PANIC ATTACKS - WHAT CAUSES THEM, WHAT IS THE CURE
A true and personal story. I write this account in the hope that if it helps only one person, it was worth the effort.If you have never suffered from a panic attack, there are no words in the english dictionary to truly explain the horrific experience that one encounters. After searching for 18 months I finally have cured myself from this affliction; but first here is my story that perhaps you can identify with.
I am 48 years old and fortunate to have a loving family an excellent career and financially very well off. I tell you this because panic attacks should not be happening to someone like me. I have no history of mental illness, nor do I have stress levels that could bereft me with such a disorder. This usually happens to other people. My life was happy and privileged and yet I nearly disappeared down a hole of depression, anxiety and despair.
Early one morning as the sun was rising, I woke from a dream that can only be described as the most horrific evil nightmare I had ever experienced.
My chest felt it was closing up, I had ice cold rivers of ice running from my chest to my arms and my mind felt as if I was going crazy. I shot out of bed and into the garden wanting not to worry my wife who was still sound asleep. Half my mind seemed in complete control and the other half was literally going insane. Pacing around the garden in a state of panic wondering if I was going to die and for some reason remembering a story that a previous employee of mine had recounted how her husband suddenly and for no reason woke up one day in a manic depressed state and for years walked around the house in his dressing gown. Having been very affluent they lost their life's possessions. He never did recover.
Finally I realized that what ever this was, it was not abating and it was time for my wife to get me to the hospital, PRONTO. Arriving at the emergency room, the efficient medical staff ran every test on me that was possible, looking very puzzled the attending physician explained I was in optimum health and put the whole episode down to a Panic Attack.
I walked out of the ER with a packet of schedule 8 drugs in case I needed them.
That night I was too terrified to go to sleep so I took a pill. These were serious drugs; I was out like a light. I awoke the next morning very groggy and decided I would only take these if absolutely necessary, so they got shunted into the back of my drawer, hoping I would never have to see them again. This was the start of one of the most horrific periods of my life.
For the next 4 months I never experienced another episode until on a flight to the USA, I couldn't sleep, so I had a couple of drinks. Not being a regular drinker I thought this would help. It didn’t. Now awake I arranged a midnight snack with 2 cups of the delicious strong coffee.
Seven hours into the flight the PANIC attack started. Hot flushes to the face which moved like strong tingly currents down my chest and arms. Fear and panic started to overcome me. Fortunately I had two of those schedule 8 tablets with me from my last visit to the ER which I brought along just in case. They are so powerful that only 1 tablet is to be taken every 24 hours, I took them both. They did absolutely nothing. By now the flight attendants were panicking because all I wanted to do was open the door to get some fresh air. The three doctors onboard had no idea what was happing to me and I could see the fear in their eyes. The last thing anyone was expecting was a crazed maniac on their flight. The strange thing is that part of my mind was in shear panic and the other part could see reason and logic.
I managed to hold on until we landed to refuel which was nine hours into the flight at Dakar in West Africa. No one is normally allowed off due to security and health reasons, however they let me disembark and brought an ambulance around to meet the plane. I was not allowed to stay over in Dakar due to all the various diseases for which I was not inoculated against. Fortunately the rest of my pills were in my luggage which they found for me. I took another two and the rest of the flight was history, I don’t remember a thing.
By now I thought I had acquired some mental aversion to flying and I still had some flying to do in the US and still fly back home. Believe me when I say that PANIC attacks while flying is one of the most terrifying experience one can have.
One thing I noticed while in the US was that every time I drank coffee I felt a hot sensation coming over my face. I put this down to the heat of the drink. The flight back home was without incident however on a scale of 1 to 10 and 10 being the previous panic attack, this time they were hovering around 5, I just prayed for 17 hours.
By now I realised I had a serious problem but it still was not apparent what the cause was. I kept on drinking tea and coffee although not to the extent I had before, however I still had not connected the dots. I suffered a mild panic attack on another short flight back home but it was only 2 hours and I forced myself to stick it out. I think it had something to do with that part of my mind that still knew logic and reason.
My desperate search for answers was prolonged as there are nearly 5 million results when you type in "panic attack" on a search engine. I used every conceivable variant and additional key words, but to no avail. I finally decided to go and see a specialist physician. I must point out that even though I have a distinguished position in the medical field, I do not have a great amount of respect for the medical community, perhaps it's because I see what most do not. My physician is a highly qualified specialist with a list of credentials as long as my arm. I gave her a recount of the past years experiences. "Not to worry", she finally said, "I have a bag full of drugs that we can use to manage this disease". Well this was probably the worst thing she could have said to me as I absolutely loathe pharmaceuticals and this approach made me very uneasy. I didn't want to be managed; I wanted someone to tell me what the hell was causing all of this and fix it. ZOLOFT was prescribed and after taking only 2 of the 2mg pills, I walked around like a zombie. I couldn't even talk properly, mixing all the words up, so I threw them in the toilet.
She wanted to see me again in a week, but now I knew I couldn't rely on the medical profession. I sat down and thought long and hard about my problem. By now I was absolutely convinced that it was not psychological but in fact chemical. I thought about my eating habits before and on flights as well as all the other times I had milder cases. This conjured up new search words for Google and Magnesium deficiency came up, listing many of my symptoms. This made sense as I drink a considerable amount of milk and calcium is an antagonist to magnesium. Searching further I noticed caffeine toxicity and intolerance also showing many of my symptoms. This was the furthest thing from my mind as I was still drinking coffee and tea without panic attacks but in retrospect I did feel uneasy however when placed in a confined space the subconscious fear of not being able to get out triggered a higher elevation of the attacks. I also noticed that I was becoming frightful from violent movies and there were times that if the storyline showed mental illness or suicide, I started to become fearful and an anxiety would come over me. Now I love a good action movie, I was in a war for two years for crying out loud, and now I was being reduced to watching old musicals and cartoons.
I decided to start a course of magnesium supplements, and they really helped but on a scale of 1-10 my anxiety levels were still at about 3, so I started to only drink decaf and tea. The levels went down to 2. More research on caffeine and I found out the black tea also contained caffeine (45mg) as well as decaf coffee (4mg), so I switched to green and red teas and no coffee. The levels dropped to 1. There was still a buzz going on in my head, not audible but my head was just not right.
So now I started experimenting with different foods, and the final solution was sugar.
So now I have cut out coffee, black tea and green tea, (I only drink herbal and red bush teas) and when I finally cut out sugar my Anxiety and Panic levels become ZERO. Finally I felt normal again. It seems that for me, neurostimulants was causing the panic attacks.
I had absolutely no idea that caffeine could have had such an impact in my life, and when I knew what to search for I found out I was not the only one. The problem is colossal including depression and other so called mental illnesses. What is an absolute disgrace is the medical community is absolutely oblivious to this problem, quickly resorting to pharmaceutical synapses suppressing drugs, quite happy to let people walk around in a semi conscious stupor rather than accepting that there are other alternative protocols.
In conclusion I am a firm believer that anxiety and panic attacks including depression are not neuro chemical imbalances, but rather we feed these disruptors through our diet that create the brain synapses to misfire. Having thoroughly researched this after the fact, I have been proven right.
Unfortunately, most doctors, when faced with a patient who suffers from panic disorder or depression, will reflexively resort to prescribing potentially toxic medications as a form of treatment, even though they don't provide any meaningful benefit. This is largely related to the incredibly effective "brain washing" influence that the drug companies have over their educational intervention.
The National Institute for Health and Clinical Excellence (NICE) recently recommended that antidepressants, specifically selective serotonin reuptake inhibitors (SSRIs), should be the first-line treatment for moderate or severe depression. This recommendation could be why many doctors reactively turn to antidepressants to treat patients suffering from depression. However, studies have found that SSRIs may increase the risk of suicidal behaviour in both children and adults, leading two UK investigators to argue: Antidepressants, for the most part, offer no meaningful benefit. After reviewing published medical evidence on antidepressant efficacy:
- One of the investigators stated she is not convinced there is such a thing as a drug that will specifically relieve depression and that so-called antidepressants are merely drugs that do other things, such as sedating or stimulating people.
- A co-author of the report also pointed out that depression should be addressed without drugs, as it is something people need to learn to deal with themselves.
Anxiety and Panic Attack Symptoms:
- Palpitations, or accelerated heart rate
- Sweating
- Trembling or shaking
- Sensations of shortness of breath or smothering
- Feeling of choking
- Chest pain or discomfort
- Nausea or abdominal distress
- Feeling dizzy, unsteady, lightheaded, or faint
- De-realization (feelings of unreality) or depersonalization (being detached from oneself)
- Fear of losing control or going insane
- Sense of impending death
- Paresthesias (numbness or tingling sensations)
- Chills or hot flashes
So what can you do
Its not as important what you can take but rather more important to stop consuming specific foods and drinks that affect brain chemicals.These are the most common disrupters.
- Caffeine
- Alcohol
- Sugar
- Glutamates (MSG is one source)
- Sucralose (Splenda is one source)
Can I go back to enjoying my coffee again
In my opinion the answer is sadly NO! It is as if the brain has rewired itself to continue reacting towards neurostimulants and now that you have stopped with the offensive chemicals, it prefers it that way. I do on occasion have something that contains sugar without side effect and every now and then a sip of my wife's coffee, but to be totally honest I am petrified to go down that road again. Its just not worth it.Caffeine containing products
Link here to a comprehensive listWhere to from here?
In most cases it is pretty simple. You have no choice but to alter your eating habits. Try the elimination process for 1 month and feel the difference.Instead of sugar, try Xylitol
Supplement with Magnesium Glycinate, Rhodiola rosea, 5 HTP and L-Theanine, as these are helpful to get you over the hump.
Here's to your good mental health.