Have had a bad day :(

[Nicola Main]

Things are getting even worse. Had to get a work colleague to walk me home but even though she was there (I had thought that I would be fine with someone else) I had a really bad panic attack and just wanted to run all the way home. I'm literally less than a 5 minute walk from my work which is on a straight bit of busy road but I've got the road in my head all the time and it's like I think it's a bad area. I was wearing my sunglasses and my backpack but I felt so bad. I've actually thought of taking my bike the short distance to work so I don't have to walk. I'm thinking if I cycle there and back it'll be such a quick ride that I won't have time to think about panicking. I'm really worrying now as I'm going away on holiday in a weeks time, staying in a B&B for two nights but then camping for the other 2. I really do not want to camp as I don't like the thought of lying on the ground in a flimsy tent. The field is quite open but with hedges around it, I'm hoping our pitch is near the hedge where it'll be more sheltered.

It's fear of open spaces and bright sunny conditions that it happens most often. Can anyone give me any advice? It's always on my mind and I don't want it to come to a time where I don't want to leave the house at all. I will see a doctor about it but don't think I'll get to see one before I leave for the holidays. Don't know what to do :(

[cymraig_chris]

Panic is the activation of the fight flight response, when you are anxious you are at your most safe.

People who experience anxiety/panic are running away from or fighting nothing.

By running/fighting you are teaching your panic that it is a necessary response so it keeps switching on. If you face your fears by just letting panic happen, panic calculates that it is no longer necessary and switches off, it responds purely and only by our reactions to it, it does not learn by spoken language of thought, it learns by demonstration. So if we run it calculates danger and keeps switched on. If we don't react, it calculates that there is no danger and this switches off.

The fight flight response is a benevolent calculating machine, as stated, it learns by demonstration, and it only learns when it is switched on.

Which means that when we are in panic mode it is learning the fastest.

Which means that the higher the anxiety the quicker it can be switched off.

We switch it off by accepting it and not reacting.

For further clarification read Dr Claire Weekes, or Dr David Carbonell. For a more light hearted explanation read www.nothingworks.weebly.com