A Guide To Dealing With Anxiety And Panic Attacks

Whether you suffer from Anxiety or Panic Attacks, or you know someone who does, you need to read this…

So what exactly is anxiety?

Anxiety is an irrational fear that something completely rational is going to transpire in the most catastrophic way ever…in fact…it will be so completely damaging that not even God himself will realize what has happened and when the final explosion goes off…it will be just you standing there surrounded by smoke and ashes of everything you have so royally screwed up.

That’s not the dictionary definition, but it should be!

I remember being 18, just starting to drink and sneak out of college to go grab a few shots between classes because my mom still wouldn’t let me go out! Yes…18! I was the good child, I never did anything bad, and if I did it would be covered up under layers and layers of well thought out plans. Generally, I was hiding a boyfriend, not even the type you make out with, just the ones you text after 6pm. Shock and horror!

By the time I got to Campus, I was ready to break free of my over-protective “shackles”, I would go out for lunch and not tell my mom, I spoke to boys and sometimes I drank!

If there is anything you need to know about suffering with anxiety, is that it is not the same as just being a stressed out person. It creeps up on you and takes over all your thoughts causing you to get worked up about things that aren’t even possible leave alone plausible.

The stress of not getting caught and murdered by my parents, the feelings that I was disappointing them, the overall stress from college and the irrational fear that I was a horrible human causing global warming single handedly would lead me to having these meltdowns of epic proportions.

When I say meltdown, I’m talking can’t breathe, while funeral crying, choking on the snot thats running down close enough to get into your mouth while you gasp for air and trying to mouth the words “I need my brother” because he was the only thing that could calm me at the time. Sure I couldn’t handle my booze, I was a lightweight, but even more than that, I couldn’t handle all the thoughts that became so loud whenever I let go of my “inhibitions”.

Thanks for the public humiliation PA!

The stories got progressively worse over time, and the worst part was that no one could understand that as much as we would joke about the episodes afterwards, it was still hugely embarrassing to me because I knew that it wasn’t just from an intolerance, it was from something bigger. I laughed while the fear loomed, the fear that there was something else going on that I had no control over.

Fast forward 10 years and I now know and accept that I am living with an acute anxiety disorder that often leads to severe panic attacks. Nothing is more real than that moment when you wake up on the floor of a bathroom covered in snot and spit and you cannot even remember how you got there.

Slowly the cycle starts again, your chest tightens up, the panic settles in and you start panting as you realize that you had another attack and you survived it but you are still alone and you don’t know if anyone witnessed it, if you broke anything on your way down or if you just lost your poo in the most melodramatic way ever.

It gets real, and it gets real fast.

The thing is, as the person suffering from it, you know that you don’t have a lot of control in this situation, which is rather ironic since attacks stem from a feeling of a lack of control. For the people around us at the time of the attack, it can be just as damaging to witness. Seeing someone hyperventilating, losing color and consciousness is not an easy task. You feel helpless and completely out of your depth. There really isn’t a winner in this scenario.

The most important thing to remember as a bystander is that we know…we’ve got to calm down…don’t bother telling us that, it only makes us more aware of how easy it should be. The initial response is to hold the person or talk them out of the anxiety and panic…this is not a hostage negotiation…my brain is not interested in listening to the sense you are speaking.

It took a long time for me to recognize the patterns that were actually indicators giving me signs that I was entering the danger zone. Once the red zone line is crossed there is absolutely nothing that I or anyone else can do to stop the attack, they can only follow the survival protocol, I’ll get to that in a minute.

For now, here are a list of warning signs that usually indicate that I should start taking precautionary measures:

• My chest starts feeling tight
• My breathing becomes really slow, almost feels calm at first (for someone hyper and all over the place like me that’s actually a bad thing)
• I start feeling emotional
• I stop really hearing anything outside my own head
• My mind starts whispering all my insecurities (you are not enough, you are ugly, you are stupid, you are worthless, you can’t be loved)
• I start becoming fidgety
• I want to lash out (I am generally calm but when I start feeling panicked I also start feeling desperate. I feel desperate to display my authority and take control and desperate to stop the external stimuli that is causing my panic)
• I start getting tiny tremors or shakes, it can be as subtle as just a foot tap or as bold as trembling hands
• I start tearing up and I don’t even recognize that I am crying
• I start zoning out
• I can’t speak, I just shut down
• My breathing suddenly increases

These all seem like things that happen to every person on a daily basis, but if you are anything like me you display very specific patterns of behavior. I know myself so well that I am aware of functions that are just so unlike me, and when I find myself doing them I know that I need to start paying attention and identify whats causing it.

External stimuli that can aggravate the attack:

• Raised voices
• Tension
• Exams
• Confrontations
• Interrogations or any form of questioning
• Being dominated or bossed around
• Crowds
• Loud noises
• Lots of movement
• Physical Touch, be it a hug or a tap on the shoulder

Those external factors need to cease the moment that the signs start showing themselves. Any one of these things can become triggers and increase the effects drastically in a short space of time.

How To Get Through An Attack:

• Listen to the breathing and allow yourself to recognize that it’s not normal. Tell yourself that you need just one normal and deep breath
• Through all the noise in your mind, just keep repeating that “it’s okay, “I am okay”, “everything is okay”.
• Be present, focus on now, it will be okay NOW, you are okay right NOW
• Sit or stand in a position that makes you feel open and safe. My position ironically is keeled over in child’s pose, that should make it harder for the air supply, but somehow for me it’s my pose of safety
• If someone is there tell them to be quiet so you can talk yourself through it
• Move to an open space that has little clutter or dirt so that you can feel like you have control over the space
• I build a puzzle to exercise control and problem solving capabilities so that my mind is tricked into believing that whatever caused the attack is being solved
• Sing…I sing ‘Twinkle Twinkle Little Star’, the melody is a consistent patter, I can visualize the piano notes or the metronome which has a grounding feeling because it is stable
• You are in it now, there’s snot and tears and goodness knows what else, don’t think about that, think about surviving, think about breathing
• Remember why you are in charge of your own life, you have purpose, start being louder than the panicky thoughts, and tell yourself that you have purpose

My boyfriend who has had to witness a number of these attacks realized what it takes for me to gather myself, he made a little ‘Survival Kit’ which has actually helped me more than one could ever think.

Understanding the stages of the attack is vital, it allows you to know which measure of action should be taken. For me, if I’m just panicking and starting to get worked up, something distracting but stimulating will calm me down, if i’m already in the middle of an attack I need to exercise control and I need positive reaffirmation.

It’s pink so I immediately see something I like

Everything is cute so that picks up my mood subconsciously

My little emergency bag is pink, that automatically reassures me, it sparks of feelings of safety and acceptance.

When I open out the bag it has Disney, my favorite thing in the world! I start seeing puzzles, toys, cute things, little fidgety gadgets and just all sorts of colorful activities that start to calm me on a subconscious level. Once I interact with the material the level starts becoming a conscious measure and method of calming myself down.

The bag also has balloons, a really silly and thoughtless trick that actually assists in regulating your breathing. It helps you match your breaths in with your breaths out on a physical level. Mentally it acts as a metaphor for letting go of the negative and breathing it into a vessel that can carry it away from you without the fear of it spilling onto the world. Dramatic right…

My favorite item out of all of these is a little glass jar with a bunch of tiny scrolls rolled up tightly. Each scroll has a little message that is a positive reaffirmation, ones that say “you are enough”, ones that remind me that “I am good” and ones that simply tell me to breathe.

This might seem like such a childish way of approaching such a grown up problem, but it really does work. Having panic attacks and suffering from anxiety can be so crippling, it’s one of those illnesses that aren’t taken seriously because the symptoms don’t often reveal themselves on an exterior level.

The one thing that we are all fighting for is control. It is important to remember that you are still in charge of your body and your life even when it feels like something else is taking over. Become the loudest voice in your mind and exercise a tone of authority, filled with love, compassion, understanding and positivity.

You got this!

WE’VE got this!