Chozo, you're the man for having Honore de Balzac as your avatar!

and I can definitely relate to your feelings. Sounds like we were separated at birth!

rayj wrote:You don't 'suspect' that you may have had a panic attack...the panic attack grabs you by the balls and punches you in the face. You know exactly what happened. And I have done quite the lion's share of hallucinogenic drugs, and seen some pretty freaky things...

Yes, it was definately like that for me, as if some crazy force reaches in and fills you with dread, almost like death. Sometimes I still wake up in the middle of the night, I think I'm having a heart attack, and I just want to run. I've gotten 'used' to it though and can calm myself down. What was causing it, was that I was overstressing my body from overtraining and I was constantly worrying about school. I never did any drugs and have never been a heavy drinker. I stopped them by making my life more balanced and taking fewer classes, not to mention learning about Buddhism. The doctor offered to give me some kind of medication but I didn't take him up on it. Fear accumulates and you have to deal with it or it messes you up.

Sly Bug wrote:Sure, it happened though, very rarely, whereas American people talk about this a lot more.
I have no French friends suffering of panic attacks whereas I have at least 3 American friends who do. That said, I have very fewer Americans friends than French friends of course.

No offense intended by the way.

No offense taken. Americans often have a 'disease model' kind of mentality where they take something you normally wouldn't think of as a disease...compulsive behaviors, for instance...and refer to it as a disease. There is a huge industry and educational apparatus backing this up (and profiting from it). Not that it doesn't end with effective treatment sometimes, but...well, it isn't always the genuine article. Right?

A friend of mine had panic attacks his whole life. At age 26, one of his wisdom teeth got impacted, and he had them all removed. The panic attacks disappeared.

My friend's mom has 'panic attacks' that play more like borderline nervous breakdowns. Probably the result of legitimate life stressors than anything else...

Once again, the two panic attacks I had were obviously from drinking.

'Panic attack' seems to be a symptom of an open-ended collection of causes, right? I'm no doctor, though...

I've been having them regularly for the past two months since my girlfriend and I broke up. We've been with each other for 2 1/2 years. I live in Minnesota, far, far from home. I have no friends to confide in yet apart from her, and I can't really just breakdown in front of her for the upteenth-billionth time. I've been miserable, fighting the urge to spill my guts here on the thread about it. I had a complete and proper breakdown this morning at work, trying to pretend life was still normal; I should have just called in today. The worst part is that she's also my best friend, my only friend, and now she's moving to Grand Forks. I don't want sex, I don't want to make out, I don't want to rebuild the realtionship, the only thing that hurts, that really hurts, is that I will never, ever see my best friend, the only person I've ever tried to impress, the person I went to bed with everynight, the person I made breakfast and dinner for, the person I've cleaned up after, bitched about, talked up, attended parties with, kept secrets for, again.
There no more rant.

Shotgun-Charlie wrote:I've been having them regularly for the past two months since my girlfriend and I broke up. We've been with each other for 2 1/2 years. I live in Minnesota, far, far from home. I have no friends to confide in yet apart from her, and I can't really just breakdown in front of her for the upteenth-billionth time. I've been miserable, fighting the urge to spill my guts here on the thread about it. I had a complete and proper breakdown this morning at work, trying to pretend life was still normal; I should have just called in today. The worst part is that she's also my best friend, my only friend, and now she's moving to Grand Forks. I don't want sex, I don't want to make out, I don't want to rebuild the realtionship, the only thing that hurts, that really hurts, is that I will never, ever see my best friend, the only person I've ever tried to impress, the person I went to bed with everynight, the person I made breakfast and dinner for, the person I've cleaned up after, bitched about, talked up, attended parties with, kept secrets for, again.
There no more rant.

<3

jason smith wrote:

rayj wrote:You don't 'suspect' that you may have had a panic attack...the panic attack grabs you by the balls and punches you in the face. You know exactly what happened. And I have done quite the lion's share of hallucinogenic drugs, and seen some pretty freaky things...

Yes, it was definately like that for me, as if some crazy force reaches in and fills you with dread, almost like death. Sometimes I still wake up in the middle of the night, I think I'm having a heart attack, and I just want to run. I've gotten 'used' to it though and can calm myself down. What was causing it, was that I was overstressing my body from overtraining and I was constantly worrying about school. I never did any drugs and have never been a heavy drinker. I stopped them by making my life more balanced and taking fewer classes, not to mention learning about Buddhism. The doctor offered to give me some kind of medication but I didn't take him up on it. Fear accumulates and you have to deal with it or it messes you up.

I've had a history of suffering from what I call anxiety attacks. I don't call them panic attacks because I never had the gripping feeling of panic that other people have described. Instead, my experience was that I would wake up in the middle of the night suddenly feeling nauseous and would pass out cold within seconds. Basically, it would come on quickly, get really intense and quickly pass upon awakening.

It took me years to figure out what was going on. For awhile, I thought it was caused by stress. I think stress can be a contributing factor but not the main source. Rather, it's excitement or anything that causes my brain or emotions to go into overdrive. Hence, it could come on after college finals or after a really exciting show with my band. Even as a kid my mom said I would get sick from getting myself so worked up about the anticipating of say going on an exciting trip or Christmas.

My guess is that some of us have natural high levels of adrenaline; probably the reason caffeine makes me feel like I want to jump out of my skin and I've got little tolerance for drugs or alcohol.

With that said, I could easily see an attack being brought on by an exciting trip or anything you've been anticipating or thinking a lot about. It's like you're a tea kettle; eventually the pressure builds up until your whistle blows.

I don't understand why you people with the panic attacks don't just go get some valium or xanax. I mean, you suffer from these panic attacks and it sucks but turns out there's a surefire cure for panic attacks readily available in pill form....why wouldn't you take advantage of it? I mean, that's what those pills are for.

Marsupialized wrote:I don't understand why you people with the panic attacks don't just go get some valium or xanax. I mean, you suffer from these panic attacks and it sucks but turns out there's a surefire cure for panic attacks readily available in pill form....why wouldn't you take advantage of it? I mean, that's what those pills are for.

Well, it's silly to take a pill everyday unless it's something that plagues a person on a regular basis. Most people experience these attacks only a few times throughout their life. Also, it's usually completely unexpected so it's not something you can necessarily anticipate unless you suffer from social phobias, which is a wholy different issue that requires therapy.

Not to mention, the medications you mention are very expensive for anyone not covered by health insurance.

NerblyBear wrote:Chozo, you're the man for having Honore de Balzac as your avatar!

Kind of you to notice. I am more a Pérez Galdós man, being that I study Spanish, but I came across this portrait on wikipedia and simply couldn't resist. I will probably look a lot like this in 20 years.

NerblyBear wrote:and I can definitely relate to your feelings. Sounds like we were separated at birth!

As an atheist/pantheist in practice (though maybe agnostic in theory), I can't overstate the importance of the concept of god in dealing with this shit. For me, trouncing my neurosis is intrinsically linked to realizing my adult self, the latter of which parallels my struggle to understand myself without a god. Because it does not exist. This is a very esoteric fragment of an individual perspective, but it might make some sense to you.

Forgive me for my momentary lapse into new-age chozo.

hellyes!! wrote:My guess is that some of us have natural high levels of adrenaline; probably the reason caffeine makes me feel like I want to jump out of my skin and I've got little tolerance for drugs or alcohol.

With that said, I could easily see an attack being brought on by an exciting trip or anything you've been anticipating or thinking a lot about. It's like you're a tea kettle; eventually the pressure builds up until your whistle blows.

I can relate to that, there is definately a process that builds up pressure, and the pressure relieves itself in this nasty way. This could also relate to some of my experiences from eating at Taco Bell. The strange thing about it, was that I felt like I was a completely different person when it happened. Not possible to describe. I think what you experience could lead to a panic attack so I hope you've figured out a way to manage it.