Originally posted by brilab45
reply to [url=http://www.abovetopsecret.com/forum/thread524810/pg1#pid7665678

---

You said it better than I could have. Thanks. Sorry for the one liner.

Uh-Oh.... you are aware that putting ( . ) periods in a string of words
does no make that reply a two liner ?!


Naw... i'm just trying to raise your eyebrow !

in an addition... my mother-in-law, 91, was in a stage of psychological distress ~ on the verge of going into a full fledged Panic-Attack ~

I'm still not satisified that my talking 'Bertha' out of the pre-panic stress was the proper thing to do.
Perhaps She knew that there was a 'clot' floating in her bloodstream...and that intuitive 'feeling' Bertha had...knowing that 'something' was amiss...
was the true nature of things and she was content & resigned to have but a short future.

and I was focusing on the 'Panic Attack' as a stress causing thing.
all this was some 2 months before 'Passing Away' (15 July '09)


One thing i know for sure, I can not fill the shoes of a Hospice, End-of-Life counselor

By the way did you know that most and some flus and parasites can be the cause of Panic Attacks?

I suffer from really bad anxiety attacks too. I've heard that each person feels it differently, my hands go numb, my heart races, i sometimes lose sight completley, sweat, throwing up (if its a big one) small ones are just hearth palpitations and tingly hands.

First attack was when i was 20 and just living out of home and lost my job (maybe it is a fear of earning your own keep eh? ) due to glandular fever. I thought i was dying, although i didnt go to ER (fear of hospitals :/), just went home and took it easy (was out at dinner) then got some blood tests done the next day, but now i'm 25 and they are still there, i've been tested over the years just to make sure there isnt anything causing them when a new one comes along, but eventually you realise that its pretty much all mental, you just have to tell yourself that it's not a big deal, you can breathe through it and make sure you have things like water and in my case an inhaler because i have asthma, and funnily enough attacks trigger it too, i panic about not being able to breathe, then i have an attack and can't breathe. Ha. I refuse to take medication to stop it because the things they tend to put you on do alot more harm then good.

Plus about OP's theory, i havent yet met an Elderly person that suffers them, besides my mother and father who have depression & anxiety and they are only 52 & 53, the only other people i know that suffer them are about 22, 26 & 29 years old. My Grandfather was in the clean up with hiroshima, and he was a messed up man when he came back and apparently not nice to be around, but as far as i've been told, no anxiety (he did die of cancer due to the radiation) My grandfather on the other side has not been through either war, has has TB, Collapsed lungs multiple times, emphysema, scarlet fever, but never a panic attack or anxiety, he's actually the most chilled man i know.

So i think it's more genetic &/or due to other causes then an elderly generation thing.

[edit on 6-12-2009 by bkaust]

Hey there's new stuff when I hit reply...cool!

Anyways...Why our generation? I tend to think there are lots of reasons.

First, caffeine. People these days are so hopped up on coffee, cola, red bull, etc. - if we could harness the energy of twitching we could power the world.

Second, over-stimulation from lack of sleep, hectic schedules and endless, over-whelming media saturation. We seriously need to un-plug.

Third, as someone above stated, underlying medical issues are exacerbated by all of the above. Mitral Value Prolapse for one, so many people have it and don't even know it, plus it's aggravated by stress. CoQ10 people!

I remember the one and only panic attack I had. I was driving from my home town to ATL. Leaving behind all of my family, my friends, my neighborhood, my favorite bars and many other old haunts and habits. But I had to go, my path traveled elsewhere, and I ended up in an ER in Greenville, AL.

It sucked but I got over it with time and made a new life for myself. Perseverance and patience are virtues long discarded in a world hooked on instant gratification.

I have once experienced something that i suspect is a panic attack. Out of nowhere i got something i thought was a stroke or heart attack. I thought i was gonna die...

I almost passed out, but i fought the feeling. Finally when the feeling did not go away i went with the ambulance to hospital, where they sat me down to wait for 6 hours... Then i got fed-up with waiting and said screw em and went home

While waiting i started realizing it was probably a panic attac, and when i controlled my hyperventilation everything settled down. Everything was caused by respiratory asidosis i think.

I have been plagued with panic attacks since 1992. When they first started I thought I was dieing and had no idea what was happening. After several trips to the dr. he said I had a chemical imbalance, and prescribed Alprazolam and
Paxil.

I started feeling much better so I decided to stop taking alprazolam and quit cold turkey, Boy did i ever pay for it. I was very lucky i was working and my workplace had a medical clinic when i went into withdrawals from the drug.

I have never experienced anything like the withdrawals I had and just lucky I had some of the pills "aprazolam" with me. The nurse made me take one and I came through it ok. Two days later the nurse told me that I was very close to going into a seizure and could have died.

I am no longer taking them but I am still on the anti-depressant. I want to quit taking the drug, However several drs. have told me that I need to stay on the pills. I have overcome the panic attacks with the help of a good psychologist..who taught me to breathe slowly through the nose and exhale slowly through the mouth.. After a little practice the attacks now last but seconds when they used to last minutes.

I tried to wean myself off of the anti-depressant but the Hell I go through with withdrawals are worse than the medicine...

Panic attacks, anxiety, depression. That's the diagnosis I got 3 years ago after finall going to my GP to try to get some answers to what was wrong.

My first ever panic attack came when I was out fishing in the boat with my hubby. In fact, when I look back there was no reason for it to have happened a all, I wasn't worried & the day was calm.
Yet, the feet started to go tingly, & the hands, the tongue started to swell, & before I knew it my hands were totally "clawed" & I was unable to speak, stand or even use my tightly clawed hands! Well, if that didn't set me off & freak me right out, I dunno what would.
Do not remember much after that, but the mind meltdown happened & I passed out, vomiting when I came too about 10 minutes later. Hands still clawed, feet still numb, but I was now able to speak.

Didn't go to the Emergency, it was a weekend & hubby just never took me there- didn't think it was necessary ( a bone of contention in our relationship ever since! )


Anyway,the next 2 years was simmilar, on & off, & no real obvious reason for the panic attacks, just when they came on it was horrendous---those clawing hands ( and fet if I had no shoes on ) just freaked me out. Not to mention not being able to breathe.

So, Dr diagnoses Anxiety & Depression & I am prescribed Effexor, 35mg eventually over the course of the 2 years I went right up to 150mg. They seemed to work, but any mention of going to talk to a Counsellor about my condition would instantly set me off into another episode!!!

One day about 4 months ago I decided that it was time to go off the medication, which was tough, but after 3 weeks of coming off slowly I was weaned--yes, there were side effects including nausea, dizziness, but that as temporary.

Well, I am 1 week out of major surgery ( to my upper body ) & am now in the recovery stages. I am fine, & if I was going to have another "attack" it would have definately been either in Pre-OP or while waiting for the Anesethist to give me my "knock out gas".
Nothing. I appear to no longer suffer from Panic attacks, anxiety, & I guess I now have the same levels of depression as the rest of the population of this planet---normal & managed.

So while I don't like to be on medications for altering mind patterns, I do have to say that without Effexor "redirecting & reprogramming" my brain "patterns" I may be in a much worse situation that I am right now.

Sorry about the long winded post , but just wanted to add my perspective.

Lastly, I've never taken recreational drugs & haven't had alcohol for 12 months or more. I also NEVER drink Red Bull, V, or any of those strange drinks that don't actually make sense to me.

The best advice? Focus. That's it, just focus on anything positive, even if you have to find a positive memory to focus on.

Two years ago my young teen daughter began to have panic attacks, so I rushed her to the ER where they gave her an injection and she slept like a baby for three hours.

The next episode happened christmas eve when she was deeply concerned about whether or not her mother would contact her.... meaning that she did love her.. in my girl's eyes. The girl focused on those thoughts and the Feelings created by them until she was hyperventilating, etc.

I told her people having panic attacks do not have the breath or energy to yell at anyone.. since she was yelling at me during this "attack". In the end I did what people used to do in the old days. My daughter was claiming she oculd not see nor move her arms, so I slapped her. Surprisingly she could move her arms and see very well!!

Apparently Panic Disorder has been around quite some time. This will take multiple posts:

Introduction

Panic disorder is new to the DSM (Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders), but it has been written about for quite some time.
One of the earliest reports of the disorder was back in the 17th century, when Robert Burton, an English clergyman, described it in his book, The Anatomy of Melancholy (1621) as "[a] fear [that] causeth in man, as to be red, pale, tremble, sweat… It amazeth men that are to speak or show themselves in public". During the 1800s, panic disorder was first described in medical documentation, when a Civil War physician named Jacob De Costa described symptoms similar to those of panic disorder in soldiers after the fighting had finished.

Sigmund Freud is widely considered to be the first major psychiatrist to study the disorder in depth. He coined the term anxiety neurosis, and this was the term that was used to describe the disorder for over half a century.

It appeared in the DSM-I and DSM-II this way. The leading researcher in the field during the 20th century was Donald F. Klein, who, in the middle of the century, first demonstrated the use of anti-depressants to avoid recurring panic attacks. Then, in 1980, the DSM-III came out. It listed panic disorder as a separate disorder for the first time.

An Attempt to Define Panic

Many different people have defined panic disorder in many different ways over the years. Sigmund Freud wrote the first clinical definition:

"… an anxiety attack… may consist of the feeling of anxiety, alone, without any associated idea… or else some kind of paresthesia… may be combined with the feeling of anxiety, or, finally, the feeling of anxiety may have linked it to a disturbance of… bodily functions- such as respiration, heart action, vasomotor innervation or glandular activity."A panic, or anxiety, attack, as described by the American Psychological Association, is defined as a "…sudden surge of overwhelming fear that comes without warning…".

The symptoms listed by the APA include a racing heartbeat, difficulty breathing, paralyzing terror, hot flashes, and a fear of impending death or insanity. The first 2 editions of the DSM defined only one kind of anxiety disorder, as mentioned earlier. By the time of the DSM-III publication in 1980, it was broken up into 2 different diseases: panic disorder and general anxiety disorder (GAD). The major difference between the two is that panic disorder sufferers experience anxiety only during the panic attacks, while GAD sufferers experience anxiety all day, every day.

Non-Psychological Symptoms and Side Effects

Panic disorder is unlike other mental disorders in that it causes physical harm and side effects as well as psychological harm. Because of the cardiovascular symptoms of the disorder, such as heart palpitations and irregular heartbeat, panic disorder sufferers are 30-40% more likely to suffer from mitral valve prolapse, a serious heart condition, than members of the general population. Panic patients also tend to go in for expensive surgeries, mainly coronary and abdominal in nature, more often than non-panic sufferers do.

To be continued.......