Shadowwin
07-01-06, 09:50
I realized tonight as I wandered through the site that i've been here since September and I have never sat down and introduced myself to you all just jumped in one night on a thread with a post. So tonight I would like to take the oppurtunity to offer a proper introduction.
My User name says it all Shadowwin.. That is who I was for a very long time a woman who sat in the shadows of life and watched it spiral by as if I was watching a movie on Television. I actually adopted the name about 10 years ago just before my panic attacks began and right after I was raped I wanted to be invisible, I wanted to be forgotten, I wanted to melt into the darkness and just hide from it all.
In April I will celebrate my 32nd Birthday, In Febuary my 6th Wedding Anniversay and I am the proud Step-Mom of a wonderful 10 year old boy. My hobbies include Medevial Re-eneactment and Creative writing as well as burying myself into the computer.. hehe.
Now that, that is all out of the way I can move on to what has brought a great majority of us to this site and particulary these forums I am a sufferer of Panic Disorder.
Who would of thought 21 years ago when I laid in my bed scared to go to sleep, crying because I felt like I couldn't breathe, shaking for no reason, heart pounding thinking nothing was real that there was a name for what I was going through. I was only 10 years old when it all began not to long after my Grandfather died.. His death had an incredible impact on me.. I had been raised by my Mother who was a single Mother long before it was accepted, I endure physical and mental abuse from my Grandmother who was hailed as the family saint and my Mother never had time for me nor would she listen when I would tell her what was happening to me the only one I had to turn to was my Grandfather and in Many ways he was not only my Father Figure since mine took off before I was even more but he was my first best friend.
So there I was left alone in a house with two women who really could have cared less, my mother was so wrapped up in her career (She was a nurse for 27 years at a Hospital here in New York) and my Grandmother was nothing more than a bitter old controlling woman who had her nose in everything I did.
It has taken me years to get to the point that I could take or write about any of this.. I always thought it was just me, that I was loosing my mind or that I was dying slowly from something noone else could see. My Mother despite her nursing career never saw the things her daughter was going through in fact she ignored many of my medical issues that later manifested in other forms in the years that have come to pass.
Then one day the attacks were gone.. by the time they faded the first time I was 16 years old and I had turned into the rebellious teenager who just didn't care anymore. My Mother took ill she was diagnosed with blood clots in both of her legs and forced to retire from her job she ended up on disability before my 17th birthday and I ended up quitting school to take on a full time job to help her afford the too tiny apartment we had moved into after my grandmother was put into a nursing home.
She still never had time for me, instead she would always tell me how she was on blood thinners and if she cut herself while noone was home and couldn't get help she would bleed to death one heck of a thing to tell your teenage daughter and slowly the attacks began to come back.
Well mom eventually met a man who took her on and supported her every whim and desire but he couldn't stand me finally he laid out the ultimatum me or her and a week before my 18th Birthday Mom opened the door and put me and my things out to this day I have never gotten an applogy for it nor does she appear to have any remorse for it.
For 7 years after that I drifted from place to place got mixed up in a bad ground, fell face first into a drug problem and a terrible first marriage by the age of 20. I had occasional attacks here and there but nothing that would make me believe I had a severe problem finally around 25 it
My User name says it all Shadowwin.. That is who I was for a very long time a woman who sat in the shadows of life and watched it spiral by as if I was watching a movie on Television. I actually adopted the name about 10 years ago just before my panic attacks began and right after I was raped I wanted to be invisible, I wanted to be forgotten, I wanted to melt into the darkness and just hide from it all.
In April I will celebrate my 32nd Birthday, In Febuary my 6th Wedding Anniversay and I am the proud Step-Mom of a wonderful 10 year old boy. My hobbies include Medevial Re-eneactment and Creative writing as well as burying myself into the computer.. hehe.
Now that, that is all out of the way I can move on to what has brought a great majority of us to this site and particulary these forums I am a sufferer of Panic Disorder.
Who would of thought 21 years ago when I laid in my bed scared to go to sleep, crying because I felt like I couldn't breathe, shaking for no reason, heart pounding thinking nothing was real that there was a name for what I was going through. I was only 10 years old when it all began not to long after my Grandfather died.. His death had an incredible impact on me.. I had been raised by my Mother who was a single Mother long before it was accepted, I endure physical and mental abuse from my Grandmother who was hailed as the family saint and my Mother never had time for me nor would she listen when I would tell her what was happening to me the only one I had to turn to was my Grandfather and in Many ways he was not only my Father Figure since mine took off before I was even more but he was my first best friend.
So there I was left alone in a house with two women who really could have cared less, my mother was so wrapped up in her career (She was a nurse for 27 years at a Hospital here in New York) and my Grandmother was nothing more than a bitter old controlling woman who had her nose in everything I did.
It has taken me years to get to the point that I could take or write about any of this.. I always thought it was just me, that I was loosing my mind or that I was dying slowly from something noone else could see. My Mother despite her nursing career never saw the things her daughter was going through in fact she ignored many of my medical issues that later manifested in other forms in the years that have come to pass.
Then one day the attacks were gone.. by the time they faded the first time I was 16 years old and I had turned into the rebellious teenager who just didn't care anymore. My Mother took ill she was diagnosed with blood clots in both of her legs and forced to retire from her job she ended up on disability before my 17th birthday and I ended up quitting school to take on a full time job to help her afford the too tiny apartment we had moved into after my grandmother was put into a nursing home.
She still never had time for me, instead she would always tell me how she was on blood thinners and if she cut herself while noone was home and couldn't get help she would bleed to death one heck of a thing to tell your teenage daughter and slowly the attacks began to come back.
Well mom eventually met a man who took her on and supported her every whim and desire but he couldn't stand me finally he laid out the ultimatum me or her and a week before my 18th Birthday Mom opened the door and put me and my things out to this day I have never gotten an applogy for it nor does she appear to have any remorse for it.
For 7 years after that I drifted from place to place got mixed up in a bad ground, fell face first into a drug problem and a terrible first marriage by the age of 20. I had occasional attacks here and there but nothing that would make me believe I had a severe problem finally around 25 it