There was a program on TV here last night about this subject. In it, Kim Basinger talked about her battle with panic attacks.

Anybody here ever experienced it? If so, how did you deal?

In my late teens/early 20s I had some panic attacks. They got so bad that a number of times I almost walked off the job I was doing at the time. To cope I smoked more and more weed and drank more and more liquor. That obviously didn't help much. I eventually saw a counselor who helped me work through the craziness in my head and the panic attacks eventually stopped.

Yep!

It scared the hell out of me...

endorphin74 said:

Interesting. What was the "craziness" that engendered them?

sag10 said:

What happened?

one time

my best friends dad had just died
my moms best friends husband just died
my lifelong friend shot and killed himself

i let my mind wander one night in bed thinking that my husband may die next to me while sleeping

it was a terrifying 2 minutes ...

I have had them before.... they are not cool at all. I think they are more common than you think. Mine were at work and having the panic that I couldn't leave and feeling trapped.

Ace said:

The crazinees was a number of things. Most of them stemming from issues I'd grown up with in my family with my horrid abusive dad and so on. Course, instead of dealing with those problems after high school I instead embarked on 18 months of intense raving during which I gobbled LSD like it was candy. My self esteem was at an all time low and that was causing me to lose it. Not to mention my brain and soul was absolutely fried from all the drugging.

Thankfully I hit bottom and lucked out by finding a good counselor on my second try. I saw him every other week for about 6 months and he helped me sort through my issues and find some pride in my self and love for myself again.

It was a scary time though. I honestly didn't think I was going to survive for a time....

i used to get them all the time. until i found out i had
a chronic depression. then i got pills. now i'm blissful




seriously though, the panic attacks are not to be sniffed
at. it's a pretty fucking big nightmare to have one or so
but to have them all the time is hell.


as it happened my best friend suffered from the same sort
of condition (although she is not chronically depressed),
and so we had a lot of support from each other.


she did a lot of training for it and went to several of
these psycho-analysts and psychologists and such which,
as she says, helped her a lot more to give her more of a
sense of control on the condition. she's also on meds
and we're both pretty much 99% fine now.


i've been to a psychiatrist once. just one session and
that was it. he told me there was nothing wrong with me
psychologically that triggered the attacks or the state
of depression.

then i went to a psychologist for about 6 sessions but
in the end all i did was play funny mindfuck games with
him because it bored me and i felt it didn't help me at
all.

but he was an honest quack and he told me that there was
nothing he could do for me since he felt my condition
was not mental but purely physical.

so then they all conspired with my physician and put me
on a steady dose of anti-depressants.
which made the whole thing a lot worse. but that's just
anti-depressants for ya. it takes a while before you
find the one that's right for you, since every person

reacts differently to all these kinds of pills.
before i started "cipramil" about a year ago (the one
thing that finally worked without any side effects) i
went through Prozac, Xeroxat, Effexor, Remeron, Zoloft
and some other shit over the course of 5 years.
some of those made me feel a lot worse than my initial
condition, i might add.

but finally with cipramil it all seemed to work fine.
i don't have any panic attacks anymore and my state of
permanent depression has almost completely gone.

sure i have on and off days, but everyone has those and
that's just fine.

same thing for my friend, she's still had a few attacks
over the past years, but they're short and the gaps in
between them are longer and longer.

all i can say to people who suffer from either of these
conditions is go to a doctor and get yourself some help
and if you're not happy with the result, just don't go
and hide yourself again but go back and demand something
else.

mental conditions are not like physical ones where you
can say "ah, a broken leg, put a cast on it, let it heal
for 6 weeks and you'll be better".

everyone's mind works differently and therefore it might
take some time before you find out what's right for you
as an individual.

so take your time and don't try to hurry things. and don't
be disappointed or let down if you don't find a miracle
cure very soon. it takes a bit of time and effort but in
the end, for most people, there are very good solutions.

I used to have panic attacks so bad that my heart would race out of control, it felt like I couldn't breathe and that I was having a heart attack, felt like I was going to pass out and my arms would go numb from the elbows down.

I had these attacks because of my apendix. I went undiagnosed with appedicitis and had 14 attacks in 5 years. It's a miracle it never burst. Before that rotten thing was removed I always felt sick to my stomach. I was full of bile and always having stomach problems. Because I always felt nauseous and was full of acid and bile it affected my mind. I was litteraly being driven crazy from the sickness.

I found that St. Johns Wort helped me to calm my nerves during this time. Before my surgery to remove the appendix I was having these panic attacks nearly every day. After the surgery I had 3 in one year. They are awful.

Ace said:

One day I was driving home from work, and I felt like i was having a heart attack. I pulled off the highway and headed for the nearest emergency room.

That is how I discovered it was a panic attack.. I read up on it, and took some behavioural modification classes, got rid of my ex-fiance.. And haven't had one since.

sag10 said:

Interesting. What did they teach you in the classes?

Ace said:

They taught me relaxation techniques. And of course I went through a little bit of therapy to help find out where the source of the problem was...

sag10 said:

What is involved in "relaxation techniques"?

I get panic attacks, when I was a teen I was told I had a mild form of Social Anxiety Disorder. I think I have mostly out grown it, but I still get panic attacks. I use breathing and meditation exercises to calm myself and I'm mostly good now, but when I was younger I would hyperventilate so much I'd pass out!


You can take a little test here to see if you have it too: http://socialanxiety.fact...spin1.html

Sweeny79 said:

I've never had panic attacks, but, I do have symptoms of social anxiety disorder. BUT, the nice thing is that since I've been on meds (about 2 yrs), things are MUCH better for me. It's like a complete 180 degrees!

I dont have Panic Disorder as such but I have suffered panic attacks in the past. I must point out that just having a panic attck does not mean you have Panic Disorder, you generally only get diagnosed with PD is you are having them often.

I suffer from what is called a generalised anxiety disorder which is usually pretty mild but can "spike" at times. This was triggered about 4 years ago when I suffered a heart arrythmia that caused me to pass out at work (I thought I was dying). My heart rythm was out of whack due to an electrical problem, probably caused by a virus, that actually corrected itself after a few days.

Anyway, the shock of feeling like I was going to die set off an anxiety reaction. I became overly concerned with my health and felt like i was going to die. Unfortunately, i became so wound up that I began having "panic attacks" where I would suddenly think I was about to die, my heart would race, i'd break out in a sweat, get dizzy and basically feel like death. On occaisions, i also became a little depressed.

After this happened a couple of times i felt medical help was needed. Luckily, my doctor is very sympathethic and helped me with it. I was putting on anti-depressants (Effexor) which seemed to help and I stayed on those for about 18 months.

I'm no longer on medication and most of the time I feel pretty good but I am prone to anxiety if a number of stressful things occur. I suffered a panic attack in January this year out of the blue but that was the last one. I can sometimes feel the tension mounting and can feel one coming on but have learned to relax more and cut if off before it happens.

The good news is that i never let it stop me doing anything. I urge all people who have suffered anxiety or panic attacks to seek medical help. It is a horrible condition that you can get over with the right help.

p.s beer helps!

bkw said:

So true.....I was at the point when I couldn't see getting back to "normal". I told my doc that I thought there was NO WAY meds, etc could help. But, sure enough, it makes a WORLD of difference. Absolutely amazing.

bkw said:

Is there anything that beer CAN'T do? If there is, I haven't seen it!

ReturnOfDOOK said:

Exactly, people need to look at these mental conditions just as they would a physical condition. No-one with high blood pressure worries about going on meds, or any other physical condition. It's just an illness that can be treated like anything else.

As a society we need to remove the stigma attached to mental health issues.

ReturnOfDOOK said:

It's natures miracle cure for anything from anxiety to ugliness.

bkw said:

My girlfriend back in college had the same sort of doubt about seeking mental health...she was severly depressed (LOTS of issues with that....she was very hard to deal with) and I told her straight up: "If your stomach's been hurting for ever, what do you do? You take medicine, you go to the doctor, SOMETHING..the same thing's true if stuff's not right in your head". I wish more people would realize that there's not something wrong with you if you seek mental health cause people would be a lot happier and more open to getting help.

bkw said:

so freaking true especially considering the amount of people suffering day to day with these issues.


Check this out from the National Institute of Mental Health, 2003

Statistics related to mental health disorders:
The following are the latest statistics available from the National Institute of Mental Health (NIMH), part of the National Institutes of Health (NIH):

Mental health disorders account for four of the top 10 causes of disability in established market economies, such as the US, worldwide, and include: major depression (also called clinical depression), manic depression (also called bipolar disorder), schizophrenia, and obsessive-compulsive disorder.


An estimated 22.1 percent of Americans ages 18 and older - about one in five (or over 44 million) adults - suffer from a diagnosable mental disorder in a given year.


Many people suffer from more than one mental disorder at a given time. In particular, depressive illnesses tend to co-occur with substance abuse and anxiety disorders.


Approximately 18.8 million American adults - or 9.5 percent - ages 18 and over, will suffer from a depressive illness (major depression, bipolar disorder, or dysthymia) each year.


Women are nearly twice as likely to suffer from major depression than men. However, men and women are equally likely to develop bipolar disorder.


While major depression can develop at any age, the average age at onset is the mid-20s.


With bipolar disorder, which affects approximately 2.3 million American adults - or about 1.2 percent of Americans age 18 and older in a given year - the average age at onset for a first manic episode is during the early 20s.


More than 90 percent of people who commit suicide have a diagnosable mental disorder - most commonly a depressive disorder or a substance abuse disorder.


Four times as many men than women commit suicide. However, women attempt suicide 2 to 3 times more often than men.


The highest suicide rates in the US are found in Caucasian men over age 85. However, suicide is also one of the leading causes of death in adolescents and adults ages 15 to 24.


Approximately 2.2 million American adults are affected by schizophrenia each year.


One in 10 persons with schizophrenia commit suicide.


In most cases, schizophrenia first appears in men during their late teens or early 20s. In women, schizophrenia often first appears during their 20s or early 30s.


Approximately 19.1 million American adults ages 18 to 54 - or about 13.3 percent of people in this age group - in a given year, have an anxiety disorder. Anxiety disorders include panic disorder, obsessive-compulsive disorder (OCD), post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD), generalized anxiety disorder (GAD), and phobias (social phobia, agoraphobia, and specific phobia).


Panic disorder typically develops in late adolescence or early adulthood.


The first symptoms of OCD often begin during childhood or adolescence.


About 30 percent of Vietnam veterans experienced PTSD at some point after the war.


GAD can begin at any time, though the risk is highest between childhood and middle age.


Social phobia typically begins in childhood or adolescence.


In their lifetime, an estimated 0.5 percent to 3.7 percent of females suffer from anorexia and an estimated 1.1 percent to 4.2 percent suffer from bulimia. Females are much more likely than males to develop an eating disorder.


Attention-deficit / hyperactivity disorder (ADHD) is one of the most common mental disorders in children and adolescents. It affects an estimated 4.1 percent of youths ages 9 to 17 in a 6-month period.


from: http://www.uuhsc.utah.edu.../facts.htm

Actually I'm going through it now. I have an Anxiety Disorder with panic attacks. Sometimes if I'm on a crowded train I'll have to hop off and catch a much later one to avoid the crowd....I can't explain what it feels like, apart from feeling utterly unprotected and frightened. It's embarrassing sometimes, because it isn't always apparent, until ofcourse you have another attack.

I don't have a "panic disorder" but, I have had a few panic attacks. Nasty things, they are.

VAMPIRELLA said:

It's the fight or flight response. You feel enclosed and vulnerable, which causes a part of your brain to react, releasing adrennilin into your system. You are then on high alert, you feel sick in the stomach and scared out of your brain. It was a very useful response to have when we were in the wild dodging sabre toothed tigers but is not very useful in todays society.

With treatment you can learn to control those feelings to a large degree. Medication can also help a great deal.

applekisses said:

They are no fun, that's for sure!

I had a panic attack on my first day of college
I was nervous because this school is prestigous and mostly rich stuck up people go there. I felt like an outcast and Im already shy which can suck
We were in line to get our ids and this one girl asked me a question,I looked around and EVERYONE was looking at me
I got dizzy and I started to breathe heavy,I couldnt talk

The craziness for me is when I have attacks,I want to run and hide

ThreadCula said:

That's the fight or flight response.