Beyondthesea
23-03-11, 02:20
Hello. I'm new here. Right now I feel great for my age both mentally and physically after years of anxiety and depression. I thought I was alone. I've visited numerous sites that deal with anxiety disorders and depression and I am astounded by the numbers of people who are having difficulties. I feel for all of you. But there is hope and basically it comes from each of you. For many years I suffered from anxiety disorders and depression. In fact all of my siblings did too. I think a lot of it stemmed from the fact that we were brought up in a dysfunctional home environment. But that's another story. When I turned 40 years of age, I started having emotional problems. I vividly recall my first panic attack. The emotional damage it inflicted lasted for years. Sometimes I would go along for months feeling great and then sink back into a depressive state and the panic attacks would start. Just like all of you I didn't know what was happening to me. I thought I was dying. I felt like I couldn't breathe, my heart raced. my blood pressure soared, I felt faint and I shook all over. I've had more tests in the last 20 years than most people have in a lifetime. I've kept the medical offices in my hometown operating in the black because of all those visits. I am a one-man economic powerhouse to the medical community. But after years of suffering I finally learned that I wasn't dying of some strange illness. I learned that I was only human, living in a fast-paced world with too many demands on my time. After skipping around from one psychiatrist to another I finally landed in the offices of a doctor who seemed to have a firm grasp of the situation. One day he instructed me to ask myself a question the next time I felt a panic attack coming on. "Ask yourself a ridiculous question, like `do I feel like laughing today?' The idea was to get your brain engaged in something else to stop the attack from escalating, to stop thoughts of dying. Ask the questiion repeatedly until the brain focuses on the question. It works. You'll feel the panic symptoms for a minute or two and then your breathing will return to normal and your mind will rest easier. In fact, you will feel like you just won a battle, which you did, and a relaxed state will follow. Every once in a while I will have this sudden urge to go into panic mood but I simply shrug it off with a laugh and force myself to concentrate on something else. One of these days I will be completely free of panic. It's a long process. One other thing I learned along the way is don't let others (generally employers) force you into an anxious and panic mode. If they persist cut them loose and find another job or line of work. A career is only that. It's not supposed to ruin your life. When you take charge, you win.