When did yours start????

[clickaway]

Cannot remember the situation of my first panic attack; I think I just felt very tense and nervous at work one day 12 years ago and went to the doctors. Then had panics for next ten years.

Two and a half years ago I suffered stomach pains and that was the start of my GAD. Had a few days off work, but after returning for a couple of days I was then permanantly off sick til I gave up work altogether.

My onset of GAD followed a period of concern about not being valued at work, loss of girlfriend and general depression over war etc - it was the year of Iraq war.

My panics and GAD are the result of bottling so much emotion all my life. They had to come out sooner or later and am currently in very painful process of letting those long-term emotional pains out.



Ray
http://www.anxietyrelease.org.uk/

And when you get the choice to sit it out or dance, I hope you dance.
~Mark Sanders and Tia Sillers

[shiv]

Hi there

Mine started about 12 years ago. In the previous year, I'd got pregnant, my step father comitted suicide, moved house and had my baby and then one evening I was watching telly (I can even remember what it was- it was a film called "Dave"!!) and all of a sudden heartrate shot up, began shaking and couldn't breathe and well I'm sure you know the rest! I had the first of many trips to casualty the following morning when anxiety was diagnosed and the rest as they say, is history!

Shiv x

[giddy]

Hi - I've had 3 episodes of anxiety/panic. The first was 14 years ago and I had major axiety attacks in shops and on public transport. At the time I was in my final year at uni and was bulimic, I think low blood sugar was the problem. It lasted about a year and then went. My second episode was about 4 years later, I had insomnia and the same anxiety attacks - not sure what caused it to come back, but I was miserable in my job. I am currently recovering from about 4 months of full on constant anxiety, I think it was brought about by stress at work and insomnia agin.
Love Helen

[darkangel]

had nervous breakdown 9 yrs ago due to various stressful events in my life and my lifestyle which left me with panic attacks, GAD, agoraphobia and clinical depression.
Lived 8 yrs of HELL - lost job, marriage break up led to me being homeless, hospitalised due to mental state.
But I turned my life around and still have the odd anxiety symptom but nothing I cant manage.
CBT does work
Darkangel

........life is for living not just for surviving

[manmoor]

Mine started just over 10 years ago when my father died with lung cancer. Ive only recently found out I have health anxiety and I diagnosed myself. Ive always been a pessimist and I think the worst of everything but now daily I live with thinking I have cancer somewhere in my body. Depending what part of my bodys sorest when I wake up by lunchtime I have diagnosed cancer there. Then I wake up next morning and hey presto I start all over again.

Mandy x

[Coni]

Hi everyone,

I first had a panic attack 20 years ago when I was 19. I was in a graveyard at the time, putting flowers on my now husbands grans grave. My heart just seemed to start beating erratically, I couldnt breath, couldnt focus properly and thought I was going to die! In the year leading up to that I lost my dad suddenly, moved away from home to start nursing 3 weeks after his death, and my mum was suicidal and drinking heavily. That was the start of a year of hell and a lifetime of anxiety (and more recently depression) although I rarely have full blown panics now.

Coni X

[anxious]

I started with OCD when i was about 14 and it just evolved from there - i'm 39 now!!

Laughter is a tranquilizer with no side effects

[jackie]

over 4 years ago. all began with a fright that i may die frim my pal anorexia( enemy really)

i realised i didnt want to die but that night i ended up in casulty. i though ti was dying. realised 3 years later it was a panic attack

good question

jackie

[honeybee3939]

Hi,

Mine started around 10 years ago when i was held at knife point by a armed robber with a knife to my throat and made to empty the safe in a local store where i worked, i lost alot of confidence and trust in people, then 3 years later was in hospital with a huge abcess in my stomach(thought it was a cancer tumour) and nearly lost my life due to septecima, my anxiety got alot worse and ended up with Agrophobia.



Andrea
xxx

[Daisybun]

Mine started properly 4 years ago after a thyroid op. I have always been a worrier about my health, especially fear of ancer but kept a hold on it until that time. I had my first panic attack after the op and then it developed into depression. The fear of it all has been with me ever since. The anxiety comes and goes but i realise now that I have health anxiety - every time i get something wrong I believe it is fatal and I am living my life in that way - not good. Latest panic and anxiety started in Autumn last year after incident at work that shook my confidence. Am currently off sick due to this.

Take care
Daisybun

'This too will pass'