Hi,
I registered on this forum a few years back, made a couple of posts but mostly read.
Today, I find myself typing on here as a way to express my feelings at the moment rather than re-introducing myself.
My Background with anxiety in brief:
I started to suffer health anxiety about fifteen years ago, and was medicated for 8 years. I have a fear of doctors and ill health. I managed to ween myself off of Paroxetine about four years ago. After getting through the weening phase my awareness and surroundings felt much sharper and I had more energy. I never used a psychologist and rarely went to the doctor - worried he might find something incurable. I quit smoking 3 years ago - I think this habit was an underlying precursor for my HA. Mind you, I did smoke 5 cigarettes Friday, I'll come back to that in a bit.
Basically, ever since I've been off the medication I can recall, 1-2 Panic attacks in that time. However, I am generally a bit more stressed in normal day to day activities and can snap and become irritated by my loved ones. But I can be happy and proud too. So it's not all bad, it's how I manage by myself without the help of white coats, psychologists and medication. I've also been running for the past two years and being exercising more, yesterday I road 18km on a bike ride, the day before I ran 8km. So, even though as an ex-smoker, I feel fairly healthy and exercise does help which I now view as my medication - but I have to fit this is with being a father and it isn't easy especially the latter part and being anxious.
I can distinctly remember my last panic/anxiety attack a year ago at Christmas time. I went Christmas shopping to the local shopping centre with my eldest boy. I walked into the centre and within five minutes I felt the whole place, with people buzzing around me, closing in on me. It felt really weird. My chest started to hurt and I knew in that moment I was having a panic attack. I recognised it. I felt uncomfortable. I had to get out of the shopping centre for some fresh air and space.
What I don't remember was how I felt in the following days, which leads me here today.
Wednesday 13th May 2020
I was at work. I felt a burning sensation in my back and found this disturbing. I do see a chiropractor but haven't seen him for 6 months. The sensation went away and then came back again an hour or so later. I Googled my symptoms. Didn't find anything too alarming but I was worried as I had never felt these symptoms in my back before. Usually, I know my back, it feels tight and aches, so I book into see the chiropractor. But this sensation didn't occur to me that is was my back at the time. Because I was at work and in a working environment where I was on the go, I didn't have time to rationalise this sensation.
1 hour later I was standing in front of my colleagues and felt a weird kind of dizziness quickly come over me, and a slight feeling of nausea. I had to get out of the room for some fresh air and take myself for a walk trying to figure out what had just happened to me. I found it disturbing and scary. When you tell your colleagues how you felt, they say 'oh, that's no good' or 'you should go and see a doctor'. My inner monologue says **** that. I hate the doctors and my colleagues telling me this, scares the shit out of me even more. They don't know I suffer anxiety. So, I brush this off as vertigo to them.
I've never had the feeling of dizziness or lightheaded-ness. I get chest pains, feel edgy, irritable, nervous, nagging negative thoughts about my health and in extreme circumstances get depersonalisation.
Thursday 14th May
I woke up feeling foggy and out of touch with reality - scary. I felt edgy all day. Legs felt really weak like jelly. Had one more dizzy episode but generally felt terrible all day. I spoke to my partner who told me that it was anxiety. She never convinced me at the time but I suspect she was right.
It didn't occur to me that yesterday I'd had an anxiety attack - usually I'm much more aware at that moment in time that it is a panic attack but it didn't feel like one I'm accustomed to.
Friday 15th May
Still felt weird and on edge. Felt depersonalised and out of touch. Irritable. Worried. Bought a pack of cigarettes, smoked five threw the rest away. Knowing it wouldn't help I did this to get some sort of instant relief. Felt I had to do something more proactive that smoke and wonder what was happening to myself all day with those negative reoccurring thoughts. So to convince myself my dizziness on Wednesday wasn't anything more sinister I tested that theory by going for a 5km run - to boost much needed endorphins as well. I ran. No dizziness. Convinced myself if something more sinister was at work I wouldn't have been able to run. A couple of hours past I started to feel relaxed and edgy again. I thought **** it I can't feel any worse I'm going to have some beer. I had 8 beers that night knowing I felt depersonalised and thought I can feel depersonalised and drunk at the same time. I actually felt better, partly because I was cheerfully drunk and a bit more carefree and not so uptight and scared.
Saturday 16th May
Started to realise to myself I may have actually had a panic attack but the effects of it from Wednesday had carried on in the following days. Don't remember what usually happens to me in the days after I've had a panic attack which is why I found this strange. Wife told me I need to keep myself busy and assured me it was a panic attack - she knows me well enough by now you know. I did some work in the garden and then went for 8km run again to make sure my dizziness wasn't nothing more sinister (that is what worried me after Wed's episode). No problem. Laid off the beer though. Although I had still been having coffee in the morning. I have a relatively new coffee machine which grounds up all the beans and tastes real nice. The exact ingredients - alcohol-beer I read you shouldn't have when suffering anxiety.
Sunday 17th May
Woke up from the best nights sleep in 4 days - couldn't sleep on previous nights. Wife again, while she was at home with the kids on the weekend told me I need to keep busy. Went out into the garden did some more work. Then I decided Sunday afternoon to go out for a bike ride with my eldest son. We rode about 18km in total which was good. Started to realise that the denationalisation was going and I was more at sync with reality now. Although, I still felt on edge, nervous and irritable at different moments during the day. I also felt, happy, normal and content in other parts of the day.
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I suppose, I have just written my own personal diary on here and my turn of events over the last 5 days or so. I don't know why I have written this on here for the world to see. Hoping, subconsciously it makes me feel better? I'm quite a private person when it comes to my feelings and emotions and I bottle stuff up. Thankfully this place is fairly anonymous, especially from people who may happen to know me. I don't like to share my anxiety with people I know in real life, except for those closest to me. All of 2 people I suppose. My wife and my Mum.
I'm going to say, that I had some sort of panic attack - though I wasn't aware of it. There is nothing wrong with me physically. I wasn't dizzy because I have tumour. I was dizzy because I had a panic attack - a symptom I've never had before. I have suffered for the last 4 days with hot flushes and denationalisation and have assured myself this was a panic attack.
Why I have written this all on here, I don't really know.
Take Care,
Topsy turvy
