Can you pinpoint your first panic/anxiety attack?

[brittney3255]

I will never forget mine. I've been having a bad year, very emotional. But everything took a turn for the worse about 5 months ago. I was having an off day but my bf and I had plans to go see a concert with some friends at a bar. I've been there before but its not really my scene but I went for him. We got there and about 30 minutes into the show I started having shortness of breath and feeling like I was burning up. I was feeling really claustrophobic and nauseous. I told them I'd be right back and I went outside and just started shaking horrible and gasping for breath. It was the first time I ever felt like that. I texted my bf that I wasn't feeling well but I'd be back in in a few. Naturally he came looking for me but went out the wrong door and they wouldn't let him back in the club and I spent the rest of the evening looking for him because he left his phone with our friends. It was a shitty shitty night. I got so mad at him. Completely unwarranted really since he was just trying to look for me but I felt so much anxiety that I totally took it out on him. I ended up apologizing later.

After that it just snowballed. 2 days later I was looking at wedding stuff on pinterest (a favorite pass time even though we aren't actually engaged) and I got hit with a surge of overwhelming anxiety accompanied by major nausea and over the top crying and that was the moment I started doubting everything about our relationship. My anxious mind reasoned that I shouldn't have such a negative reaction to looking at wedding stuff if I really wanted to be with him. My normal mind reasoned that I had looked at that sort of stuff a million times before with no ill reaction so maybe it was just because I had just had this panic attack that I associated the two. Whatever the reason it totally sucks. It has since broken us up because the anxiety is unbearable to live with daily and he blames himself. I hate to say that I have noticed a reduction in my anxiety levels with him gone but I think its because I can just not think about it and distract myself. I'm by no means anxiety free as I now get hit with the total realization of my failure in my career and not taking care of myself. Hes actually the most caring and thoughtful person in my life. I love him. We have been talking recently and I would like a reconciliation which he is totally for but every time I try to tell him I get hit with anxiety. Its so damn frustrating!

[Ahlstrom]

I drink too much while on Lexapro (didn't you can t drink on antis) then hit a joint and my heart went nuts and I went to the hospital and threw up.

2 days after I was released I rolled me up another joint and then went to go watch tv. I kept worrying about my heart rate and checking my pulse, eventually I worked myself way up into a panic. My body was shot with pain from my malfunctioning nervous system. I hit my mother twice because she refused to take me to the hospital, she was later able to calm me down. And I was explained to that it was a panic attack and that I'd probably have them for the rest of my life unless I could learn to control it.

[AnxiousPsychGrad]

Yes. October 15, 2013. I wasn't feeling very well so my boyfriend and I decided to rent a movie. I told him anything but something with the subject line of death... He picked "This Is the End" -- a comedy about the end of the world. It was totally not his fault. He didn't realize the severity of my anxiety on that day. We finished watching the movie about 5 a.m. I was getting ready to go to sleep, and he looked at me and said "you look a little pale. Are you ok?" I got up to go look in the mirror --- and that's when it hit me. My first move out of my way-get me to the hospital-I'm going to die within the next five minutes panic attack. I was a WRECK for months. Finally got what seemed to be the right medication, but it hit me again a couple months ago.
I don't believe my medication is working for me anymore, so I'm looking into starting a holistic approach to ending (or lessening) my anxiety.
Hope you are well, and good luck on your journey through this. Just remember, it doesn't last forever. :)

[darkavenger]

Ahlstrom - You're some HC anxiety user :D

Mine was 7 years ago when I was at the university studying theology, I was playing Lineage 2 on some free server, and we were raiding a boss. From all those effects and my exhaustion I started to feel "weird", soon after I started to suffocate and ran up to the balcony for some fresh air. It was so bad I thought I'll die coz of insufficent air. I remember being totally disoriented, shaky, felt like I'm dying literally, I called 911 and they told me to breathe myself into and empty paper bag. I did so, and I felt better. Right after I was suffering from being unable to breathe properly for more then 3 months, then I went to my first psychologist, after one months she suggested I suffer from hyperventilation neurogene tetany [no shit sherlock], and gave me B6 B12 and calcium [good job]. I suffered like hell for a few more months till I couldn't go out at all. I didn't go to school, I didn't go out, I was stuck at home, suffering from one to another panick attack, till one really bad came and my schoolmates took me to the hospital, where I got my first real medications at my new psychiatrist. In the "meantime" from the first panic attack, I changed like 20 psychologist, tried many methods, but most of them told me that my mental level is beyond their ability to help me [in general they meant something like "one has to be a bit stupid in order to get help from supportive psychotherapy].

...though, year and a half ago I found one very, evry old psychologist, she's 62-65 years old and she's way ahead of me both in iQ, EQ, and neurokinetics. She's heping me to rearrange my life so I can suffer from my anxiety as little as possible. She never told me she'll heal me, she just promised me to make things bettter, and she is...

[NixonRulz]

It was years ago but remember it vividly

I was suffering from GAD for years but didn't know it

I just knew something in me always had me dwelling on my thoughts

Quite obsessive to a point where I made myself feel physically sick

I suppose I focused on that so much that I was completely tensed when the adrenaline rush hit

Thought I was going to die and went into a full blown panic attack

Off the the ER I went

Dismissed it as anxiety while there and sent me on my way

If someone would have spent an hour with me telling me what happened and why it happened and there was no reason for alarm from them, I believe I would have been fine

There were no real forums at the time and the internet was kinda new so I just dealt with it. Not very well I might add

No doc thought it was something I should be concerned with

But I was concerned. I had an anxiety disorder so I obsessed with the fear of another and my panic disorder was born

Started reading lots of books but never really grasped it until 20 years had went by after lots of in depth research on the internet

That is why I think this, and other sites similar, are the key to a very short bout with major symptoms.

People see others going through the same thing and they understand that what they feel is not just them

It's not a scary, harmful condition and it is not a mental illness in the terms of bipolar or shyzophenia, it is more an emotional illness

Even thinking of it on those terms make some people feel better

But knowing it's not scary or harmful is hard to grasp when you have a disorder

We fear things without the presence of real danger

Once anxiety is understood for what it is, the scariness goes away and you are free to live your life

And be taxed to death like everyone else

[superchick22684]

My first anxiety attack was almost eight years ago. I was in college and went swimming in a pond. I know how to swim but this particular pond had an algae smell and I couldn't see the bottom. I was fine at first but then it was like a switch was thrown in my mind. All I could think about is what would happen if I got tired and couldn't swim my way out or what would happen if I drowned?
Next thing I knew I started hyperventilating (or panicking if you prefer) and someone dragged me out of the pond to safety because I was pretty much paralyzed with fear. I went back to my dorm and was so embarrassed. I tried to calm myself down but was unable to. By the time the ambulance made it to my dorm I was having a full blown panic attack. It was written off as anxiety after hours of sitting in the ER.
In the years since I've been diagnosed I've been in therapy twice (just started again in April) and have been on several antidepressants (just started taking Lexapro a little less than 2 weeks ago). I've also found this forum to be a great support. My therapist has told me that I might always experience some level of anxiety but the optimist in me loves to prove people wrong. Even after seven years I still hold out hope that someday perhaps I can be anxiety-free. :)

[brittney3255]

It's so scary to me that it was like just one day that detrimentally affected my life! I wonder if I didn't do something that day that it wouldn't have put me in the panic attack and I'd be 'fine' now. I'm currently looking for a psychologist now because I'm trying to not do meds if I don't have too. I was on wellbutrin for the depression but I stopped taking it because I didn't feel like it was helping much. I might ask about some anxiety specific meds but I'm going to have my doc run a full blood panel on my next appointment because I want to check my thyroid and stuff. I hate that we all go through this but I'm so happy I'm not alone!