Wave84
03-20-2010, 06:13 AM
Hi,
I'm a 25 year old male and perfectly healthy aside from the anxiety.
I'm going to be a little bit cryptic as I don't want my employer to see this. I know the odds are slim that they will but you can never be too safe, right?
Anyway, I've been living abroad for three years. I lived in Korea for two and a half years and I moved to Japan almost a month ago. I've also been working in both of this countries (teaching my native tongue).
A little more than a month ago I started having panic attacks. It always started with heart palpitations. I remember being at work, feeling like my heart skipped a beat and then silently panicking. It basically felt like I had pins and needles all over my body and I had a sense of imminent doom. All typical stuff, I imagine.
I've also had neck and lower back pain. At first I attributed that to the fact that I had a minor motorcycle accident around the same time as both pains started and thought that the fall might have been harder than it felt. The lower back pain always occurred in the morning after a sleep. I'd wake up, my lower bank would feel really sore and it wouldn't go away until after I walked around a bit.
The heart palpitations persisted. They weren't bad during the day (sometimes they wouldn't show up at all) but at night, when I was in my apartment by myself, they'd strike with a vengeance. I'd begin to panic, I'd get tingly and go through all the motions, but would eventually nurse myself to sleep by trying to take my mind to it.
One morning I decided to go to a local clinic and see what was up. Originally I thought it was a heart problem so I told the doctor that and they did an EKG, chest X-ray and a urine test. The doctor said he wished he was as healthy as I was, then he told me it was stress and then sent me home. A few weeks later, another scary panic attack which made me go to the hospital emergency room in the wee hours of the morning. Same deal, they did an EKG, chest x-ray and had me lay in bed for several hours. I always got really embarrassed when it ended up being nothing serious and it looked like I was wasting the doctor's time but I didn't know what else to do.
The panic attacks didn't stop. I had also become constipated which I attributed to latent ulcerative proctitis that had been activated by all the stress.
In Japan I went to the doctor and they focused on the constipation and the proctitis. I had a colonoscopy, was prescribed meds and all the rest of it. With the help of laxatives my constipation was relieved. However, all my anxiety/panic attacks remained.
I should also mention that since I don't speak Japanese, my employer has sent translators with me for all of these visits.
I came to the conclusion that my proctitis (which causes blood loss) and my anxiety attacks were related because I could have anemia, which does have a side effect of panic attacks.
Two nights ago, I had a major panic attack. The worst ever. The muscles in the right side of my body started tensing up. I actually called an ambulance because my heart was racing and my right shoulder had became very tense and my heart was feeling like it was going to jump out of my stomach.
When I was in the ambulance they tested my vitals and sounded somewhat pissed like I was wasting their time. My resting heart rate is 62bpm, it was showing up between 65-75 (because of nervousness) in the ambulance and was not giving any signs of it being a heart attack. When I sensed this I immediately felt like a complete retarded idiot savant and wish I had never called the ambulance, but at the time I honestly thought I was having a heart attack and I had read that EKGs and chest X-rays don't say squat about the kind of heart problems that aren't present at the time of said tests.
After a morning in the hospital I was put on some tranquilizers. Because of some language-cultural barriers, the message at the end of the visit politely boiled down to "you're fine, you've wasted our time and our resources now go home." On top of that, my company called me and had me come to the office for a "meeting".
I was basically told that because of my medical conditions and the importance of the work I would be doing, that I might be given a position of lesser importance within the company because if I were to have these panic attacks at work it would make the company look very bad. They were nice about all of this but it has made me feel like a crappy human being that is wasting everyone's time.
Anyway, I don't have depression or any other psychiatric problems. My sister has a few psychiatric conditions (including panic attacks) and my father has heart problems (mainly attributed to diet and partly to genetics). I've always been prone to anxiety and stress but it has never controlled my life like this, I can usually manage it perfectly well like a lot of human beings.
Today I went to Tokyo and spoke with a foreign doctor from my own cultural background and for the first time I felt like I wasn't wasting someone's time and he was pretty sure that it is a panic disorder. I feel a lot better today because of the meeting and although I'm still having panic attacks, I think the medication I'm on ("Depas", a sedative/tranquilizer) I know that I'll at least be able to sleep well until this subsides.
I do have a few questions, though, for those of you who are too busy to read all of the above:
-Why now? I'm 25, not 12. I've had all my life to develop a panic disorder. I've traveled half way around the world more than once... I've adjusted to an extremely different culture, I've done some things that people with panic disorders would NEVER do... and not once have I panicked. Moving to Japan wasn't even a big deal to me as I've already "seen it all" in Asia and Japan is the safest/cleanest/least infuriating place over here.
-Has anyone else ever had muscle tension as a result of panic attacks? I actually have tension knots in my chest muscle (peck?) They came about during a panic attack.
-Why do the heart palpitations come first and the panic attacks come second? This is why I thought my problems weren't panic attack-related for the longest time. I always thought that with panic attacks, palpitations would come AFTER the attack began and intensify it. I could be feeling perfectly normal, then I'd have a palpitation and then I'd freak out.
-Am I stuck like this for ever? Will I get over these panic attacks? My current position within my employment revolves around convincing them that this is temporary and will go away. If it's not temporary it may come up again at some time or another and affect my work. I'm also concerned because the anti-anxiety medications they gave me always say "no alcohol" and "no driving." I need to drive and drink alcohol (not at the same time!) as part of my job and not being able to do these things could hurt me financially and socially.
Thanks a lot for any help and advice.
I'm a 25 year old male and perfectly healthy aside from the anxiety.
I'm going to be a little bit cryptic as I don't want my employer to see this. I know the odds are slim that they will but you can never be too safe, right?
Anyway, I've been living abroad for three years. I lived in Korea for two and a half years and I moved to Japan almost a month ago. I've also been working in both of this countries (teaching my native tongue).
A little more than a month ago I started having panic attacks. It always started with heart palpitations. I remember being at work, feeling like my heart skipped a beat and then silently panicking. It basically felt like I had pins and needles all over my body and I had a sense of imminent doom. All typical stuff, I imagine.
I've also had neck and lower back pain. At first I attributed that to the fact that I had a minor motorcycle accident around the same time as both pains started and thought that the fall might have been harder than it felt. The lower back pain always occurred in the morning after a sleep. I'd wake up, my lower bank would feel really sore and it wouldn't go away until after I walked around a bit.
The heart palpitations persisted. They weren't bad during the day (sometimes they wouldn't show up at all) but at night, when I was in my apartment by myself, they'd strike with a vengeance. I'd begin to panic, I'd get tingly and go through all the motions, but would eventually nurse myself to sleep by trying to take my mind to it.
One morning I decided to go to a local clinic and see what was up. Originally I thought it was a heart problem so I told the doctor that and they did an EKG, chest X-ray and a urine test. The doctor said he wished he was as healthy as I was, then he told me it was stress and then sent me home. A few weeks later, another scary panic attack which made me go to the hospital emergency room in the wee hours of the morning. Same deal, they did an EKG, chest x-ray and had me lay in bed for several hours. I always got really embarrassed when it ended up being nothing serious and it looked like I was wasting the doctor's time but I didn't know what else to do.
The panic attacks didn't stop. I had also become constipated which I attributed to latent ulcerative proctitis that had been activated by all the stress.
In Japan I went to the doctor and they focused on the constipation and the proctitis. I had a colonoscopy, was prescribed meds and all the rest of it. With the help of laxatives my constipation was relieved. However, all my anxiety/panic attacks remained.
I should also mention that since I don't speak Japanese, my employer has sent translators with me for all of these visits.
I came to the conclusion that my proctitis (which causes blood loss) and my anxiety attacks were related because I could have anemia, which does have a side effect of panic attacks.
Two nights ago, I had a major panic attack. The worst ever. The muscles in the right side of my body started tensing up. I actually called an ambulance because my heart was racing and my right shoulder had became very tense and my heart was feeling like it was going to jump out of my stomach.
When I was in the ambulance they tested my vitals and sounded somewhat pissed like I was wasting their time. My resting heart rate is 62bpm, it was showing up between 65-75 (because of nervousness) in the ambulance and was not giving any signs of it being a heart attack. When I sensed this I immediately felt like a complete retarded idiot savant and wish I had never called the ambulance, but at the time I honestly thought I was having a heart attack and I had read that EKGs and chest X-rays don't say squat about the kind of heart problems that aren't present at the time of said tests.
After a morning in the hospital I was put on some tranquilizers. Because of some language-cultural barriers, the message at the end of the visit politely boiled down to "you're fine, you've wasted our time and our resources now go home." On top of that, my company called me and had me come to the office for a "meeting".
I was basically told that because of my medical conditions and the importance of the work I would be doing, that I might be given a position of lesser importance within the company because if I were to have these panic attacks at work it would make the company look very bad. They were nice about all of this but it has made me feel like a crappy human being that is wasting everyone's time.
Anyway, I don't have depression or any other psychiatric problems. My sister has a few psychiatric conditions (including panic attacks) and my father has heart problems (mainly attributed to diet and partly to genetics). I've always been prone to anxiety and stress but it has never controlled my life like this, I can usually manage it perfectly well like a lot of human beings.
Today I went to Tokyo and spoke with a foreign doctor from my own cultural background and for the first time I felt like I wasn't wasting someone's time and he was pretty sure that it is a panic disorder. I feel a lot better today because of the meeting and although I'm still having panic attacks, I think the medication I'm on ("Depas", a sedative/tranquilizer) I know that I'll at least be able to sleep well until this subsides.
I do have a few questions, though, for those of you who are too busy to read all of the above:
-Why now? I'm 25, not 12. I've had all my life to develop a panic disorder. I've traveled half way around the world more than once... I've adjusted to an extremely different culture, I've done some things that people with panic disorders would NEVER do... and not once have I panicked. Moving to Japan wasn't even a big deal to me as I've already "seen it all" in Asia and Japan is the safest/cleanest/least infuriating place over here.
-Has anyone else ever had muscle tension as a result of panic attacks? I actually have tension knots in my chest muscle (peck?) They came about during a panic attack.
-Why do the heart palpitations come first and the panic attacks come second? This is why I thought my problems weren't panic attack-related for the longest time. I always thought that with panic attacks, palpitations would come AFTER the attack began and intensify it. I could be feeling perfectly normal, then I'd have a palpitation and then I'd freak out.
-Am I stuck like this for ever? Will I get over these panic attacks? My current position within my employment revolves around convincing them that this is temporary and will go away. If it's not temporary it may come up again at some time or another and affect my work. I'm also concerned because the anti-anxiety medications they gave me always say "no alcohol" and "no driving." I need to drive and drink alcohol (not at the same time!) as part of my job and not being able to do these things could hurt me financially and socially.
Thanks a lot for any help and advice.