My panic attacks?

Question

I'm almost 17 and I've been getting panic attacks since 2004. At first i just got one a week, but now they're getting worse and worse. I now get them everyday. My doctor diagnosed me, but said I'll be fine and just breathe.

When I get one I seriously feel like I'm going to die and sometimes i wish i would. Why is it so bad?

What can i do to feel better?

I always feel like i can't breathe now too.

Answer 1

It can happen anytime, anywhere — when you're alone, with others, at home, in public, even awakening you from a sound sleep. Suddenly, your heart begins to race, your face flushes and you experience shortness of breath. You feel dizzy, nauseated and out of control. Some people even feel like they're dying.

You may have experienced a panic attack — a sudden episode of intense fear that prompts severe physical reactions in your body. Many people, thinking they're having a heart attack, go to the emergency room. Others try to ignore the signs and symptoms, not realizing that they're experiencing a panic attack.

More women than men are affected by panic attacks. Some people are affected by frequent panic attacks, a condition known as panic disorder.

Although panic attacks were once dismissed as nerves or stress, they're now recognized as a potentially disabling, but treatable condition. A variety of approaches, including medications, therapy and relaxation techniques, can help you control or prevent panic attacks.

Learning how to relax may help you head off a panic attack. You can learn to relax through a variety of techniques, such as meditation, muscle relaxation, relaxed breathing and guided imagery (visualization).

Relaxation is more than getting away from the work-a-day grind, and it's more than the absence of stress. It's a specific, intentional action that's positive and satisfying — a feeling in which you experience peace of mind. True relaxation requires becoming sensitive to your basic needs for peace, self-awareness and thoughtful reflection and having the willingness to meet these needs.

Relaxation techniques can help lessen the discomfort and duration of the signs and symptoms of stress, such as headaches, anxiety, high blood pressure, trouble falling asleep, hyperventilation, and clenching or grinding your teeth. One simple method is to remove yourself from a stressful situation, block the world out and concentrate on your body. These steps can help you relax:

1. Sit or lie in a comfortable position and close your eyes. Allow your jaw to drop and your eyelids to be relaxed and heavy, but not tightly closed.

2. Mentally scan your body. Start with your toes and work slowly up through your legs, buttocks, torso, arms, hands, fingers, neck and head. Focus on each part individually. Where you feel tension, imagine it melting away.

3. Tighten the muscles in one area of your body. Hold the muscles for a count of five or more before relaxing and moving on to the next area. This is a good method for releasing tension. Tighten the muscles of your face, shoulders, arms, legs and buttocks.

4. Allow thoughts to flow through your mind, but don't focus on any of them. Many people find using autosuggestion to be a great help. Suggest to yourself that you're relaxed and calm, that your hands are heavy and warm (or cool if you're hot), that your heart is beating calmly, and that you feel perfectly at peace.

5. Breathe slowly, regularly and deeply during the procedure. Once you're relaxed, imagine you're in a favorite place or in a spot of great beauty and stillness. After five or 10 minutes, rouse yourself from the state gradually.

6. To maximize the benefits of these stress-reduction techniques, be sure to also get adequate sleep, eliminate caffeine and other stimulants from your diet, and engage in regular exercise. About 30 minutes of moderately intense physical activity most days of the week can improve your psychological well-being.

Answer 2

OK, as someone who is fresh off medication for anxiety and panic disorders, let me take a crack at this: A fair few of the symptoms could be either, but all of them could be panic attacks. However, here are a few things which could help you determine which: Do these start after you've been thinking about your health, and wondering if you are OK. Panic attacks normally start with a thought, and build up based on it. Are you mentally confused at all during them? When I had panic attacks, I was never able to sit still. I would try to calm down and breath normally, but the slightest thing would set me off and I'd have to move. Does the shaking happen usually after things start to calm down. Your body produces a huge amount of adrenaline during a panic attack, and coming down off that causes shaking for people who have had panic attacks. If you really try had, and breath slowly and normally, and try to clear your mind, does this help it go away? Does the headache come after as well? I often got them from the physical exertion, which is usually quite extreme during a panic attack. I hope this helps...

Answer 3

I'm 16 and I've had a few panic attacks. They told me the same thing, just breathe. I felt like i was gonna die to. I suspect there is a problem that lies deeper that your doctor has not found yet. If your getting them every day then somthing isn't right. I would suggest going to a theripist or a psychologist as well to help you determine why you are getting these panic attacks, because it's not only a physical issue, but a mental one as well. When you feel one coming on, grab a paper bag and breathe in and out of it as slowly as you can, sing a song in your head, or count to 10, that will get your mind off of the "pain" when your having an episode. Also get your stress levels checked. Stress and panic attacks are linked. Hope this helps.

Answer 4

Do not start on the medications... they'll probably make the situation worse because they'll get you addicted, and you'll feel like you're at the mercy of the pills...

Meditation and even Tae Kwon Do (you probably already know what it is) but they are art forms that will help you relax whenever you feel the attacks coming.

If you start having an attack just try to relax... I know it is hard but just lay down (laying down will help you channel your thoughts in a calmer slower way so 5,000 things don't just rush to your head).

Listen to your favorite song and sing along. Singing along lets you concentrate on the music (tuning and rhythm) and off of what is causing the panic.

Sleeping is the key. Sleep will cure or help in repairing your body (mentally and physically).

I have asthma and most asthma patients when an attack occurs will go into panic. Thinking that the next breath is your last is not the key to pass the attack. I usually lay down turn on my favorite song (but I can't sing to it, I just listen) and breathe. Close my eyes and breathe... Concentrating on my breath that I am taking in, not on the ones that are to come or the ones that have passed. I just put myself in the moment I am in at that second and nothing more, nothing less.

Everyone needs breaks once in awhile, people don't want to put you in bad situations. Everything, everyone, and whatever else can wait. You don't have to cram everything just to please others. Just take your time through life.

Answer 5

Hi there, I just laugh about my past 3 years of panic now. I was not able to go anywhere without carrying xanax. Fear of having another attack was the most important subject of my days.When i first found joe barry's web site i started to cry because of my happiness.

Free audio to end anxiety and panic attacks fast?

Answer 6

"Just breathe" - easy for the doctor to say. I really like this book: Mind Over Mood: Change How You Feel by Changing the Way You Think (Greenberger and Padesky). It explains how those feelings in your body can make you think you're going to die - and how those thoughts you're going to die can make those feelings in your body worse... Which is a viscious and extremely uncomfortable cycle. It shows you HOW to "just breathe". Though, as you know, there's no "just" about it. It also goes into how depression and other anxiety can cycle in a somewhat similar way. Good luck!

Answer 7

I used to have bad anxiety issues.

a) recognize that no one is paying the attention to you that you think they are. In short, people don't care...they have their own lives.

b) recognize that anxiety is caused by trying to control things that can't be controlled (i.e. when you die, etc).

I tried medication and counseling, but once I came to these realizations it went away.