Adequate treatment favors a regression of symptoms in most cases and allows you to start living your life with serenity.
The first panic attack is never forgotten and often occurs at a young age. Those who have suffered from it can, even after tens of years, describe the sensations felt as if the event had just happened. The symptoms are in fact so intense that they are fixed in the memory. The good news is that there are effective treatments that can keep unpleasant sensations away.
What it looks like
The panic attack is like a bolt from the blue. Suddenly, very high anxiety appears, accompanied by physical and psychological symptoms.
| Physical symptoms | Psychological symptoms |
|---|---|
| Tachycardia
Breathing difficulties Intense sweating Tremor Dizziness |
Intense fear of dying quickly
Fear of losing control Deep anguish |
Usually a panic attack lasts a few minutes, and then resolves spontaneously. Sometimes sufferers feel so sick that they think their lives are in danger.
There are numerous factors that can “give way to the hurricane of sensations that characterize it: crowded, cramped, closed places, from which it is difficult to escape (elevator, plane, tunnel, etc.), or situations of tension or sudden relaxation.
In short, the panic attack is a terrible experience, which makes you feel very bad and that, when it tends to repeat itself, arouses a dangerous anticipatory anxiety for the fear of having new attacks. In practice, the patient to avoid suffering implements avoidance strategies, trying to avoid all situations that can, in his opinion, increase the risk of a new episode. And so you can get to give up many things (cinemas, public transport, restaurants, etc.) with heavy repercussions on the quality of life.
The causes of panic disorder are unclear, but some studies suggest that the attack may be an expression of triggering a physiological mechanism of reaction to drowning or suffocation, present in mammals, which occurs when blood oxygen levels decrease and carbon dioxide levels rise. In fact, it has been seen that the use of substances capable of increasing carbon dioxide in the blood can trigger panic attacks in people who suffer from them.
Anti-panic remedies
The main tools to combat panic attacks are:
- drug therapy
- Psychotherapy
- relaxation techniques.
The drugs of choice are selective serotonin reuptake inhibitors that help certain areas of the brain to make better use of serotonin, a neurotransmitter essential for mood and emotion management.
Psychotherapy, especially cognitive behavioral interventions, helps the patient to make contact with their fears and to modify them.
Breathing techniques, yoga, meditation, biofeedback and so on are all methods that can help those suffering from panic attacks not to accelerate breathing too much which, associated with states of anxiety, can favor the onset of attacks.
From a preventive point of view, a valid advice for everyone is to practice regular physical activity and have adequate sleep hygiene.
Joycelyn Elders is the author and creator of EmpowerEssence, a health and wellness blog. Elders is a respected public health advocate and pediatrician dedicated to promoting general health and well-being.
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