Thankyou Note

Came on here whilst writing notes for my seminar and I am so pleased with the amount of people looking on my blog. I really hope I am helping you in some way and this is beneficial to you and I am grateful you have taken time to read my posts!
Getting quite anxious about tomorrow but I am thinking positively about what I can do when I get home and about the weekend. Its an hour out of my day after all and that's nothing!
I will be blogging on the way there to give you an insight into how my journeys going and what I'm doing to prevent a panic attack. Hopefully through sharing experiences, anxiety and panic attacks will become less taboo and more people will talk about how they're feeling!
I am currently thinking of whether to reveal my identity and post pictures of my journey and life so that it is more personal to other sufferers and may start this next week. Let me know if you think this is a good idea!
In quite a sad mood today as my partner's not here, but I keep telling myself this is a normal emotion to feel when he is 200 miles away :)
Anyway back to my work, my kittens keep standing on the laptop!

Lasting thought - Do more than you think you can each day
xx

Helpful Youtube Videos

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VdtVC_wB0Jo
Quite motivational and short if you need a quick boost ^


http://www.panic-away.com/index.php
Promotional video for the 'panic away' method. I have watched this very pessimistically because I have seen many fraudulent vidoes promising to cure panic attacks which prey on the vulnerability and desperation of sufferers. Because of this, I may buy the set of disks and then let you know whether this approach is effective or not.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OVhe5E14YUA
Genuine account of a man who began having a panic attacks from taking drugs but has recovered :)


http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QuR_VAww3Jg
One man's personal journey through anxiety, panic attacks, and depression

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Zh-klfBJlHc
Relaxing meditation video. I used this video when I had my first big attack that I have written about in a previous post. It helped me to stay calm(ish) when my mum&dad returned from Turkey.  


http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_vaDln5cEiY
Meditation for anxiety, anger, depression.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qs_DuZigRzY&feature=related
'chakra' meditation for your mood. Very positive comments although I do not like her voice very muchx


Whilst searching I also found a video of a man having a panic attack on an aeroplane. I did not want to post this as it was quite distressing and didnt want to make anybody panic but it did show me what the behaviour of an anxious person appears like to others& comforted me as the other passengers were genuinely concerned for his safety and welbeing and were not unpleasant towards him.

A little bit about medication& my experience with it

It Almost slipped my mind to tell you that I have tried medication to combat my panic disorder. I have tried fluxotine, citalopram and propanolol.

General information for these medications can be found here:
Citalopram
Fluoxetine
Propranolol

In my personal opinion, I didn't want to carry on with medication because;
1) I felt it did not work to help reduce my anxiety and with citalopram, actually made it worse and
2) I do not believe treating the symptoms (i.e using propanolol to reduce the heart rate increase associated with panic) and not treating the cause of the panic is an effective way of 'curing' yourself of anxiety. 
This may not be true of you and I would never advise anybody to avoid medication because it may work to reduce the unpleasant symptoms of anxiety and this may give you the confidence to 'take back' your life.
The side effects were also quite upsetting. I never had a problem sleeping with anxiety but with fluxotine especially, painfull heartburn would wake me up every night at about 3am causing me to lose sleep and make me very depressed. I lost 13lb during this time and decided that the side effects outweighed the benefits fluxotine may have given me.
I found propanolol particularly frightening for the soul basis it says on the box, not recommended for anxiety. This made me question whether my GP actually knew anything about panic disorder at all (typing angrily) When I took the tablets they did slow my heart rate but this just made me feel like I was trapped in a lifeless shell. Inside I was screaming and on the outside I couldn't even work up an increase in my heart rate. Here again, medication is just masking the symptoms. It is preposterous to think that this medication can be used on a long term basis as a treatment for panic disorder. I would rather deal with my issues than pretend they are not there with drugs. Instead of coping and existing, I would rather live.  

Diary 4

Hello! Today I went for a meal with my boyfriend which I'm very proud of since I haven't been out for one in about 6 months! We got a taxi to the pub, had a lovely dinner and we walked home. Although I was slightly panicked, having fun and being out somewhere that I wouldn't usually go took my mind off my anxiety. This has shown me I can go out and do sociable things and made me feel less insecure about my partner thinking I'm boring or annoying lol!
Tomorrow I go back to uni which I am a bit anxious about because of the journey, but my dad is taking me so we will do breathing exercises on the way and hopefully the topic of my seminar will keep me focused and distracted. I'll let you know how it goes tomorrow! I hope this doesn't make me feel panicked today because my boyfriend has returned to work ( he works away) so I'm feeling a bit sad about that and would prefer to be chilled out.
In the meantime I am going to go for a run around the park and then do some meditation that I have found on youtube. I will post useful videos I find in the next entry and let you know whether they worked or not.

Have a lovely, lovely day!
xx