My name is Tiffany and I suffer from a panic disorder. I'm 24 years old and seemingly healthy. I'm educated and well rounded. I studied for two years at the University of Mary Washington. I graduated at the top of my class in high school with an advanced diploma. I attended and won states on the debate team and I was the entertainment editor for the school newspaper. I was a member of not only the National Honor Society, but also the French Honor Society and Quill and Scroll, an honor society for journalists. I danced ballet for over twelve years and was part of a competition dance team. I attended the only semi-professional dance studio in the state of Virginia. I have one younger brother, whom I have a great relationship with and my parents are still married. It all seems fairly normal, right? Almost picture perfect.
But there is a wall in my mind. I'm smart enough to know it's not a real wall but one I have created in my head, yet I still can't get past it. When my anxiety acts up and a panic attack kicks in, it's like my whole world is ending in that moment. None of the amazing things I've done or experienced matter, the only thing I can think about is how frustrating life is living without being able to control my emotions and the on set of panic.
As defined by the National Institute of Mental Health, an anxiety disorder is a pattern of constant worry and anxiety over many different activities and events. Most of us experience anxiety in some form in our life. Whether it's jitters about the first day at school or nerves leading up to an interview for a job, everyone has felt nervous at least once in their life. So what's the difference between nervous and having an anxiety disorder?
With most people the nerves come and go, with the disorder the presence of worry is almost constant. Job interviews and starting school are no longer mere hurdles but a huge mountain to climb. Going to the grocery store, which is a normal task for most, becomes an on set of anxiety. This daily issue of nerves and anxiety can escalate and fester into a panic disorder, which is defined as the repeat occurrence of unexpected panic attacks, during which the individual experiences a strong fear with anticipation of death. A typical panic attack can feel like a heart attack, which only makes the panic worse. Your chest will tighten, your heart can race, one may feel faint or dizzy, and you can become very tearful. Most panic attacks only last 20 minutes or so, but it can feel like an eternity to the individual suffering through one. Another problem for those suffering from panic disorders is the constant fear of another panic attack. Now, not only are you fearful of certain situations but you're afraid of your own mind and body having another episode that you can't control.
I have always dealt with anxiety, which I perceived to be fairly normal. I would tense up before the first day of school and be sick to my stomach that morning. When I switched schools, whether from elementary to middle or middle to high, it would always be that much worse. I would cry myself to sleep the night before school started and pray that something would happen so I wouldn't have to go. Before going on stage for a dance recital I would feel shaky and somewhat faint, but always managed to push through. The same would happen before any debate tournament and I would feel my face get flush and the temperature in the room would spike up while I was giving my argument. When I finished my speech and sat down my hands would shake uncontrollably, but I believed it was just adrenaline working through me.
When I went to my first job interview, it was unimaginable. I sat in my car convincing myself that I had to go inside the building. Then the unthinkable happened, I got the job. My first day at work was a nightmare. I remember feeling lost and having trouble concentrating the whole shift and cried for hours after I got home. I pushed my way through it and came out stronger, but it didn't get easier. I learned that the anxiety was just a part of who I was. I thought it was normal and that everyone always felt the same way I did, they just did a better job at hiding it.
When I was 17 years old, I was involved in a bad car accident. I never really had nerves about driving a vehicle but that night changed everything as far as riding in a vehicle. I was sitting in the back on the passenger side of a two door Honda hatchback. The boy driving was going well over the speed limit and not listening to our requests for him to slow down. We were on a back road and were luckily the only car present. He went around a curve to quickly and hit gravel, he overcorrected and we went head first into a tree running over 80mph. The car crumpled, the windows shattered, and all I could hear was screaming. I hate to sound cliché, but it really did happen in slow motion. I remember hearing him skid on the gravel and telling us we were going to hit a tree, and then we did. The doors were bent in and couldn't be opened. The glove box in the dashboard had went through the passenger side window and the girl in the front seat was able to get out. I couldn't get her seat to move forward and was trapped in the back of this car. We were sitting on the wrong side of a dark road and there was traffic coming at us. I remember asking her not to leave me and to help me, and she did. She pulled me out of the car through the window and we got to safety on the side of the road. I didn't know what emotion to feel. For a few moments we laughed, I think out of shock. When I saw my mom before I was taken to the hospital in the ambulance, I realized what had happened and cried. Everything considered, we were fine. My knee had been caught between the front seat and the door and I dealt with some fluid in it and was on crutches for a short amount of time. The driver broke his collar bone and the girl in the front only suffered a few scratches. The paramedics said we missed wrapping the car around the trip by inches. I'm not a hugely religious person, but that was definitely a sign that someone was riding with us and it was not our time to go.
After the accident, I took the liberty of driving whenever I went somewhere with my friends and therefore, I didn't find out how much of a toll this accident had taken on me until some years later. A few friends and I decided to make a late night trip to the beach and we were going to take his car. It was the first time I rode in the back seat of a two door car since the accident and I didn't put the puzzle pieces together until later. Not even twenty minutes into our trip and I couldn't breathe and I was nauseous. We pulled over and I got myself together, thinking it was just a momentary problem, and we were on our way. A few minutes later, he had to pull over again and ended up letting me drive us back home. From that day forward, I refused to sit in the back of a car and have another episode like that occur. I didn't realize it at the time, but that would have been my first panic attack.
In September of 2011, I had, what I thought was my first, and most intense panic attack. I remember I was laying in bed, doing homework and watching TV. I had worked that day and my husband was in the living room playing a video game. I was laying on a heating pad because my chiropractic appointment had left me somewhat sore. I felt my heart start to speed up and figured it was just the heat getting to me, so I turned off the pad and took an Advil PM to help relax and get some sleep. I laid in bed tossing and turning for two hours with my heart still racing. I went and laid on the couch to avoid waking my husband and lay there my whole body shaking and not understanding why. Finally, I woke my husband up and told him we needed to go to the hospital. I couldn't form coherent sentences, I couldn't think, I was shaking to the point of not being able to walk, and I thought my heart may jump out of my chest. The doctors in the ER diagnosed it as a panic attack and gave me Lorazepam, which is a benzodiazepine- a common treatment for panic attacks. The medicine barely effected me. After another dose in my IV though and I didn't know who I was. Six or so hours after it had all started, I was finally not shaking and my heart began to slow down. That day, my life changed. I spent the next week laying in bed afraid anything would trigger another panic attack and that was the last thing I wanted. I thought I was dying and I never wanted to experience that again. I finally
convinced myself to go back to work the following week only to break down in tears twenty minutes into my shift and leave.
I ended up back in the hospital two more times for panic attacks and on the final time they admitted me. I spent two and half days in the hospital going through psychiatric evaluations and was transferred to an outpatient program at a local mental hospital. I spent my 24th birthday at an interview with a program counselor getting ready to start my treatment. It was horrible. Admitting you have an issue serious enough to put you in a mental hospital is tough, at least it was for me. I felt like there was such a stigma placed on patients of mental hospitals and I didn't want anyone to think I was crazy.
Going to the first day of treatment was hard. I remember feeling uncomfortable and anxious and ready to bolt out the door at any second. I refused to go the following day, afraid going would cause another panic attack. My husband forced me to go the third day and then my insurance advised me that they wouldn't cover the program because I wasn't threatening to hurt myself or anyone else. I was discharged from the program and referred to a counselor and a psychiatrist. I was devastated. I had finally admitted I needed help but I couldn't afford to actually get the help I needed.
The psychiatrist I ended up seeing, simply wanted to drug me and move on with life. Living like a zombie may have gotten rid of the panic for the most part, but it wasn't ideal. My counselor on the other hand is incredible and has helped me make tremendous progress. She has taught me coping skills and always been there to remind me that I am strong enough to conquer anything and I'll get through this.
Tomorrow, I start training for my new job. It's my first step back into the real world since that first terrible panic attack in September. It has been almost a year and I am extremely nervous for tomorrow. But I want to write this blog to document what life is like living with a panic disorder and document my struggles with getting re-acclimated to the "real world." It will not only help me to get some of this off my chest, but I hope it will reach someone who is going through a similar situation and they will realize that they're not alone. I'm sure through the course of these entries, I'll retrace some steps and fill in the blanks from the past 11 months but the focus is on the present and that there is a light at the end of the tunnel, always.
Reference:
US National Library of Medicine- www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmedhealth
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