After six months of being ill one way or another, I finally slipped into the world of physical anxiety symptoms. I had to have an xray which involved injecting me with some dye. As one of my ailments is an immune disorder, I was terrified that I would have a reaction to the dye. From the moment I left the hospital things turned really bad.

I went to A&E twice and had the doc visit me at home within the first week. Symptoms were chest tightness/pain, difficult breathing, heart racing - all things I later found to be anxiety related (thanks to reading this site). There was another symptom though - my stomach area felt like I was winded and I had a constant "falling" sensation. This was never investigated. 4 weeks later, after several more doc visits (inc 2 courses of antibiotics for a throat infection that still hasn't gone) they prescribed beta blockers and antidepressants. I was sure that the stomach thing wasn't right, that it was in some way responsible for the rising feelings of panic and not the other way round. I stopped the antidepressants after 1 tablet, they made me completely disconnected.

To cut a very long story short, I went to stay with a friend and despite her efforts and care, I slipped further into despair. I couldn't sleep, I had terrible angst-ridden nightmares that woke me with a start every 20 mins. this was it - I had had enough. As a last resort, I called in another friend who is a complementary therapist. She listened intently as I blubbed my way through the saga for the nth time, then she examined my abdomen. She believed that my diaphragm was in spasm and had probably been that way since the xray (where they also put heavy weights on your abdomen to keep the dye up in the kidneys while they take the xrays). Anyway, hurrah - someone was listening and telling me there WAS something physical and it was not in my mind. She then started reflexology on my feet and while she was talking, I had the strangest fluttering sensation in the stomach area - it freaked me out but she confirmed that she was working on that area of my feet and that's what's supposed to happen! I was a complete sceptic about alternative therapy until that moment. She had released the cramp I had been suffering with and oh the relief!!! I felt like a weight had been lifted, quite literally.

I still have the aching tense chest muscles, racing heart and my stomach still feels a bit odd, especially after food, but I am on the mend. I have panicky feelings and get dizzy but am learning to cope. It's all new to me as I was relatively OK a couple of months ago (although reading another post earlier made me realise I had been heading for this for a number of years it seems)!

The posts on this fantastic site have made me understand exactly what's going on and roughly where I am in the process. I had never been so frightened in my life and I am both glad and appalled that there are so many of you out there suffering in a similar way.

I have quite a few questions and maybe some of my experiences of late can be helpful to others, so I'll see you all on the other forums.

Eeb