The article has been automatically translated into English by Google Translate from Russian and has not been edited.

Not like everyone else: how I live with panic attacks

'08.04.2019'

Source: lady.mail.ru

Even when it seems that everything is so bad and your heart is about to stop - this can also be corrected.

Фото: Depositphotos

Ekaterina (35) is an ordinary resident of a megacity, a mother of two children. It is unlikely for this sociable and cheerful girl to say that more than ten years ago she experienced the first panic attack, which was the beginning of a whole series of painful attacks, writes lady.mail.ru. This frank story about how she coped with panic attacks, how she was able to reduce them to a minimum and did not allow them to ruin their lives.

How it all began

Now I can calmly talk about what was happening. Panic attacks, if any, are very rare. I'm not scared anymore, because now I know what it is and learned how to treat it correctly. But ten years ago it seemed to be my personal hell.

One evening I was sitting at home alone and watched some kind of thriller. The eldest daughter stayed with her mother, the youngest daughter was not in the project either. I then worked a lot and smoked more than usual, I could smoke a pack a day. At some point, puffing on with another cigarette, I suddenly realized that I could not breathe. In a panic, she put out a cigarette, but she still could not breathe. I panicked violently, blood rushed back to my heels, a kind of unimaginable terror squeezed my throat. She stuck her head out the window, tried to inhale the frosty air, but it didn't get better.

Gasping, my heart pounding, I called my mother and called an ambulance. They came, measured the pressure, dropped the “Valocordinum” and said that everything was fine with me. They asked not to invent problems for themselves and not to disturb them with more false calls. When the ambulance left, I calmed down for a while, but then it all happened a few more times. I breathed normally, then began to choke again.

The first year with panic attacks was the most difficult - the attacks were repeated daily, often several times a day. It seems that psychotherapists call such a long period of attacks "acute panic disorder." But I know this only now, but then I simply could not understand what was wrong with me.

Shame, fear and uncertainty

At that time, in 2005, it was not customary to say openly that you had mental problems. Then there were hundreds of bloggers who openly talk about their psychological difficulties in social networks. When I tried to share with someone from my friends, I was confused, sometimes even scared. People tried to quickly move the conversation to another topic. I was ashamed and it seemed that I was so alone.

Each time, when a completely unbearable attack rolled in and it seemed that I would suffocate and die, I again called an ambulance. At some regular visit, the therapists soon threatened that if I called them again, they would invite me to the psychiatric hospital. After that, I refused doctors.

I tried to diagnose myself: it seemed to me that I had lung cancer, or schizophrenia. When the condition worsened, I almost stopped sleeping and started taking heavy antidepressants (I got it through my acquaintances). At first it helped, but very soon new fears appeared, and it began to seem to me that I was really losing my mind.

I started drinking alcohol - it helped, but not for long. Then there were bouts again, worse than before.

Фото: Depositphotos

Culmination

Once I was on the subway, and the train got in a tunnel for several minutes. I felt panic rolling in again. I tried to get together, remind myself that this is a standard situation, there is nothing dangerous in it and that the train will soon start moving again, but this only made it worse.

I struggled in the door to let me out. I was wildly ashamed, I understood that people look at me as if they were crazy, but I already didn’t care, because I was sure that I was going to die, I would just suffocate right here, and that was that. And none of those present will help me.

When the train started, I was almost unconscious. I don’t remember how I ran out to the nearest station, fell face down on the grass and started to sob. It was a real breakdown, I understood that it was impossible to continue to live like this and something needed to be done.

My closest friend then lived in constant travels, and we almost did not communicate. But for some reason at that moment I wanted to call her exactly. In hysterics, I "laid out" everything that happens to me at once. She listened carefully, and said that she knew all this very well. I had a shock - it was the first time in all the time when someone understood me!

She said that this is similar to panic attacks, she said that there is a forum where there are a lot of people with such a problem. Moreover, it turned out that she herself suffers from attacks, but in an even more severe form, much worse than mine. So I learned that what happens to me has a name. It literally helped breathe.

Panic Attack (PA) is an acute attack of fear or panic. The bodily symptoms of panic can be so intense that it starts to seem like there is not enough breathing, that now a heart attack, stroke or heart attack will occur. These symptoms usually have nothing to do with the actual state of health and do not threaten a person’s life, but only further aggravate the course of the PA itself.

The worst thing about panic attacks (PAs) is that they can happen anywhere, at any time and for no apparent reason: in the stairwell, on the street, in the office, at home next to my husband. Yes, almost everywhere, but most often in the subway. As I learned, the metro is generally the most terrible fear, not only for me, but for almost everyone who has PA.

No more scary

The good news is that the more you learn about panic attacks, the better you understand the mechanism of their occurrence, the better you understand that they themselves are not dangerous: in fact you are not sick, you have no heart attack or stroke you surely will not die. You get worse from these fears. And it turns out you can control them.

When I learned that I had a panic attack - I began to read a lot about it, I discussed it with people on the forum. It turned out that many of the symptoms are similar, but manifest differently, someone is more acute, someone is easier. I also learned that PA is a symptom, and the real reason is always deeper, a person may not even be aware of it. And it is important to find this cause.

The psychotherapy really helped me then. I was lucky - I found a good psychologist with whom we were able to get to the real cause and work it out. After this attacks gradually began to pass. Now I understand that if I knew right away that it was with me, and then I turned to a psychologist, everything would be easier.

After the birth of the second child, everything somehow settled down. I'm not afraid of seizures anymore, probably because I'm ready for them. For several years I have found my own ways to deal with them. I train mindfulness to understand that in fact I am breathing, that this is just a spasm of blood vessels and in a few minutes everything will pass. I learned to wait: distract myself, pinching, counting, breathing through my nose for a long time and deeply.

It helps that now I can openly talk about it. Now it has become such a common occurrence that one of my acquaintances is unlikely to turn away or think that I am dangerous if I say that I have PA.

In addition, I myself have learned not to attach such great importance to this. The most amazing thing is that the better I understand that a lot depends on me, that I can control what happens in my life - the less there are reasons for panic attacks.

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