Stop My Panic

Article by David

Experiencing a panic attack can be an intense experience, and that is an understatement. I’m sure you have experienced a panic attack if you are reading, this. Well in this article, I’m going to provide one solution to stopping your panic attacks and anxiety. This is going to be a 4 step process that you can cycle through as many times as you need to stop the attack.

The first of those steps is to relax. You can relax by taking a very deep breath. I find that a very effective way to breathe to help me relax is to breathe in slowly, hold my breath for 4 seconds, breathe out slowly, hold my breath for 4 seconds, breathe in again, and repeat the process until I am fully relaxed. Continue to take slow, complete breaths. Holding your breath for 4 seconds at the top and bottom of each breath will help keep your breathing slow. This is the first step to stopping the release of adrenaline, which leads to a panic attack.

The next thing you need to do is to get rid of that negative thinking. You need to shout the word “stop!!” in your head as loud as you can. As you shout this word either out loud or in your head, you will interrupt the message that is being sent to your brain’s adrenal gland. People who are experiencing extreme anxiety are getting in a loop which they thing horrible, repetitive thoughts over and over again. Getting caught in this loop is never beneficial. But interrupting the loop can stop the endless negative thinking, and replace the scary thoughts, with thoughts of peace and calm.

The next part of the process is to use coping statements. These are a few positive statement which can be used to help cope with anxiety. This is where you replace your negative thought or thoughts with a positive thought or thoughts. For example, lets say you are having an intense panic attack, and you can’t stop thinking “I’m going to die”. Well, you need to replace this with something else, after you have already shouted “Stop”. You need to replace the negative though with something positive that will help you cope in this type of anxious situation. You could say something like “I am having a panic attack, and as soon as I relax it will stop, and be over”. You could choose a different statement like “I’ve been though this specific situation before, and I was fine, and I didn’t die, so this time won’t be any different.” You can think of all types of coping statements and write them down so you have them in your arsenal for the next time you experience a panic attack.

Finally, the fourth phase of the process is to accept your feelings. If you identify and pick out the emotion you are feeling, you can understand and reason with yourself more easily. Usually, feelings of anxiety are caused by extreme emotions, like fear. You need to realize that you are scared for a reason, and you are experiencing fear because it is your body’s natural response. It isn’t anything out of the ordinary, and many other

• 

Pages: 1 2