Is this what you mean by fleas?

February 1, 2011

So I am realizing that anxiety attacks are not a new phenomenon in my life, it's

just that I am only now realizing what they are, how they are affecting me, and

how they affect my actions. I realize that I may have learned this anxiety

reaction from nada. I mean I definitely have anxiety in relationship to dealing

with her, but this is anxiety that I think is learned from her, watching her

when I was young.

I'm trying to get over a panic attack right now, and I'm okay, getting through

work, just trying to breathe deeply and convince myself that this is not a life

or death situation here. So, here's the situation: I have this domain, and I

haven't checked email at the domain for a while. I tried to check it and

realized I had forgotten the password. To reset it I will have to contact the

domain adminstrator. No big deal, but I probably won't be able to get into the

account for a few days. But for some reason, I am obsessing and compulsively

trying all these different passwords (that aren't working--the password is there

in the back of my head, I can almost touch it). And starting to panic,

literally. Breathing hard, etc., and all of a sudden, everything on my desk

feels like an emergency and I feel like the world is going to end, and as the

attack starts to go full force I realize what's happening, and I start breathing

deeply and telling myself that this is small beans, no big deal. Which it is

such a small deal, really. And academically I get it so I'm fighting the

physical response and doing okay. But I think when I was in my early twenties (I

haven't had an attack like this--not caused by direct interaction with nada--in

a long time) and a reaction like this would happen, I would go confront whomever

I thought was the cause of my panic and stress and ream them a new one.

So is that some learned response to anxiety that I learned from nada?

February 2, 2011

,

First, (((((hugs)))). This is my own theory based on my own experience. I have

a diagnosis of GAD (generalized anxiety disorder). There are times when under

great distress (primarily when my character or person is under attack) that I do

have panic attacks. My own theory is that as a child I knew things weren't

quite right but was always told I wasn't seeing things correctly, that I was

wrong, everything was normal and I was the abnormal one. As you can imagine,

this created a lot of stress. So, to cope, I began ignoring stressful thoughts

in that I will not acknowledge them. So, they buzz right on by my consciousness

and generate the anxiety. If left unchecked, and if more stressful thoughts are

generated, my system goes through an " overload " process. Where suddenly

everything sets off the adrenaline and I've lost control. My panic attacks come

in waves. If I'm not careful, the first one that hits will cause a loss of

consciousness for a few seconds. The second and third wave will be very

uncomfortable but I wont suffer LOC (loss of consciousness). It sucks so much

and makes me feel so defective...but that's bad because that adds to the stress.

So, yes, my parents put those thought responses into me but I'm in charge now

and can disengage from the anxiety. I have had to learn to be incredibly

watchful for negative thoughts inside my head and pluck them out to rationally

address. If I view any of those thoughts associated with the lies nada planted

into my thoughts, I dismiss them by turning it around. I will say to the voice

inside my head, " you lie and this is not what it seems. " I will then start with

positive affirmations, silver lining seeking thoughts and quickly inventorying

the things I have the power to change and plan to change them one step at a time

or accepting the things that are out of my control and realizing I need not

borrow trouble by worrying about assumptions of impending doom when I cannot

validate with 100% certainty that the assumptions are facts. I have had to

learn to quickly deconstruct my thoughts and reconstruct them in a hurry. To do

that, I have to temporarily remove myself from the situation. I was in a

meeting with my boss and I felt like he was attacking me much like nada would.

Involuntarily, the tears and shaking started and I couldn't stop it. I just

looked at him and said, " You'll have to excuse me for a few moments, I'll be

right back. " I went to the ladies room, acknowledged the stress - realized that

his line of questioning was about his own stress and had nothing at all to do

with me. I calmed myself, avoided the panic attack and went back in to finish

my meeting. Seeing the state he unwittingly drove me to caused him to change

his tactic with me and the meeting went just fine.

So, I can't help when it strikes too much but I can control my reactions by

disengaging from whatever activity is generating too intense of a stream of

anxiety for me. I've suffered so much anxiety from nadas attacks that my

anxiety is now generalized and I suffer it often. I have to take care of my

disorder, be patient with myself and learn ways to seek complete peace. I take

walking brakes in the middle of the day to be by myself. I meditate at night to

clear all thoughts and start purposely thinking loving thoughts about me. I

will talk calmly, soothingly and lovingly to myself during such moments and I am

able to reduce the stress. I've also had to learn to ask for help with some

tasks that are overwhelming.

So, thinking positive helps. Remove yourself from stressful situations to

collect yourself. Take deep cleansing breaths to help calm yourself and

disengage from the thoughts. It's possible that some negative thoughts are

running rampant unnoticed by you consciously and they are generating frustrating

thoughts. You can retrain your mind to work a little differently but it takes

time and practice. If that doesn't help, talk to your MD about pharmaceutical

options until you can gain some positive ground in working through the anxiety

on your own. I do have xanax in case of emergencies where I just cannot shut it

off. It's great. It works and I use it sparingly because I fear addiction

since my mom, dad and brother all were addicted to substances.

Hang in there...nada may have contributed to the anxiety problem but you can

learn to regain control, reprogram your thoughts and your stress response and

learn to live with it in a positive way. I have not had a panic attack in 3

years. Even when nada got my number by accident a couple of months ago, the

PTSD response kicked in hard core at first and for a week, I didn't feel safe.

But, I did not have one panic attack. You can master it.

Sending you strength and joy dear !

Jaie

February 2, 2011

Jaie,

I wrote that post while I was at work. Then that night I had two more anxiety

attacks, one was a full on panic attack that actually started while I was

asleep. I woke up in a full panic.

Then this morning, the stress of working with some completely incompetent and

lazy individuals brought on another anxiety attack. So I decided I needed to

stay home from work and just be in a stress free environment.

I emailed my boss and just told her the truth. She is aware of everything that

happened at Christmas and saw me have the panic attack at work when nada called.

I have explained to her that I am seeking help and that I understand that it

puts strain on the team when I'm not at my best. I just feel so bad to be like,

I need to take a " sick " day because I'm feeling so much anxiety. But I also feel

depression. Like it's a double-edged sword that's slicing away at me.

This is going to be my first thing to talk about with T tomorrow. First on a

long list.

>

> ,

>

> First, (((((hugs)))). This is my own theory based on my own experience. I

have a diagnosis of GAD (generalized anxiety disorder). There are times when

under great distress (primarily when my character or person is under attack)

that I do have panic attacks. My own theory is that as a child I knew things

weren't quite right but was always told I wasn't seeing things correctly, that I

was wrong, everything was normal and I was the abnormal one. As you can

imagine, this created a lot of stress. So, to cope, I began ignoring stressful

thoughts in that I will not acknowledge them. So, they buzz right on by my

consciousness and generate the anxiety. If left unchecked, and if more

stressful thoughts are generated, my system goes through an " overload " process.

Where suddenly everything sets off the adrenaline and I've lost control. My

panic attacks come in waves. If I'm not careful, the first one that hits will

cause a loss of consciousness for a few seconds. The second and third wave will

be very uncomfortable but I wont suffer LOC (loss of consciousness). It sucks

so much and makes me feel so defective...but that's bad because that adds to the

stress.

>

> So, yes, my parents put those thought responses into me but I'm in charge now