Suffering from a panic attack is a scary experience. It can bring feelings of fear, isolation and desperation, It's estimated that almost 1 to 2 per cent of the general population will suffer from panic disorder in any given year, and approximately 5 per cent of the population will experience panic attacks at some point in their lives.

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So what is the best cure? And how can you simplify the process in order to bring a sense of peace and calmness into your life? In this blog, I share with you my panic attack story including how I found the trigger and knowledge to face up to my own body and dissolve the pattern of the attacks.

 

Just when you think you could do without it, the world teaches you a lesson

I have now been stung by a wasp, three times in my life. Every time my body has reacted. The first time when I was 7, my eye swelled up so much I didn't want to go to school! The next time I was 26 and my throat/tongue swelled up and the last time at the age of 35 my ankle swelled up and the itching was unbearable. 

 The second time was the worst. I was not in a great place mentally. I had been depressed for about 2 years. I didn't like to use the word depressed so I called them "my blue days." The days when I just wanted to curl up in a ball and go to sleep. Hide and not face the world. The days when I would think I was not worthy and my life was going anywhere. It was typical these days for all the irrational fears and thoughts to flood in and I would panic that I didn't have a child or a partner. I felt very alone. 

At this time I was healing myself of my eating disorder and I had just started to find a focus around all the painful points in my life so I could anchor myself and bring some light and joy into my day. I was only 7 stone and this was a very unhealthy weight to be I was at such a turning point to begin to find more love for myself and I was hopeful that things would get better.

The sting happened before I went to bed. I was living back at home with my Mum and sister. The wasp was in the bathroom and I picked it up as I didn't want it to sting either of them. The irony was that they are not allergic and of course picking up a wasp is not the best thing to do! I didn't know how allergic I was at this point though. I thought I was protecting my family from the fate that I was just about to go through. 

Instinct over Panic

I lay in bed and I just knew if I fell asleep I would be putting my life in danger.  I had never been in a situation like this before, where I had felt so vulnerable. Part of my brain was trying to calm me down by saying ‘don't worry go to sleep it will be alright’ and the other part was saying ‘don't sleep you are in danger.’

Adding reason to the panic 

I now understand these two parts of my brain, to be part of the two divisions of the autonomic nervous system. The system is responsible for regulating the body’s unconscious actions. The two systems being the parasympathetic nervous system and the sympathetic nervous system. The parasympathetic nervous system (PSNS) takes charge of such things like digestion, salivation and crying, especially after we have eaten whilst the sympathetic nervous system (PNS) stimulates the fight and flight responses to a situation. 

 

Whilst these two systems were in a debate with each other, some other part of my body told me to check my body. All over my torso were hives. Hives are small lumps that appear on the body as a result of an allergic reaction. I now knew there was something wrong. I asked my Mum to drive me to A&E. Whilst driving my throat began to tighten up and swell. I was petrified. My Mum remained very calm and in the end, she suggested I called 999. 

The trained voice of reason 

The ambulance guys were amazing they talked to me and it helped calm down my fight and flight responses, which in the long run was helping my body to fight what was happening. I was still so scared though but they reassured me it was still best to keep driving to A&E. When we arrived I was injected with an adrenaline shot and my body began to heal itself. 

This experience left my body and brain in a suspended state of trauma. The panic attacks started soon after and would come more often than not. They were, of course, worse in the Summer but I still had them in the Winter. I accepted them as a part of my life and dreaded the moment one would pop up and take me out of my day. I had them in public, alone and even once whilst having a singing lesson I managed to continue singing through the attack though!

Everybody’s panic attacks are different 

Different people suffer from panic attacks in different ways. The most common reaction is that people find it difficult to breathe. The reason being the body takes in too much oxygen as the body gasps for breath and leave the person feeling light-headed. Hence why people are taught the paper bag cure.

 

The paper bag cure enables the body to breath out for longer which balances the carbon dioxide and oxygen levels in the body. The long exhale balances the levels and as you keep this pattern up for a period of time you can feel the body returning to its normal state of calm. 

 

My breathing wasn't really ever affected. Mine attacks were more internalised. The outside world became almost squashed inwards and I felt very distant from everything. I thought I was going to die and always I could feel my throat starting to close up. At this point, I began to realise that the symptoms of the panic attacks matched the anaphylactic symptoms from the attack. 

 

Enough is enough

After a year I decided to take action. I went to the doctors and explained my symptoms and the impact the attacks were having on my life. The doctor advised me to visit Guy’s hospital for some allergy tests and then potential immunisation treatment. I took her advice and I had many routine allergy tests and found that I was allergic to wasp venom. I was a total victim in my response and remember saying “why me?” I was so hoping that I wasn't allergic and that I could move on from this experience.

 Time to face the fear head-on. 

I was put on the immunisation programme. This entailed a visit every week for 8 weeks so I could be injected with wasp venom. Over the 8 weeks they built up my immunity to the venom and by the 8th week, my body was immune to the equivalent of 2 full-grown wasp stings.

The only reaction I got was a small red mark around the injected area and it would itch for a day or two. Then every two months I revisited the clinic to be injected again with the equivalent of 2 grown-up wasps. There was no 100% guarantee my body would be totally immune however it felt like the right thing to do. 

Every Friday I dreaded the visit. After being injected you had to wait for 2 hours in the sterile waiting room to see if you had a reaction. Every time I went I would cry on my way on the train and I would sit for the whole two hours in fear of a reaction. 

Turning Point Breath. Breath. Breath

 

Then one Friday morning sitting in the busy waiting room I began to use the breathing techniques learnt from my singing lessons. It seemed to fool my brain and helped me to focus my mind. You can read more about how singing can help you to express yourself in my blog breathing for life - the doorway to speaking your truth.

Miraculously I began making new friends in the waiting area. I would listen to their stories and eventually, I began to reassure people who looked nervous. Hooray! The tables were turning. 

I was beginning to change my patterns. Or control my sympathetic nervous system and the fight or flight reaction was being calmed down by my awareness to remain present within the moment by focusing my mind with the breathing technique.

 

There were always many people around me but the breathing technique was quite quiet. I didn't mind if they heard me as I knew this was my chance to overcome the fear and start to cure the panic attacks. I used the two hours of stillness wisely. Some patients didn't even stay for the two hours, some talked happily and one man 6ft tall collapsed after his first injection and lost his front teeth so it wasn’t only me who got nervous! 

My next step was to read more about panic attacks and actually understand from a scientific perspective what was happening. There was one sentence that I read in my research that turned the situation around for me.

I began to understand that the brain was like a circuit board. It would take information and store it. Then at points when the body would feel it was being attacked it would go back into this said 'memory bank' and react in the way it had learnt previously from the past situation to help protect me from being in danger. 

 

I want to break free

Through my healing, for my eating disorder, I had already started to learn that I could turn negative thoughts into positive and that I could remain more in my present self than in the past. All I needed to do was to trick my own brain and body to learn a new trick. It would take time and patience. I was learning a new way of being as my mind became more focused, new exciting things were happening in my life and I was becoming happier. 

 Bye-bye panic attacks. When an attack came on I used to breathe. Here is the exercise.

1. Breath out on a long exhalation for 5-10 counts. Lips slightly open, teeth slightly open, the tongue tip will curl and rest on the hard palate.

2. Make a simple sound with the breath like the sea lapping on the seashore.

3. As you exhale focus your mind to your ribs and follow the sinking movement of the ribs to the centre of your body as you exhale. 

4. . At the end of the exhale inhale for one breath expanding the ribs. 

5. Begin the longer exhalation again. 

6. . Repeat until the body has resumed a normal breathing pattern. 

 

I had another routine that I implemented to help reprogram my circuit board. 

1. I would also tell myself I am ok continuously through the attack.

2. I would find a mirror and stand in front of it and open my throat and allow my eyes to see that my throat was not swelling up. 

 

 Listen, Explore, Connect.

It took 6 months for the reprogramming and then one day I just realised the episodes were happening less and less. I had used breathing and Positive Mental Attitude PMA to cure my attacks. I found my own cure a cure I understood for my body I loved the image of the circuit board as it simplified the process for me and put a realistic slant on my approach.

 This then began to open my mind to new ways. I wanted to understand the body even more especially the irrational effects that the sympathetic nervous system had on the body. If this was the case for panic attacks could it be the same for other irrational thoughts and of course depression, mood swings and general bringing of joy and balance into people lives? 

 

Sometimes things have to happen to let you know it is ok. The last time I got stung I believe was a bit of a lesson to me. It was 9 years from the last sting and I happened to be in California in Yurt Village at White Louts Foundation training to be a yoga teacher. 

 Wasps were far from my mind. I had my flip flops on and had taken my early morning shower. For years in the Summer, I walked with my head down, checking for wasps so not to tread on them. My brain had recovered so well that I didn't feel I need to check the floor anymore. I did however still carry the two epi-pens the doctors prescribed annually just in case I got stung.

 I screamed out in pain. I knew straight away I had been stung. And I cried automatically. I again could feel the victim mentality arise. I was miles from home and miles from anywhere if my body reacted badly.

STOP 

All these thoughts that were rushing in were not real, they were part of that fight/flight system that I had leant to control. My yurt mates luckily were still in the yurt and they calmed me down. They sat with me for thirty minutes, when I could safely say the years of travelling to Guy’s hospital had been worth it. I was immune. The reaction was only localised. The swelling took a day to go and the itching was horrific but I was ok. 

 When I began to reflect, I realised it was perhaps the safest place for me to have been stung. I was healed and I didn't need to worry anymore. For a little while, my body panicked as I thought I may start to suffer from the attacks again. But I had moved on. 

 

Face the fear and do it anyway Facing the fear is a toughie. Boy, do we thank ourselves for it afterwards. 

 

Everybody is different. That’s, why I love the, practise of yoga as it takes this approach and offers a time for us to tap into our bodies, engage with our breath, offer space to evolve and internalise our thoughts, so we can make rational decisions that will enhance our lives and those around us. 

 

I cured my panic attacks through self-awareness, the thirst for enquiry and need to move on and let go of what was holding my higher consciousness from evolving. 

When we master the practise of inversions in yoga we feel weightless. 

 

I believe, life, when it is on the correct tracks also feels light and weightless. If your life is feeling heavy and hard work maybe it’s time for you to assess what it is that weighs you down.  Start today for tomorrow doesn't yet exist…. 

For more information on my thoughts and practices visit @cosmicsoulschool on Instagram I would love to meet you there and share ideas and answer any questions you may have you can always email me at cosmicsoul@cosmicsoulschool I am now a qualified NLP Master Practitioner and Wellbeing coach so I can help others to cure their bodies of such unwanted attacks.