Looking for some reassurance

[panicgrl1]

I am 33 years old and have had panic disorder since i was 22. I've been on paxil for years and just recently i've had a good friend die over the holidays. Then for no reason my anxiety has come out FULL BLOWN where i can't even leave the house and i may even lose my job. :cry:
I constantly am taking my pulse and sometimes if i feel like my heart is beating too light i get MORE nervous.
This is a terrible feeling as i am pretty much housebound at this point. I'm on klonopin and it does help, but i want to be back to my old self where i could do things as before. Can anyone else relate to what i'm going through? Please, if you have gone through this i would like to hear your story so i could not feel so alone with this.

Thank you.

[RabidBadger]

Hi panicgrl

I had a similar experience in 2005 when my anxiety suddenly turned into full-blown agoraphobia but mine was caused by having to go through a bankruptcy and losing my house (and everything else I owned).

It's interesting that you say in your post that your anxiety increased "for no reason". Obviously there was a reason and the death of a friend is no small matter. Unfortunately, I've found that we (anxiety sufferers) very often lose the ability to feel emotions properly and things that in the past might have caused great happiness or sadness or excitement, just get translated into greater or lesser degrees of anxiety.

When you think about it rationally, you are not any more likely to become ill or die just because someone else has, it just seems more likely because it is currently very significant in your mind. Try to stop feeling your pulse because this will only give it more significance and, as far as diagnostic evidence goes, you are gaining very little from feeling your own pulse anyway, you are just scaring yourself. Just remember, your heart does beat harder and faster when you're scared - it's supposed to - and if it was beating so lightly or slowly that it wasn't providing enough blood, you would faint. You don't have to go looking for heart problems, they generally let you know that they are there.

Best wishes

Chris

[SuperMegaRichard]

Hah, I had the same problems. I fear if my heart is beating fast, and when I guess my body decides to calm down and i feel the pulse light and faint I freak out. That of course brings it back to the "normal" harder than normal pounding. My neck has visible palputations and throbs harder than normal. When I check my pulse and find it probably acting the way normally it should, which I now feel is faint and light, I freak out.

So your definitely not alone on this issue. I can tell you that so far it hasn't help me in any situation. But it has become an obsession that now I freak out if I try to make myself not check it and eventually give in.

Let me know how it goes.