If you suffer with panic attacks then you know
the overwhelming sense of fear and panic that seems to take over your mind and body.
You may become breathless, feel faint and start sweating and shaking. Some people experience chest pains and end up in A&E expecting to be told it’s a heart attack.
You feel as though you are under attack and out of control.
So it isn’t hard to understand why they are called panic attacks.
What causes panic attacks?
With all the cars on the road today, you might think that driving from A to B is the easiest thing in the world.
And for many people it is that easy.
But if you struggle with driving fear and anxiety then just getting in the car may be an ordeal in itself.
If you have driving fear, you may try and avoid driving anywhere. Sometimes just the thought that you may have to drive can fill you with anxiety and your feelings only increase if you do get behind the wheel.
And the more you think about it, the worse that fear and anxiety seems to get.
The less driving you do, the more the anxiety increases and your driving confidence disappears. So it gets harder and harder to do anything about it and the anxiety continues to grow.
Sometimes fear and anxiety can be
As a running leader with Ely Runners, and being a keen runner myself, I love helping people improve their sports performance and that feeling of satisfaction they enjoy when they perform to their potential.
Whatever your level and sport, you can learn from the techniques of champions and Olympians so that you get in your best performance zone and enjoy the results of all your practice and training.
Recently I was working with an athlete who would get very nervous on race day. Vast amounts of energy were being wasted just trying to hold the anxiety at bay and all the things that worked so well in training would vanish.
She would perform reasonably well but was left emotionally exhausted by the end of the day and was worried about losing her love of her sport.
When they first come to see me, many of my Ely weight loss clients tell me that it feels like the food (whether it’s chocolate, crisps, cheese or something else) has all the control.
They only have to see it or, in some cases, think about it and soon they find that familiar craving taking over. It may have even become automatic – walk into the kitchen grab it and eat. Without pausing.
A recent client of mine, who we’ll call Sheila, came to see me after putting on two stone which she couldn’t shift.
She told me she knew she was eating too much, even overeating on things which made her feel ill afterwards. She even called her eating an ‘obsession’ – thinking about food all the time and using it to try and help handle the stress in her life.
But knowing that we don’t want to be doing things the way we are, and actually changing them, can be two very different things.
If you have PTSD (whether or not formally diagnosed) or have encountered trauma, and it still impacts upon your life now, then you may have symptoms such as:
And you may also experience depression, anxiety, stress and a loss of confidence.
And with all that comes the fear that was experienced originally. In effect, you are right back there in the traumatic event.
This is why it’s often said that PTSD survivors work on two clocks: the ‘real world time’ clock, which ticks forward in the same way for everyone, and the one that stopped because of the trauma.
Would you like to feel happier more of the time?
We know that the more you focus on something, the more of it you notice and the more it becomes a part of your experience.
Just ask anyone with depression or who is unhappy or low and they’ll tell you how bad things are and how they can’t seem to imagine life ever getting any better in the future.
It seems to me that we often spend our days operating in some sort of reverse gear in our minds – instead of focusing on all the good things, we spend most of our time and thoughts engulfed in all the things that are going wrong or that we think will go wrong.
You only have to watch the news on TV or pick up a paper to engulf yourself in tales of disaster and gloom.
And it’s a useful little experiment to notice how many
If you suffer with anxiety and panic attacks right now then you may be surprised to learn how many others experience similar anxiety levels.
Often you may feel that you are the only one who feels the anxiety and panic – that no one else could possibly understand how you feel. My clients who used to have anxiety and panic attacks are often surprised when they mention it to others and find how widespread an issue it is.
One of the hardest parts with your anxiety and panic is that it seems like you are no longer in control of your mind and body. The sweating, tension, fear and other symptoms you have just kick in – and you probably just want to get away to somewhere you can wait for it to pass.
Because of the overwhelming nature of anxiety and panic, it’s hard to think of anything except the fear and how you feel. Consciously you may know there’s nothing to really feel scared about, but that doesn’t stop you losing control.
All that anxiety and panic stops you thinking straight.
Yet if you
Have you had enough of your phobia placing limits on your life?
It’s estimated that around ten million people in the UK suffer with a phobia of some sort.
Whether you have a fear of flying, driving, injections or something different, you already know how it can suddenly overtake how you feel, making it seem like you are no longer in control of your own mind and body.
Most people I have helped used to do as much as they could to avoid the situations or things that triggered their anxiety and panic. You may be unable to do the simple things that others do so easily such as flying, driving, going to the dentist or having an injection.
Just knowing that your phobia is irrational, limiting and frustrating isn’t enough to stop all the worry, anxiety and other physical symptoms that automatically kick in. Your mind is hard wired to protect you (which is a good thing!) yet for whatever reason your mind has decided that these things are dangerous so you need to fight whatever it is or escape as quickly as you can.
Yet rather than let it limit you, it is possible to
I work with many people who suffer with anxiety and panic attacks.
And if you suffer with anxiety and panic then you’ll know what a limiting effect they can have on your life as you try and avoid any situations which may cause them to strike.
You may have found that your panic attacks now control your life – you fear experiencing that level of fear again, especially in any situation where you feel out of control, you can’t get away quickly or where others may see you panic.
However bad things may seem for you right now, there are ways to start feeling better quickly.
Here’s what two of my clients recently had to say after
Does the thought of going to the dentist fill you with fear and anxiety?
My dental hygienist was telling me last week about the number of people she was now referring on to me for help with their dental phobia.
Now if you suffer with dental phobia then you may get so anxious that you don’t even make it as far as the dentist’s chair – you anxiety levels are just too high to put yourself in that situation.
Or you may be able to get into the dentist’s chair but then find that you are so anxious you don’t open your mouth. You may get shaky, sweaty, panicky and start hyperventilating.
Some clients I have worked with have literally run out of the room in a state of anxiety and panic. Their dental phobia was just overwhelming.
In fact, some of my clients had let their dentist down so many times with cancellations and running from the room, that the dentist had told them only to come back when their dental phobia was fixed.
Subscribe to Dan’s Digest filled with tips, strategies and techniques and get instant access to your free rapid relaxation hypnosis audio track.
Enjoy feeling and being more mentally calm and physically relaxed right now:
