jray23
24-08-19, 06:04
Hey gang,
For the first time in well over a year I anxiety spiraled and just completely lost it. It was slowly building up over the course of the week but tonight I just went full on panic attack. :(
All week I have been feeling like I need a deep breath now and then and it often feels like it's not completely going down. Even sometimes when I yawn. Like it's getting caught somewhere in my throat or upper chest. Early in the week my brain was wandering to simple respiratory infections (and I googled...oops). So Thursday I called the doctor office on my break to schedule an appt for Friday. Well upon hearing "feels like my breath isn't going all the way in" I was transferred immediately to the phone nurse who asked a whole bunch of Q's to determine if I should go to ER.
I was calm then and told her no it's all good just give me a regular appt. But later that day it seemed to trigger in my brain that maybe this was a life threatening heart problem. To fight it I tried to do an exposure by going out and walking a mile then jogging another half. The walking was fine but jogging wore me out immediately. I'm not in shape though. It was a struggle but i felt calm after.
At the doc I didn't address any heart concerns and he listened to my lungs and had me do a breathing power test and said I was all fine and that maybe allergies and postnasal drip was just making breathing a bit more difficult. Then this evening the fear started growing again so I tried to do the walk/jog again, and during it, it felt a bit easier than the first time although I swore I felt a tinge of pain in my chest (now from a calmer state I am sure that is from my lings/ribs being irritated from all the air gulping I've been doing this week). But a few minutes into cooling down at home, I felt like it was hard to breathe properly and it just exploded to full blown panic mode. Upon walking to get more water I swore I felt light-headed or that I might pass out or have an imminent heart attack.
After 15 minutes of not really calming down I texted my new girlfriend and embarrassingly admitted how I was feeling (she never saw this side of me yet) as I was so frightened I didn't care how I would look to her. At that point I figured I was either going to her for help or the ER. I then drove to her place and she helped me calm down most of the way.
I'm no longer panicked but the anxiety is certainly still going strong as the air hunger is still how it typically has been all week. It's like I can't dodge the feeling. Any advice on what to do moving forward? I'll try to get in front of my therapist this weekend. One of my typical tools of deep breathing practice doesn't work because that's the symptom. Exposure by exercise made me worse. My thought diary didn't work in the moment either. I tried reasoning that my heart has been proven healthy by tests a couple years ago, couldn't crack the catastrophic thoughts. I'm struggling to find a tool to fight off this anxiety and/or panic. I'm going to look for that link here to that panic cartoon series, that helped me once years ago.
Any thoughts?
Sent from my Moto G (5) Plus using Tapatalk
For the first time in well over a year I anxiety spiraled and just completely lost it. It was slowly building up over the course of the week but tonight I just went full on panic attack. :(
All week I have been feeling like I need a deep breath now and then and it often feels like it's not completely going down. Even sometimes when I yawn. Like it's getting caught somewhere in my throat or upper chest. Early in the week my brain was wandering to simple respiratory infections (and I googled...oops). So Thursday I called the doctor office on my break to schedule an appt for Friday. Well upon hearing "feels like my breath isn't going all the way in" I was transferred immediately to the phone nurse who asked a whole bunch of Q's to determine if I should go to ER.
I was calm then and told her no it's all good just give me a regular appt. But later that day it seemed to trigger in my brain that maybe this was a life threatening heart problem. To fight it I tried to do an exposure by going out and walking a mile then jogging another half. The walking was fine but jogging wore me out immediately. I'm not in shape though. It was a struggle but i felt calm after.
At the doc I didn't address any heart concerns and he listened to my lungs and had me do a breathing power test and said I was all fine and that maybe allergies and postnasal drip was just making breathing a bit more difficult. Then this evening the fear started growing again so I tried to do the walk/jog again, and during it, it felt a bit easier than the first time although I swore I felt a tinge of pain in my chest (now from a calmer state I am sure that is from my lings/ribs being irritated from all the air gulping I've been doing this week). But a few minutes into cooling down at home, I felt like it was hard to breathe properly and it just exploded to full blown panic mode. Upon walking to get more water I swore I felt light-headed or that I might pass out or have an imminent heart attack.
After 15 minutes of not really calming down I texted my new girlfriend and embarrassingly admitted how I was feeling (she never saw this side of me yet) as I was so frightened I didn't care how I would look to her. At that point I figured I was either going to her for help or the ER. I then drove to her place and she helped me calm down most of the way.
I'm no longer panicked but the anxiety is certainly still going strong as the air hunger is still how it typically has been all week. It's like I can't dodge the feeling. Any advice on what to do moving forward? I'll try to get in front of my therapist this weekend. One of my typical tools of deep breathing practice doesn't work because that's the symptom. Exposure by exercise made me worse. My thought diary didn't work in the moment either. I tried reasoning that my heart has been proven healthy by tests a couple years ago, couldn't crack the catastrophic thoughts. I'm struggling to find a tool to fight off this anxiety and/or panic. I'm going to look for that link here to that panic cartoon series, that helped me once years ago.
Any thoughts?
Sent from my Moto G (5) Plus using Tapatalk