I'm writing this blog as a sort of self-induced therapy, and sort of diary for my daily thoughts, my daily life, my daily experience living with panic attacks and constant anxiety. The hope is, that it will help me release some of the worry and stress and to make the mounting fear of a life out of control, and in fear of my own mind, feel smaller and more manageable. If it touches others even a little, by letting them feel not alone in their anxiety/panic or depression, or even helps one person understand someone they love who experiences the same issue, then that will make all the blogging worth it. Welcome to my personal chaos.
There are really many reasons for this blog. Yes, therapy for me. Yes, to connect to others. And yes, to make all of us feel a little less misunderstood, a little less alone. The catalyst to this blog was a conversation with a loved one earlier today, who also suffers from panic/anxiety. We have found that we can often only talk to each other about how we feel, our fears, and our strengths in fighting the daily battle against our own minds. As much as friends and family try to understand, as patient as they can be, they can never fully grasp what we think or how we feel. Its not their fault anymore than its our fault for having these disorders. It reminded me of a conversation a few weeks ago. Let me tell the story.
It was 3AM and I was sound asleep. I awoke suddenly, feeling as if I could not breathe. My breathing was fast and my heart beating loudly in my ears. My hands were cold and clammy and as much as I wanted to convince myself it was a panic attack in the middle of a dead sleep, it was also a first for me. I've never been awaken by panic when asleep. Not one time in the 15+ years I've dealt with this disorder. My deep breathing and attempts to calm myself woke my boyfriend. He rubbed my back, brought me water, and listened as I worried out loud that maybe, just maybe this time it was something "serious", maybe it was a heart attack. I cried and paced and could not calm myself down nor make my breathing come easier; my heart beat slower. Within 45 minutes, I convinced him to take me to the ER, and off we went, the darkness of the early hours still outside. Once we arrived, I was immediately brought back, as the minute you whisper to them, "I cant breathe", they escort you in right away.
As has happened many times, by the time I arrived and was settled, I felt calmer, better. They still took my blood pressure which was low, my pulse low as well. They took an EKG, which was normal. Twice. That's when the doctor started the questions that were all too familiar...."Are you going through anything right now?", "Anything causing you a lot of stress?". He diagnosed me with a panic attack.
I couldn't say I was surprised. It was expected. As much as us sufferers know in one part of our brain that it is likely panic/anxiety; there's another little black voice that follows us everywhere, whispering manically that maybe its not panic this time. Maybe you are dying. All the maybe's, all the worst case scenarios.
As we waited for discharge, I asked my nurse how often they see people in the ER for panic attacks. She said all the time, almost daily. That she would guess maybe 1 in 5 people have some form of panic/anxiety at least once and just never talk about it. Herself included.
It got me thinking about how shameful we can be made to feel, how embarrassed we are by our disorders. We dont want to be seen as crazy or weird or sick or weak. We hide.
This is what prompted this blog. I'm no longer going to hide. If people think I'm crazy, so be it. If people say I should shut up, they don't need to read this blog. But to those who need to talk and those who just want to feel like someone understand them. I say, lets chat. Lets blog. Lets do whatever we need to take our own mental health into our own hands and make ourselves feel less lonely, less misunderstood, less crazy. Fuck the people who don't understand and don't want to. We have each other, or at the very least a blog.
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