In the OLD DAYS

[dizz]

My mom has been a huge help to me in dealing with my anxiety and panic. She went through the same thing I'm going through, almost exactly. However, when she was my age, there was FAR LESS information about it. In fact, she went to NINE different doctors before someone mentioned anything about 'breathing' (hyperventilating). It's the closest she would ever come to an 'explanation' from a doctor, so she hit the book stores and finally found a book that helped her.

She recently told me that when she was young, folks like us were labeled as having a 'nervous breakdown'. I imagine that in generations before that, we'd be labeled insane, perhaps in need of a frontal lobotomy.

I guess my point is that we should feel incredibly lucky to live in an age of such vast information, available at right at our fingertips. I find it hard to imagine dealing with this like my mother did, and impossible to imagine it before her time.

Anyone have stories of the 'Old Days' to make us feel better?

Cheers;)

[Robbed]

Funny that you mention nervous breakdown, as even Dr Claire Weekes frequently uses this term throughout her books. In any case, the old days certainly had one distinct advantage over modern times: a lack of medications. Although modern antidepressants can actually help some, I feel like they do more harm than good to MOST anxiety sufferers - especially those who suffer from the kind of mild to moderate anxiety that is most likely to just go away on its own after a time. However, it would appear that, to some degree, the current tendency to prescribe pills for anxiety is on the decline in favor of CBT and nutrition oriented treatments (especially when you consider the changes in anxiety treatment going on in the UK). So in some ways, we are going back to the old ways, but with a better understanding overall of anxiety disorder.