Anxiety Support Group

Anxiety is a physical condition marked by intense and persistent feelings of distress, fear, angst or dread. General anxiety caused by routine day-to-day stresses usually passes quickly and is experienced by almost everyone at one time or another. However, such feelings that linger over time and are very difficult to cope with, and which lack a clear cause, may indicate...

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Reed31 08/23/2016

Hello All, I've largely treated a lot of my anxiety with folate (B6) which has been great. That being said, my BODY will still have an anxiety reaction but I don't feel panicky in my head. So I'm not feeling scared, but my heart races, my BP goes up, etc. I want to do more stuff but still feel held back with this body reaction. Plus I'm not sure how good it is to push myself to do things I"m scared of. BTW, I hate that saying, "Do ONE thing each day that scares you." For me, some days that's going out to get the darned mail!

I've called an ambulance twice in the past few months and feel like a ninny. The first time, my bp was 186/125. I was stressed, but not panicking. The paramedics told me it was perfectly normal when having a panic attack. It dropped over time and the next time I saw the dr it was normal. Today I called again. I was stressed and wound up getting an aura. Then I got a migraine. I needed to make some notes but I was unable to write what I was thinking. "Fine" came out "Future" and "Market" came out "Margaret" and so forth. I was really worried and was home alone. I tried calling my dr but they were out for the day. I tried called "ask a nurse" but with my insurance changing, they could no longer help. I was worried about stroke or something, so I called 911 and spoke with the dispacher and told her that I did NOT need an ambulance, but needed to know if this was an aura thing or if I should worry about stroke. They sent a fire truck and an ambulance. Slow day. They checked everything and I was fine. BP up - like 170/110 but it dropped over the few minutes they were there and again said during panic, this is natural.

Here's my issue: I am totally embarrassed about calling an ambulance and it really is overkill. What do you do when you have a health concern but you can't reach anyone and you're not sure it's an emergency.

Also, wondering about what people do to calm down when stressed. I'm meditating, exercising, using AAT but sometimes I am still having issues.

joesmoes294 08/24/2016

I use to get panic attacks but now im just like brain dead I guess from em that I yes get numb and shaky and the blood pressure sores through the roof. Id be careful taking like folate b6 just like most unless you know you have an deficiency because chances are your already getting it in your diet that is the recommended dosage. I only take a small dose of magnesui myself but hell nothing seems to work but in my mind at least Im doing something...Maybe dont check you BP during an attack because youll panic even more. Keep up the meditating and exercising sounds like your on the right track...takes awhile to get over panic attacks...I got over them been free about 10yrs. A antianxiety pill helps too just as needed only...Good luck

bridgie101 08/24/2016

I've been having heart scares and all that recently, and I ended up in A&E on a cardiograph for a few hours. and they said 'if this happens again, we know it won't kill you so just let it happen.'

which is awful, but okay.... Yes my body has survived this. Yay. But how many times can you hit the same pot with the same hammer before it smashes? Double yay.

I tell my self if I kark, I guess I just kark. I can't think of anything else to do.

But a stroke is confusion, numbness on one side, dizziness, trouble seeing out of one or both eyes, and headache. Not necessarily all of these at once.

Go do a first aid course. I had to do one for work and have found it helpful. Things like heart attack: sweating. It's really good to know that if you're having a heart attack you're sweating because I have lots of chest problems that feel like heart attacks, but no sweating. So I can relax and just put it down to angina or reflux or whatever the heck.

Palpitations are apparently normal: my heart thumps like crazy, or it misses beats. All apparently totally fine. But I did have to be on the ecg machine for a while to know they were fine. You can get cardiogram things that they attach to you and you wear them for 24 hrs to find out exactly how your heart is functioning, and I think that's a good idea because some kinds of palpitations are dangerous.

AnxietyFreak40 08/24/2016

One of the best things my counselor ever told me was for during the panic attack. She said you are flooded with adrenaline and you need to burn it off. She suggested doing something physical to help burn it off more quickly. She told me to do girly pushups against a wall or counter. Something about the image of it "flooding my bloodstream" and just needing to burn off the excess really helped me.

Reed31 08/24/2016

Thank you all. This really does help a lot. The stroke thing I was concerned about because I had an aura so I was not able to see properly, then with not being able to put my thoughts on paper I was worried about the confusion bit. It's a challenge because I have auras, glaucoma and other issues that can sometimes masquerade as other problems. I think the first aid class would be a great idea.

I am taking the B6 because of a deficiency and they run a blood test once every three months.

I'm looking at some sort of med to take as needed - I don't like valium, xanex is hit and miss in terms of whether or not it works. Ativan or Klonopin? Something else? Other ideas?

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