Panic attack treatments have been given by doctors to those who suffer from the condition for a long time. Anyone who has had to cope with the debilitating fear and discomfort of an attack will certainly put them to use when they feel the effects of an attack building up. But many have had cause to question their effectiveness.
To illustrate an example of the typical panic attack treatments that people use to calm themselves during an event, try to imagine the following scenario:
In an ordinary day spent running ordinary errands, you find yourself in line at the supermarket. Without warning, you sense a familiar and unwelcome feeling in your throat, and you begin to breathe in shallow gasps. Your chest begins to grow tight, and your heart speeds up and skips beats. You’ve had this feeling before, and you fear what’s coming. And the more you fear it, the worse it grows. You begin to get dizzy, you start to tremble, and you feel your stomach cramping. You’d give anything to avoid what’s coming, but you know with certainly that you’re only seconds away from losing it altogether and falling into a gigantic panic attack. So you start coping the only way you know how, by using what you’ve been taught in an effort to keep control and hopefully prevent the worst.
The first of the panic attack treatments you’ve been told to try is deep breathing exercises. You focus on breathing in through your nose, out through your mouth. You try to think relaxing thoughts, but it doesn’t seem to have the positive effect you’re hoping for. Just the fact that you’re concentrating on breathing makes you feel more embarrassed and stressed out.
The second of the panic attack treatments you try out is gradual muscle relaxation, another physical intervention. You tense your shoulders, holding the tension in for several seconds, and then relax. You do it a second time. A third time. Why isn’t this working? Your stress increases as you realize that this isn’t working, and coupled with the knowledge that you’re running out of ideas for how to cope, your fear begins to get the better of you.
Finally, you pull out the last of the panic attack treatments in your arsenal. Running for your life. The adrenaline is coursing through your body, and when the fight didn’t work, the flight was all that was left. You are convinced that this is the worst case scenario, you’re going to finally go crazy for real, right there in public. Your only option is to get away as fast as you can, and at least save some shreds of dignity before the end.
Ten minutes, thirty minutes, maybe an hour later, your panic has subsided. But you still don’t have your groceries.
There are differences in triggers, physical sensations, and intensity, but the above is probably very familiar to people who suffer from anxiety or panic attacks. It is an intensely real and overwhelming fear that something very, very bad is about to happen, and while they may find no comfort in this fact, they are not alone. It’s estimated that about 5% of the population suffer from some form of anxiety disorder.
But if the panic attack treatments they’ve all learned to manage their symptoms aren’t doing the job, what’s left to try? Is there an alternative to simply suffering, or a lifetime of medication? Isn’t there a way to stop a panic attack before it starts, eliminating the need to cope with them, with little success, after the fact? The fact is, it’s entirely possible to put an end to the vicious cycle of panic attacks. It’s not another of those panic attack treatments that don’t work; it’s a method whereby the fear is eliminated by facing it squarely. We all know, deep in our hearts, that we can only conquer a fear by turning to look it in the face. No matter where we run, the fear will only follow. While it seems contradictory, the best of all panic attack treatments is to deliberately dare one to come.
In fact, it is possible to end the cycle of panic attacks. It involves a method of curing the fear by facing it head on. Deep down, we all know that the only way to overcome a fear is to turn and face it – if we continually run from it, it will only follow us. It may seem paradoxical, but the most effective of all panic attack treatments is to welcome an attack, even to hope for one to come.
You begin to shift the balance of power in your favor when you choose to embrace a panic attack, rather than fight to push it away. Soon, the panic no longer controls you; you control your panic. Making the conscious choice to induce a panic attack results in the increasing impossibility of one actually coming on. You’ll learn that you can look your fear in the face and spit in its eye. You may understand intellectually even now that panic can’t hurt you, but when you finally receive this truth deeply and emotionally, you will have truly gotten your life back.
