Hello

[OldChris]

A bit about me - late 40's male married 3 university aged kids - absolutely nothing to be anxious about!
But 8 years ago - major work stress stuation lead to chronic anxiety and what i now know to be panic attacks - took the tabs and had some counselling - felt "better" but not well in a couple of years. Never had any time off but i changed jobs (interviews and tests were a real trauma) - but some situations were and still are hard to deal with - some examples - going overseas (i don't) traffic jams (ok if i am alone but i won't share a ride just in case) meetings - when i am the focal point, trains and tube. Now i am terrible sleeper / can't work function for more than 3 or 4 hours / terrible chronic tiredness / lost my fitness and the get up and go got up and gone long since. I just now feel that unless i make a radical life change, make a break so to speak / recover my fitness and lose a ton of weight that i am heading for a bad place. I still take a 20mg flouxetine dose - not sure that it is helping much - but it feels like a crutch.

So what do i hope for - well some contact with likeminded people who might just have some helpful advice.

Hope to hear from you all
Old Chris

[marie1974]

hiya chris and welcome to nmp, well u will find lots of very useful advice and support here and make some friends too, this site has helped me loads and im sure it will help u too. hugs xxx

[Missy69]

Hiya Chris,
Massive welcome ! Im quite new here myself, but i can tell you in the short time i have been here, there are lots of nice helpful people with lots of sound advice. It gives you the chance to know your not alone in what you are suffering, which in my opinion is a great help to not feel your the only one. Everybody just seems to understand, surprising because they all seem to have been in your shoes, you dont come across that everyday in a just a normal day eh ! anyway hope you settle in well and get to make some good friends. Take care Sarah x

[jodie]

hiya

:welcome: to nmp

jodie xx

[lorac]

Hi Chris

Welcome to the site I am sure you will meet many people on here who understand what you are going through.

Take care

Carol

[Cathy V]

Hi Chris and welcome to nmp. Your anxiety 'journey' is a familiar one here so we all know how you feel. I can relate to most of what you say, especially the loss of fitness-wieght gain part! Its a viscious circle isnt it? the more the anxiety takes hold and the fears creep in to our lives, the less we move around for fear of 'damaging' our bodies further. It takes time to change the programming, and realise that yes it really is anxiety causing all the symptoms, and that its just our imagination that feeds it.

To realise that actually our bodies are behaving exactly the way they should in reaction to our fears. The part that produces the adrenaline responsible for most of it, doesnt know that its only a spider, or that you're only sitting in a car on the motorway...the fear is real for us and so are the symptoms, but its not because we are ill in the true sense, its because of our imagination.

For those of us who do travel we have our coping stratagies and you will see these often on here when members talk about travelling and holidays etc. like you i do make myself get out there, but i really dont like it and even going on a train is planned with military precision, especially if i have to change trains! I do fly back to uk often to see my children and grandchildren and with the help of a large glass of red wine in the airport im usually ok. I dont do motorways very well, as a driver or as a passenger...my 20yr old daughter who goes to uni in uk often picks me up from birmingham airport and just despares of me because im a nervous wreck, and if the traffic grinds to a stop on there i just freak out...i prefer to be up in the bloody plane i think!

Im constantly amazed at how much we do push ourselves to do and how well we manage to hide alot of it from people around us, and thats a tribute to our strength. We anxies are stronger than you know. This forum has helped so many people just by understanding exactly how we all feel. Hope we can help you too.

Now where did i put that exercise bike......

Cathy xxx :D :welcome:

[robertz]

nice to meet you :)

[milly jones]

welcome to no more panic

its a wonderful place to share our anxiety

love milly xx :hugs:

[pooh]

Hi there and welcome along to NMP

Pooh x

[alexis]

Hi and welcome Im sure you will get lots of good advice here and find lots of new friends.