Thats easier said than done. I find that my panic symptoms change and new ones are added into the mix and old ones sometimes go away.

I liked reading this article. You are exactly right about it can be hard to tell the difference disease and panic. I was diagnosed with Panic Disorder and I was really really sick, coughing up blood, immune system malfunctions and pluerisy...and the list goes on. Now here comes the interesting part...I had already been diagnosed wtih Graves Disease and then Panic Disorder when they stopped looking for any more causes despite my physical and emotional suffering. I almost died due to the misdiagnosis of Panic Disorder, 7 months ago I finally got diagnosed with Addison's Disease and I have to wear a Medical Alert Bracelet. They save my life at the last moment, just in time! Also, I was misdiagnosed Bipolar and then changed to Graves Disease.

These are some very helpful information.I recently learned i was Bipolar that's just added to the rest of things i suffered from.

I think that nursing professionals should have a better education regarding panic attacks and conditions that may APPEAR to be a panic attack but could really be something else. I once had an asthma attack whilst in hospital. I had mild asthma but had never had an attack before. However I had experienced panic attacks, and when I was very anxious about my forthcoming operation and started to get short of breath I assumed I was having a panic attack. I told nursing staff what I thought was happening to me. One of them asked me if I had been smoking in the toilets! I have never smoked in my life so I was quite insulted by this. Another nurse made me lie down and gave me oxygen, which I don't think would have been the right thing for a panic attack. However, one nurse suggested I try my blue inhaler, which helped my breathing and I calmed down. I realised after a while that I was actually having an asthma attack brought on by anxiety. My symptoms seemed generally to just cause confusion to everyone, myself included. I feel that nursing staff should be trained to deal with this kind of situation and have a procedure to follow in order to ascertain the nature of an attack of breathing difficulties.

Thanks as I had a 'tunnel vision' panic attack as we were shopping in a differently-arranged store and my hubby was on his cell and walked very close to him before I knew it. I felt like I was in a maze, watching the signs above to get my route through the store. This is the first one this badly in years.

Your 'musings' are very helpful Julie - and you have gleaned a lot obviously from your patients, and that is indeed important -- to confirm the correct diagnosis, ie getting the all clear from one's doctor that symptoms are not related to another medical condition. A relative of mine was experiencing inability in coping all of a sudden, plus distressing anxiety (actually more psychosis) and it was discovered she was suffering Grave's Disease, for which is now appropriately being treated. Also, yes heart attack symptoms are so similar to panic disorder, as has occurred with my mother.

But I do empathise very much with Shantiann and her frustrations.

Whilst general practitioners and therapists can diagnose and help treat the anxiety/panic disorder conditions and provide support to the sufferer, there is often a lack of true understanding of the degree of suffering that we go through. I recall once in an acute panic state desperately ringing my doctor for help - I really thought that I was going to die! He meant well I'm sure - but he told me to have a hot bath! As if in the state I was in I could possibly have even got to the bathroom and place myself in that vulnerable state - when I was totally overwhelmed with utter fear and anguish, and couldn't even move...

I just want to stress that a panic attack is one of the most debilitating, frightening, terrifying, sorrowful, alarming, distressing ...... experiences that one can ever have in their life time! The need/desperate desire is for IMMEDIATE HELP and RESCUE, otherwise you are going to DIE! It's as simple as that (from my perspective anyway). I once picked up a pamphlet which aptly stated: " PANIC ATTACKS ARE SUDDEN FEELINGS OF INTENSE TERROR!!! " - that's excactly how I found them, and the only people who can truly understand are fellow sufferers!

I'd just like to share with others, that I've been a panic disorder (with agoraphobia) sufferer for 22 years. I have tried everything from meditation to relaxation therapy, to yoga, to intense prayer (which does provide great comfort ). On a couple of occasions via prayer, when I've had to pull over to the side of the road in panic whilst driving my car - it seemed miraculous how some religious person arrived on the scene (as if from nowhere) to instil courage in me to continue safely on.

I've read every self-help book there is to read on the subject (the best I think are those written by Claire Weekes). I've been to various therapists. But nothing has helped me more than having been on an anti-depressant for the last seven years, along with a very low dose benzodiazapene. And, I shouldn't say this, but in all honesty I've resorted to drinking on occasions - a very dangerous scenario, and another problem in itself (as I have discovered, and as we all know). One shouldn't really drink when on these medications of course, or only moderately!

A professional, trusting, caring therapist - who even rings after hours to see how you're doing is also a Godsend, and worth searching for. I have recently made a vow to never try again to wean myself off anti-depressants, because I have finally realised, like a diabetic requires insulin - I need them, and they help stabilise me, and the quality of life is far superior. I have not had a panic attack for some years now! I still pray, and God is my greatest strength but he too gave us doctors and pharmacists, and I respect them and am grateful (but of course not all are perfect!)

To finalise, of course the greatest cure for panic is to learn to no longer fear it - that is a hard one, but many people have successfully defeated the 'fear-cycle' as Claire Weekes appropriately describes it. I did overcome a couple of the many tormenting aspects, ie shopping in supermarkets etc, but some, I just can't get a grip on.

I do sympathise so much with my fellow sufferers of this and similar conditions. It's not an easy road for us, and it definitely is something physiological, not "all in our minds". I think that's interesting about the "cell-memory" concept - makes sense.

Forbes magazine has this habit to rank the world prominent personalities in various categories and field of influences even on gender basis. This time around Forbes present 100 most powerful women in the world. Number 1 is neither Michelle Obama, nor is it Hillary Clinton – Number One is Angela Merkel, Chancellor of Germany. First Ladies don't come that close – Michelle is only #40. The top American – at #2 – is FDIC Chair Sheila Bair. #3 is PepsiCo CEO Indra Nooyi, and #54 is Supreme Court Justice Sonia Sotomayor, but she's ranked lower than the other sitting female Justice, Ruth Bader Ginsberg at #48. It takes more than the best payday loan rates to get on the Forbes 100 Most Powerful Women list.

Unfortunately panic & anxiety aren't the only diseases that mimic life threatening conditions. As others have so eloquently stated, a big contributor to panic and anxiety is the medical profession itself. I cannot tell you how many times I've been misdx'd, mis-medicated and/or downright blown off. I can't begin to tell you how much DAMAGE, physical and emotional, that has caused. After two years of going to dr after dr after dr....my daughter ended up having to have emergency surgery a week before she turned 17. It all could have been avoided if she hadn't been pigeon-holed!

So distinguishing the difference may or may not help and it certainly isn't the be all end all solution.

The medical profession (including all therapists) could help a lot by not making snap decisions AND not pigeon holing us. ACTIVE LISTENING and a tad of EMPATHY would be a good start. Of course that flies against most medical institutions' protocol and ability to make as much money as they can...

I believe that panic/anxiety disorder is a combination of physical and emotional. For me the physical comes first then leaves the anxious/panic-y feeling.

Personally, I believe in cellular memory and I suspect that's where panic originates. Physicists have proved that cells do have memory. And I think the medical profession should pay more attention to that as well as their patients. After all, WE are the ones that KNOW our bodies the best.

I have been reading comments on various web sites regarding panic attacks for quite some time and still surprises me how ignorant doctors and patients are on the food additive MSG. Even my own patients, friends and relatives find it just too difficult to to eliminate E621 from their diet. Why does patients opt for the easy way out with medication before trying a more holistic approach first? Please read my testimonial and please study the subject and make an informed decision before going to the doctor. I did.

I mean no offense Ms. Cohen so please understand my musings here are coming out of frustration towards "medical professionals" that have never had a panic attack in their life so are basically clueless as to what really goes on when the panic attacks start, worsen, and then get their very own zip codes within our bodies.

The majority of us who suffer with PD are intelligent enough to truly know what you're talking about....but that's all it is. An understanding of what you are talking about. It does not, and I repeat, it does not change one bloody thing when the attacks start to come again. No amount of refocusing, CBT, or drugs (unless they’re addictive sedatives!) help.

We get lulled into believing that we have learned to "manage" this lovely little disorder, only to quickly learn time and again, no matter what we do, they always, always come back. It just depends on the severity of this round of panic this time.

No matter what we know intellectually or how we learned to deal with it, either cognitively or pharmacologically, nothing anyone says or does changes our belief patterns at the times of the attacks. It’s not like we don’t want to change them, we do…we just can’t. And then we are admonished for not trying hard enough, not concentrating enough, not practicing enough, and the list goes on until we feel more like a failure than we already did.

I cannot speak for everyone but I will speak for myself and a few of my friends who deal with this on a more frequent, daily basis. If we could indeed stop these train-wrecks of behaviors and thought patterns, we would do anything to do just that. But experience has taught us that they do not work. A lot of us "fake" that they do work for varied reasons: We see the frustration of our PCP's dealing with us; We see our loved ones and friends beginning to reach the breaking point in dealing what is our disease, not theirs.....and the list goes on an on. But what you as clinician's and doctors DON'T understand is that we see it on you. We see it in your actions, your body language and certainly the care as the frustration begins to sink in deeper for all of you...we are not blind.

So we retreat and then retreat some more. And each time we retreat and no one can "see through us" on WHY we are retreating, it just solidifies that pattern of pretending that what you’re doing is kind of helping, even if it’s not because you are the only hope we have left.

What I would say is a very high number is you have yet to see any of this. We truly have learned or been conditioned to (once a certain point has been reached) to now become the greatest actor/actress’s that the outside world has ever seen.

Once we've embarrassed ourselves ad-nauseum with doctor's and they have now "flagged us" so that we can't even walk into an emergency room anymore because we all know once they pull up our records we are considered "one of them"....the over-emotional, hypochondriacally, emotional disturbed patients who are from that moment on treated differently, if we could just crawl under the gurney and out the door we would because now we know we have to suffer further indignities while being “treated” until we are released. Treated like little children who do not have all their marbles upstairs, they humiliate us further. We are shuffled off to the side where we are left as chattel on the side of the road that no one wants to deal with.

And no, for once, this is NOT in our heads. I've seen it done while WAITING in an ER for a friend and someone comes in ill....all of a sudden, nurses, doctors, and other caregivers meet in a corner of their/your cubicle whispering about how on your chart you suffer from PD and "that's probably all it is. Give him/her something to make them feel better and send them home.” Never mind that your arm may be swinging by a single tendon, people with PD exaggerate what's wrong with them…give her a tranquilizer and tell them to go see their doctor in a few days. Case closed, they cleared out another person in the ER..

I guess the most dehumanizing thing about having PD is that you are then no longer treated as an informed patient, but instead treated as someone who's looking for an illness. I've even had an ER doc check to see if my friend had Munchhowzen's (spelling?) because she finally had had enough and decided to be totally honest and went down the list of symptoms she's had since she's hit puberty.

She didn't wind up in the psych ward but it was debated.....all for telling the truth.....all for so desperately wanting to get some sort to treatment, any kind of treatment to have some semblance of a "normal" life. We retreat….we isolate…and why shouldn’t we after years of being treated like this?

Maybe our symptoms are not life threatening but they are real physical symptoms nonetheless and are NOT psychosomatic. And trust us when we tell you that we HAVE done the work on identifying, keeping records, et., etc., That doesn't work for the majority of us and for the few that it does work for, we can only hope that will be us one day, but it does not work and probably won't work for the more severely afflicted.

Eventually as in everything else, we just put on our acting faces once again and give you what you need to hear because we see the breaking point coming for you and we're too tired to start again with someone else. Why bother anyway? It would only be a matter of time before they too reached that point of frustration.

Thank you for listening to the ramblings of a person with Panic.

I do have a question for you….Has a study ever been done on how many suicides are related to PD? It would be an interesting report.

I mean no offense Ms. Cohen so please understand my musings here are coming out of frustration towards "medical professionals" that have never had a panic attack in their life so are basically clueless as to what really goes on when the panic attacks start, worsen, and then get their very own zip codes within our bodies.

The majority of us who suffer with PD are intelligent enough to truly know what you're talking about....but that's all it is. An understanding of what you are talking about. It does not, and I repeat, it does not change one bloody thing when the attacks start to come again.

We get lulled into believing that we have learned to "manage" this lovely little disorder, only to quickly learn time and again, no matter what we do, they always, always come back. It just depends on the severity of this round of panic this time.

No matter what we know intellectually or how we learned to deal with it, either cognitively or pharmacologically, nothing one says or does changes our belief patterns at the times of the attacks. I cannot speak for everyone but I will speak for myself and few of my friends who deal with this on a more frequent, daily basis. If we could indeed stop these train-wrecks of behaviors and thought patterns, we would do anything to do just that. But experience has taught us that they do not work. A lot of us "fake" that they do work for varied reasons: We see the frustration of our PCP's dealing with us; We see our loved ones and friends beginning to reach the breaking point in dealing what is our disease, not theirs.....and the list goes on. But what you as clinician's and doctors DON'T understand is that we see it on you. We see it in your actions, your body language and certainly the care as the frustration begins to sink in deeper for all of you...we are not blind.

So we retreat and then retreat some more. And each time we retreat and no one can "see through us" on WHY we are retreating, it just solidifies that pattern.

What I would say is a very high number, is you have yet to see any of this. We truly have learned or been conditioned to (once a certain point has been reached) to now become the greatest actor/actress that the ouside world has ever seen.

Once we've embarrassed ourselves ad-nauseum with doctor's and they have now "flagged us" so that we can't even walk into an emergency room anymore because we all know once they pull up our records we are considered "one of them"....the over-emotional, hypochondriac, mentally disturbed patients who are from that moment on treated differently. You all listen, but not one hears us.

We are then shuffled off to a region where we are left as chattel on the side of the road. And no, for once, this is NOT in our heads. I've seen it done while WAITING in an ER for a friend and someone comes in ill. As “one of us, you see it immediately, you instinctively know what at least part of the problem is”...all of a sudden, nurses, doctors, and other caregivers meet in a corner of their/your cubicle whispering about how on your chart states you suffer from PD and "that's probably all it is. Give him/her something to make them feel better and send them home.” Never mind that your arm may be swinging by a single tendon, people with PD exaggerate what's wrong with them……pretty sad scenario isn’t it? Open your eyes to see clearly for one day and look around. You will be quite surprised as to how often you will see this now that you have been informed.

I guess the most dehumanizing thing about having PD is that you are then no longer treated as the informed patient that you try to be. But instead you are now being treated as someone who's looking for an illness. I've even had an ER doc check to see if my friend had Munchausen's because my friend was finally frustrated enough and decided to be totally honest and went down the list of symptoms she's had since she's hit puberty.

She didn't wind up in the psych ward but it was scarily debated. All for telling the truth.. All for so desperately wanting to have a "normal" life like everyone else? Or at least some semblance of normality?

Maybe our symptoms are not life threatening but they are real physical symptoms nonetheless and are NOT psychosomatic. And trust us when we tell you that we HAVE done the work on identifying, keeping records tracking the severity and the how’s and why’s, et., etc., All on your promises that this will lesson the PD. That doesn't work for the majority of us and for the few that it does work for, we can only hope that it will be us one day. But it's now and probably won't be for the more severely afflicted. Eventually as in everything else, we just put on our acting faces and give you what you need to hear because we see the breaking point coming again and we're too tired to start again with someone else. Why bother anyway? It would only be a matter of time before they too reached that point of frustration and the whole circle jerk starts again. It’s exhausting. Not only do we fight against our PD but to have to battle the people who claim to want to help us too?

I wish you well in your endeavor to help us and hope you do eventually find something that may help, or at the least, someone eventually find something…anything-----a lot of us are running out of hope….Please feel free to share my ramblings with your colleagues. Maybe this can shed a glimmer of light into their client’s daily fight for life.

Until then, we retreat, we withdraw, and we isolate some more----and yet no one sees this? Yes, because we are the greatest actors in the world-----we have to be.

Sincerely,

Shantiann

so hard to tell the difference sometimes so scary wish my doc would take me seriously

Thank you for expanding on the feelings that can accompany panic attacks. The women in my family have had panic attacks and general anxiety disorder as far back as we can trace, but only my sister (near my own age) has the sudden conviction that her symptoms mean she is dying of something (from colon cancer to a heart attack). She is into herbal medicine and generally takes herbs which makes her feel better as she is doing something. I will pass this information on to her.

Imagine my surprise after having been diagnosed with clinical depression more than a decade ago to be told that what I was experiencing was anxiety/panic attacks. I started having heart palpitations, numb right arm with pain in the shoulder blade, would catch myself stop breathing, sensations of vertigo and/or nausea and ocassionally when speaking my tongue felt thick and in the way. I didn't mention these things to anyone until I read an article that these symptoms could be signs in a woman of a possible stroke. My physican determined it was not physical and like shrinkinviolet66 I had no emotional provocation, in fact my life was/is going very well if not great. I found it amusing that I took a college course on Anxiety Disorders not all that many years ago and couldn't identify with a single disorder in my personal life. Today I am grateful to know when my "aged" body makes dramatic changes that first I have an opportunity to breath deep, say to myself that this feeling will pass, try for some peaceful things, refocus my thinking on things like meditation, prayer or the art of substitution thinking. If the feeling lasts for more than 3 days then I can make a choice to seek medical attention knowing I've done my part emotionally and mentally. I know there is medication for this disorder but my choice is no chemicals and I do not recommend this way to anyone but myself.

OMG! I have vertigo and have to take meclazine when I have an attack. The docs have noticed a couple times that my heart is racing when I go for my check ups (I have to go about 4 times a year because I have hypertension). The last time, my doc gave me an EKG because my heart was racing but they didn't find anything wrong. Should I make them look further into it?

Thats how i feel every day, don't bother going to the doctor's anymore because they only give me bad look when i walk in the surgery, The woman even said your here again?

KristieW is absolutely right. (I am sorry to hear of her loss) I think it is high time that doctors consider panic a medical condition, rather than an emotional condition, as clearly there is something wrong that is creating these feelings of breathlessness and other physical symptoms initially, without ANY provocation from any "emotional triggers" that psychologists love to blame these symptoms on. The fact is that as more research is being done into this condition, you will find many physical causes that seem to appear with panic symptoms, things like patent foramen ovale, (a heart defect), migraine headaches, vertigo, and postural orthostatic tachycardia syndrome, to name a few. Many of these and other conditions are difficult to diagnose and some people spend years believing that their problem is "in their head" when in fact their problem actually has a physical cause at the root of the symptoms that can not only explain them, but be treated as well.

i used to feel like that.

My partner died suddenly of a massive heart attack at the age of 40. He had been to the doctor 3 months previous complaining of tightening in his chest etc. The doctor told him it was anxiety, and mild panic attacks. Unfortunately, he believed this and never sought more medical help once he was cleared by the doctor. Upon autopsy, it was discovered that he had a heart defect from birth that follow up would have revealed. Since, I've heard of several people in a similar situation. I think too many doctors are brushing us legitimate claims, and panic has become a convenient diagnosis.

I have dealt with panic attacks for so many years, it is frustrating. I have gone to the hospital when I have thought I was having a heart attack, only to be told otherwise. My problem is I am a healthcare provider, so each time I go I feel that my skills and knowledge as a healthcare provider also are put into question. It sucks and it is likely imagination on my part. Now I do not go and hope and pray it is not a heart attack. I really hate it. Just another way for me to hide my mental health issues from others.

I have problems with panic attacks. When I am not around my Paternal Chaldean side for cultural support and my religion that are my legal rights, I find myself having panic attacks and more vulnerable because of being a woman in the United States and oppressed as a Half Chaldean from my Father's people. Also, I take after my Chaldean Father in my blood. My blood group is AB negative and the B negative is dominant from my Chaldean/Middle Eastern Father. Being at home with my Father, helps me to have less frequent panic attacks.