ago I worked for a company in Northern Ontario as an accountant. I did not like the job. My job was to streamline all the work and put it on computers. None of the people whose jobs I was eliminating knew anything about computers or even wanted to learn. They thought computers were a temporary solution, that they would never be able to replace workers.
In a way they were correct, as long as they knew enough to operate the computers.
I was completely worried about my job and about the workers who were starting to organize to prevent my project from moving ahead. Many of them were young with young families.
The stress got so bad that as I was driving home, I felt a tightness across my shoulders. I felt very warm and flushed through my face and head. I was sweating and feeling very panicky.
Just when I turned onto my street I started to pass out. Luckily I was at a stop sign and a passing motorist stopped to see what was happening.
Later I spoke with a psychiastrist and he indicated that I had a panic/anxiety attack. I had almost passed out because I was holding my breath. I was so fixed in my mind about my worries I was forgetting to breath, a common symptom of anxiety.
He asked me if I had done anything about the stress. I told him that I had quit my job.
Hope that helps to you to understand what you are going through.
There is no shame in seeking help.
http://www.themeaningisyou.com
Mine are kind of random, they usually come at times when I'm just sitting there doing nothing, or when I have an unusual pain or thing on my body (bumps, marks, etc). I'll somehow convince myself that I am dying. I feel like I can't breathe and everything around me is swimming away, everything around me loses value and meaning, I'm dead anyway.
But I get myself out of it and calm down after a few minutes. It's scary though. It only happens every once in a while though, like every 3 months.
I am diagnosed with an anxiety disorder. I was diagnosed for this after nearly wrapping my car around a tree and going into a severe depression. I do take medicine every day to keep myself under control, even though i don't like to, i need to in order to function on a daily basis. I become highly irritable and every little thing can set me off. There is no specific way for me to judge which way that will be however. I remember that just speaking with my mother set me into a tail spin and i wound up hitting a tree with a baseball bat. Normally i am a very sane person, who doesn't do such odd things as that but when your brain is chemically at war with itself you are forced to reassess the situation.
I would suggest that if you are having extreme emotion, whether it be fear, rage, or anything related to those emotions track it for a week, sometimes it can just be stress but other times it is a signal that something is wrong. When i am on my medicine i am my normal self, however off of it i can be described like a loaded cannon because i work myself up beyond my own measures of control. If you have been having a rough time in your life, or if you have had a series of traumatic events happen it can also trigger your instability. Tell your doctor how you feel and ask what suggestions they can make for you to regulate yourself once again. good luck!
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