Panic Disorder: When Fear Paralyzes You
Panic disorder is a type of anxiety disorder. It is one of the most common mental disorders in today's society. It is characterized by the sudden, unexpected, and repeated onset of intense feelings of fear, anxiety, and discomfort.
These outbreaks are known as panic attacks or anxiety attacks. Episodes can occur at any time, whether in a calm or anxious state. They can occur even when you're not in a real dangerous situation. They vary in duration, usually lasting a few minutes. However, they can have a significant impact on your life.
Symptoms of panic disorder
The main manifestation of panic disorder is anxiety attacks. However, these are some of the symptoms of a panic attack you may experience:
- A feeling of unreality or derealization. This translates into the impression that what is happening to you is not real.
- Depersonalization. That is, you experience both your own body and the environment around you in a strange way, as if you weren't living your own life.
- Experiencing a feeling of intense anxiety due to fear of losing control
- Feeling an overwhelming panic about losing your sanity, having an accident of any kind, or even dying
- Developing an intense fear of visiting places where you have previously had a panic attack and trying to avoid them at all costs
- Constant worry about when you might experience another panic attack.
Physical symptoms of a panic attack
A panic attack or anxiety crisis is an episode in which you experience high levels of anxiety, terror, and intense worry in response to a stimulus that does not represent a real danger to your physical, psychological, or emotional integrity. This reaction is usually accompanied by negative, catastrophic, and terrifying thoughts, in addition to a set of the following physical symptoms directly linked to fear:
- Tachycardia or rapid, strong palpitations
- Difficulty breathing or experiencing a feeling of suffocation or drowning
- Hyperventilation or rapid, shallow breathing
- Tightness, pain, or discomfort in the chest or thorax
- Extreme sweating and perspiration, chills, or hot flashes
- Tingling, loss of sensation in the extremities, tremors or strong shaking - Feeling of choking or not being able to swallow normally
- Dizziness, unsteadiness, or feeling faint or loss of consciousness
- Nausea or abdominal discomfort and discomfort
- Feeling of excessive heat or cold
Causes of panic disorder
Currently, as with many other mental health problems, the exact reasons why you may experience this difficulty are still unknown. However, it's true that the causes vary from person to person and are often due to a combination of multiple factors.
Hereditary factor
Genetically, you may be more predisposed to an anxiety disorder if your family has a history of anxiety. However, this factor is not a determining or definitive factor in itself.
Chemical activity of the brain
Some studies suggest that the same areas of your brain are activated when you experience rational fear as when you suffer a panic attack. Likewise, a lack of hormone production or an insufficient number of neurotransmitters could play a decisive role in this condition.
Influence and educational context
Feeling overprotective in childhood makes you more vulnerable when facing problems. This means that when faced with a challenge, you may respond with extreme anxiety and worry due to the symptoms of distress you experience.
Situational factors
The onset of the first panic attack usually occurs after experiencing a situation of extreme stress, fear, and anxiety that you can't or don't know how to manage properly. This episode can happen at the height of anxiety or later, when you're calmer.
It is necessary to take into account the factor generated by anticipatory anxiety.
In some cases, the panic response may arise from the anxiety caused by thinking about the panic attack you experienced and when you will experience it again.
How panic disorder affects your daily life
The central component of panic attacks is fear itself. This disorder can have serious consequences on your daily life, especially if you don't receive any type of therapy or treatment.
The combination of symptoms that activate and alert your body, along with your interpretation of them, whether consciously or unconsciously, makes it easier for you to do or refrain from doing certain things. By doing this, you combat the appearance of your own symptoms and prevent the supposed dangers that cause your panic.
By avoiding these situations or circumstances, you experience immediate relief, but it prevents you from verifying whether the threat is real or not. So, as your attacks increase, your options become increasingly limited.
In other words, all the shortcuts you take to avoid exposing yourself to circumstances, activities, or situations that generate fear are short-term solutions that temporarily calm you down. But in the long term, they hinder your daily life and make it impossible for you to overcome your fear of the symptoms you experience and the elements that cause panic attacks.
Non-pathological panic attack
It's important to note that, although anxiety attacks are an extremely unpleasant experience, they don't necessarily have to be directly related to panic disorder or any other condition. To be treated as such, they must occur frequently and cause you to need to avoid situations or circumstances that can trigger this reaction.
In fact, anxiety attacks are especially common in more advanced societies, where there is a high level of demand, stress, and demands.
So, despite everything, they are not and will not become entirely unusual for a large percentage of the general population.
Treatment and therapy
Panic disorder is a condition that can severely limit your daily life. It can worsen over time and become chronic. That's why early attention and the treatment a specialized psychologist deems most appropriate for your particular case are essential.
One of the most effective techniques for treating this disorder is in vivo exposure, which is part of cognitive-behavioral therapy. It's important to emphasize that exposure to the situations and elements you fear and avoid is done gradually, systematically, and progressively.
Keys to controlling a panic attack
At this point, you may be wondering what to do when faced with an anxiety attack. In addition to psychological therapy, you can follow the tips below to help you overcome panic attacks and make them less unpleasant.
Recognize a panic attack
The first and most important thing is that you are aware of what is happening to you.
Once you're able to recognize a panic attack for what it is, and not what you fear it might become, your anxiety level will decrease, even if only a little.
Focus your attention on your surroundings
Although panic attacks are very brief, they are also very unpleasant and flood your mind with terrifying and negative thoughts. When you focus your full attention on the symptoms you are experiencing, their intensity increases, which increases your sense of fear and prolongs the duration of the panic attack.
So instead of thinking about your physical sensations, occupy your mind with other kinds of thoughts. Use a gadget to distract yourself or focus your attention on the specifics of the elements around you.
Do nothing
Part of understanding what you're going through is understanding that the physical symptoms, feelings of intense terror, and alarming thoughts are temporary. Therefore, when you have a panic attack, don't force yourself to fight your emotions or try to prevent the attack from happening. With panic attacks, the less you do, the faster they'll pass and the milder their symptoms will be.
Breathe
Some of your fears can disappear more quickly if you manage your breathing well. When you notice that you're short of breath or that you're breathing shallowly and rapidly, stop for a second. Breathe deeply and slowly through your nose until your abdomen is full. Hold the breath there for a few seconds and slowly release it through your mouth. If you haven't managed to reduce your anxiety level, try this exercise again.
Think about the present
Finally, don't make the common mistake of dwelling on everything that could happen and focus solely on the present.
In conclusion, although panic disorder is one of the most common conditions today, it requires psychological treatment to prevent it from becoming more severe over time.
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