Panic Attacks

"I have absolute certain knowledge, perfect knowledge, that God loves us. He is good, He is our Father, and He expects us to pray, and trust, and be believing, and not give up, and not panic, and not retreat, and not jump ship, when something doesn't seem to be going just right. We stay in, we keep working, we keep believing, keep trusting, following that same path and we will live to fall in His arms and feel His embrace and hear Him say, "I told you that it'd be okay, I told you it would be all right."-Elder Holland.

Trusting -instead of panicing and retreating- is not a survivor's natural impulse. Part of PTSD is feeling panic and feeling the need to retreat. Because anxiety and panic attacks are common among sexual abuse survivors- I thought it important to talk about Panic attacks.

Panic attacks involve sudden feelings of terror that strike without warning.  Working in the ER at the hospital I have seen many come because they are worried they are having a heart attack, only to find that it is actually a panic attack.

Recently I was counseling someone suffering from panic attacks at her son's hockey games. She understood her panic attacks were due to a previous injury that had taken place watching her son's hockey game. A few years ago, she had been hit by a stray hockey puck and had suffered from a concussion and long term headaches. Naturally being back at the ice rink involked great feelings of panic. No matter how much she tried to reason with herself -that the likelyhood of it happening again was slim-her body continues to react with feeling dizzy, a racing heart and a sense of terror and impending doom.

Panic disorder actually are fairly common and affects about 2.4 million people in the U.S., or 1.7% of the adult population between the ages of 18 and 54. Women are twice as likely as men to develop the condition, and its symptoms usually begin in early adulthood.

Some Symptoms of a panic attacks are:

•  "Racing" heart
•  Feeling weak, faint, or dizzy
•  Tingling or numbness in the hands and fingers
•  Sense of terror, or impending doom or death
•  Feeling sweaty or having chills
•  Chest pains
•  Breathing difficulties
•  Feeling a loss of control
•  Panic attacks are generally brief, lasting less than 10 minutes. 

Many people don't know that their disorder is real and highly responsive to treatment. Panic disorder is highly treatable, with a variety of available therapies. Once treated, panic disorder doesn't lead to any permanent complications. Some are afraid or embarrassed to tell anyone, including their doctors and loved ones, about what they experience for fear of being considered a hypochondriac. Instead they suffer in silence, distancing themselves from friends, family, and others who could be helpful or supportive.Take a look at this great site for more on panic disorders. http://www.adaa.org/understanding-anxiety/panic-disorder-agoraphobia?gclid=CPj0vOzIgrsCFbBAMgodzlgAKw

"Most specialists agree that a combination of cognitive and behavioral therapies are the best treatment for panic disorder. Medication might also be appropriate in some cases.
The first part of therapy is largely informational; many people are greatly helped by simply understanding exactly what panic disorder is, and how many others suffer from it. Many people who suffer from panic disorder are worried that their panic attacks mean they're "going crazy" or that the panic might induce a heart attack. "Cognitive restructuring" (changing one's way of thinking) helps people replace those thoughts with more realistic, positive ways of viewing the attacks.

Cognitive therapy can help the patient identify possible triggers for the attacks. The trigger in an individual case could be something like a thought, a situation, or something as subtle as a slight change in heartbeat. Once the patient understands that the panic attack is separate and independent of the trigger, that trigger begins to lose some of its power to induce an attack.

The behavioral components of the therapy can consist of what one group of clinicians has termed "interoceptive exposure." This is similar to the systematic desensitization used to cure phobias, but what it focuses on is exposure to the actual physical sensations that someone experiences during a panic attack.

Relaxation techniques can further help someone "flow through" an attack. These techniques include breathing retraining and positive visualization. Some experts have found that people with panic disorder tend to have slightly higher than average breathing rates, learning to slow this can help someone deal with a panic attack and can also prevent future attacks."-American Psychological Association.