Article by Paris Lee

Aside from the three inevitables of life, birth, disease and death, you can also include stress to the list of unavoidables that seem to lengthen with time. Believe it or not, stress is a part of the normal bodily response to encourage people into action. It executes a positive and protective function. Having said that, because of individual differences owing to the trillions of A, T, G and C combinations of nucleotide bases, in other words, the genetic makeup, people look at stress in different ways. For that matter, people react to stressors differently. For example, speaking in front of a crowd is stimulating and satisfying to politicians. However, for a person who hasn’t talked before that many people, this can bring a feeling of apprehension as he or she waits for the turn to speak. Both may feel a certain degree of stress; but, for the former, the stress can enhance bodily functions in order to ready him or her for the event. For the latter, the stress can blow out of proportion to cause him or her to get out of the activity altogether.

Panic disorder works similarly with the latter scenario. Stress can become uncontrollable to the point of causing a series of panic attacks. To define terms, panic attacks refer to the abrupt onset of intense terror from feelings of impending doom. Panic disorder, on the other hand, is an escalated form of panic attack which lasts from five to thirty minutes and may fluctuate in intensity within this period. However, some have reported episodes as short as one minute and as long as a month. The disorder becomes severe when the panic disorder symptoms prompt a person to seek treatment from emergency rooms at the hospital. In reality, fatality rates for panic disorder sufferers are twenty percent higher than the general population. In addition to that, a high number of people with disorder commit suicide. The disease can severely alter the quality of life of people who live in constant fear of the precipitating event or having to experience the attack again.

Common panic disorder symptoms include palpitations (irregular, rapid, hard heartbeats), perspirations, dizziness, dyspnea (difficulty of breathing), uncontrollable fear, choking or smothering sensation, hyperventilation (fast breathing), chest pain, nausea, paresthesias (tingling sensation), chills or hot flashes, and many others. These symptoms result from the stimulation of the sympathetic nervous system and are exaggerated reactions of the body to perceived stressors, which may not be real at times. Once the stressor has disappeared, the effects of the sympathetic nervous system will usually be reversed. Having said that, in the case of the disorder, due to the maladaptive coping mechanism to stress, symptoms remain until they bring harm to the person.

The panic disorder symptoms can be overcome with the right attitude and support of family and friends. A mix of both cognitive behavioral therapy

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