caffeine alcohol and travel

[mimie]

I have GAD and have been doing so well, exercising, watching diet, relaxing. Every time I go away from home I get anxiety symptoms which are real scary - chest pains, breathless, hot sweats, but I keep going in the hope that I will get less affected. I am going away next week to see my daughter in Switzerland for a few days and was so pleased that I had kept the anxiety at bay - then I went for a meal at a friends, had 2 cups of coffee with caffeine and 2 glasses of wine-I could hardly sleep last night- heart pounding and today I feel awful all the symptoms are back and I have a sore tum and feel as though I need to stay near a loo! Can anybody give me any advice please as i really want to fly see my daughter.

[rchippex]

I feel your pain. Unfamiliarity seems to have brought my anxiety back recently. I went 3 years with ZERO anxiety and recently I went away to Spain on a business trip and on day 3 it hit me like a freight train. I couldnt think, I was sweating and shaking and felt awful. I couldn't believe it hit me so hard. I have had a bit of anxiety since then now whenever I am tired. In fact I have just come to this forum to write a post about it! One thing i learnt when I first got over my anxiety some years back was to learn to accept how i felt and do whatever it was anyway. I had to keep reminding myself that I 'didnt care'. I would repeat it to myself and after about 3 months I began to actually not care. I finally saw the light at the end of the tunnel! If you hang in there and get tough with your mind and tell it that you are going no matter what then I am sure you will soon be flying off without fear.

I think part of the problem for me was the feeling of not being able to just go home if I got worse. That was what deepened the anxiety for me. Luckily that day my boss was understanding and took me back to the hotel at 6pm instead of the usual 8-9pm. He is pretty cool to be fair. Sometimes just knowing there is an out if you need one is enough to make you relax again.

Oh by the way I used to have to avoid caffeine like the plague. If there was ever one thing that would set me off it was caffeine. Since beating my anxiety those years back I have been able to drink it again but it is well known that caffeine will set the mind racing which really doesn't help an already tired mind. If you start to get anxiety I have found it is generally a lack of relaxation in the mind and the brain just cant cope and even more so when tired. Try getting an early night or sitting quietly with a book in the evening to just unwind a bit. Anxiety is a funny thing really as the more you worry about it the worse it gets as you continue to batter your mind when it is already struggling to cope. Being able to let go and relax is possible by retraining your mind but for the mean time you need to just take some deep stomach breaths and avoid the caffeine I think. Try to concentrate on why you are there and tell the little imp in your mind that is attempting to make you feel a certain way that you are going to stay and enjoy your time there no matter what.

[Oosh]

Hiya mimie

I'm sure the caffeine and alcohol will be well out of your system by next week and you'll feel a lot more resilient. Go for some nice walks in between now and then and replace that anxiety with lots of calming feel good chemicals.
Find some good podcasts to listen to on the plane on a subject you like or a good book.

Enjoy yourself. You're very lucky, I'd love to visit Switzerland. :yahoo:

[mimie]

thank you both for your replies. I just want to tell you that I made the trip and for the first time in 4 years did not have any anxiety attacks - i avoided alcohol and caffeine- drank loads of orange juice and the only time i felt slight panic was when I went on a long walk with lots of steps, in this case I just concentrated on the walk and put the anxiety out of my mind. I do hope you are both successful in being anxiety free.