So what?!
It is almost one year since I had my first panic attack, and I have come a long way. When it first started, I thought nothing would be the same again. I didn’t even know it was a panic attack; I thought something had changed in me. The first attack came just as I was about to go to sleep. It was sudden and scary, and the after effects lasted for 24 hours. I felt like a zombie. My brain wasn’t working properly. I went to work the next day because if I didn’t, I felt I wouldn’t survive. Normally I would consider staying off sick at the slightest sign of illness, but that day I was desperate for normality (or reality) to come back so I had to stick to my normal routine. I told my colleague at work what had happened and that I wasn’t feeling myself. I asked her to help me with my heavy workload (which I never, ever did before). She said it sounded like I’d had a panic attack (which she’d had before too). I politely considered her diagnosis (and now I feel eternally grateful to her for her advice and support) but in my state of anxiety, I never really accepted that it really could be this. I really believed something in me had changed; my perception of life. I felt that there really were no rules in life and anything could happen – just because something hadn’t happened before didn’t mean it couldn’t ever happen. I still feel that my perception of life has changed (and I wish it hadn’t) but the difference is I am starting to accept that I can choose what my perception of life is.
During the last year, I have questioned everything about reality and it has terrified me. I have panicked at the thought of my own mortality, wondering why I have never realised that one day I will die and wondering how all of humanity can go on living when they know it will end. Wondering what it really means to no longer be alive. What’s the point of it all? It all feels surreal. I am surprised I can even bring myself to write the words because the thought of it still brings on the tingling at the back of my head, the tight feeling in my chest, breathlessness, trembling… all the warning signs that a panic attack is imminent. But somehow, miraculously, these days I can control it. It’s just a panic attack. I’ve had them before. I’ve survived them before. It took a few attacks to realise that I would indeed come out at the other side and still be alive.
James has helped me more than anyone and anything. He has a magical way of saying ‘so what?!’ ‘So what if you think your perception of reality has changed!’ ‘So what if you are going to die!’ ‘So what if you are going to have a panic attack!’ ‘So what if you think there is no point to life!’ Thinking like that doesn’t changing anything. It’s all just thoughts. You can use your imagination to think up anything you want but that doesn’t mean it’s real or that it’s worth wasting your time thinking about. James makes me smile! He makes me realise that I can choose to worry about anything but I can choose not to! My Granma used to say ‘you worry about the day you’ll never see.’ I’m trying not to! How did these people become so wise?!
Posted in Me, Panics, People