Panic attacks

On one of those days when a lot of rockets "landed" in Kyiv and other cities of Ukraine (it was the first months of the war in 2022, I didn't remember exactly when), I opened Instagram and saw a photo of my niece where she wrote that she had her first panic attack. Then I opened FaceBook and read how many other people wrote that that particular day they also had panic attacks, some for the first time, some for the second or third time.... I decided to break the silence and share my experience, which I didn't want to reveal, because on the one hand, I was used to keeping everything in silence, but on the other hand people used to know me as strong and indomitable. The truth is that a panic attack can happen to anyone, especially to those who are strong and indomitable. And the problem is not in the panic attack itself, the problem is in the person's reaction to the panic attack.

It is impossible to breathe. Your heart flies out of the chest and at the same time presses very hard. Your eyes become dark. You feel dizzy as if you are on a roller coaster and forget to fasten your seatbelt. It seems to you that you are dying, and these are your last moments. Your thoughts get confused. Your concentration of attention disappears.

This is what a panic attack looks like. However, of course, everyone has their feelings, and the palette of these feelings can be completely different.

In times of war, in highly stressful situations, when the nervous system is exhausted, panic attacks appear: they can be related to a specific situation or as a result of chronic fatigue, stress, or physical, emotional, and mental exhaustion.

When a person has a panic attack for the first time, it seems to him/her that he/she is dying, because there are no memories of such an experience in the brain, and there is no understanding of what it is and what to do with it. The fear that you are dying oppresses your body, and your brain, it seems you are paralyzed, the level of anxiety increases significantly and you cannot do anything. Your legs become cotton wool, your body doesn't belong to you, your head is foggy, it's hard to even cry, and you just don't have enough strength to cry. You try to control the situation, but you can't, you understand that you are losing control over yourself, your body, and your brain. By understanding this, the level of anxiety rises even more. You want to breathe deeply fresh air, but it doesn't work out well, your stomach spasms, and it seems that all the organs inside you are already dead and scattered into small parts. The world around you is spinning, and you feel that you have fallen into some kind of centrifuge, you want to stop it, but you can't, your heart squeezes even more, and your body tenses up. You try to fix your eyes on at least something to keep your attention, but it doesn't work either. But then somehow tears start to flow down your face, releasing at least a little of the paralyzing fear that eats you from the inside. You begin to breathe more deeply and slowly, and the panic begins to subside.

When a person has felt a panic attack and survived it, he/she is afraid of its repetition again and again, so he/she does not want to experience this horror again, and then again and again.

When I had my first panic attack, I thought I was dying, I didn't even realize it was a panic attack. Then, adapting to this process, I realized that I was not dying, this was just a temporary process that would pass and I would survive, but despite this fact, I was always afraid of repetitions. I already knew all the symptoms, and how the whole process went, but quite often there were extreme panic attacks, during which besides normal symptoms there were also nausea, vomiting, and tremors, the body became cold and pale-white, and everything was blurry.

The most important things to do during a panic attack are:

1. Sending your brain the message that you're not dying and this is only a panic attack, that will pass. Since it is the brain that further gives the body impulses of negative emotions of fear, that will then spread throughout the body and cause certain symptoms in it.

2. Just physically touch your body, feel it.

3. Begin to breathe deeply. Do not try to remember any special breathing practices or yogic techniques (if you know them), just start breathing deeply, watching your breath.

4. Drink water if available. Lots of water, wash your face and hands with water.

5. Start telling yourself what you are wearing on, what you see around you. Just tell.

6. If you are indoors, open the window, you need fresh air.

7. Continue to breathe and talk to yourself that you are alive and healthy, everything is fine with you and will be fine in several minutes.

After some time, the attack will begin to subside and you will calm down (of course, not in the absolute sense). You need to give yourself a little more time to recover and continue doing something.

Such attacks can last from 3-5 minutes to an hour or two, everything is very individual for each person, it all depends on the strength of the panic attack and how you can cope with it.

I'm not a psychiatrist or a psychotherapist, but I'm against anti-anxiety pills or antidepressants, of course, there are situations where you probably can't cope without them, but there are a lot of cases when it's better to look for alternative methods of treatment. So I did not take medication, for me, it was a principled decision, because I believe that taking pills is a step towards dependence on them and a slow jump into the abyss. During the first days of the war, many girls wrote that they immediately ran to pharmacies for pills, because they had panic attacks even before the war, but there were no more pills. And strangely and magically, the same girls later wrote that they managed on their own without pills and did not understand why they had taken them before for so long. Of course, each person has his/her own experience, and each person makes his/her own choice, but you should always listen to your heart, not to your mind, which is capable of swallowing anything to stop this fear, anxiety, or panic attack. So I chose a different path for myself through meditation, breathing techniques, mindfulness, and spiritual practices.

For information. If you want to study in any famous international spiritual/esoteric, etc. school, where meditation and spiritual practices, yoga, and breathing techniques are taught (I do not mean pseudo-schools and pseudo-spirituality), the first question you will be asked will be: Have you taken anti-anxiety pills / anti-depressants / psychedelics? And if your answer is yes, you will not be allowed to study, because such pills directly affect not only your brain but also your consciousness.

* This article is a reflection of my personal experience. It is not scientific and I do not have any degree in psychology. Here I am sharing my own experience, what I went through, and how I coped with it.

May 20, 2023.