Panic attacks

[Sunny]

For panic attacks it always helps me to go into a meditative-type of state wherein I "go" somewhere else where I have been happy
at some point in my life. This in conjunction with breathing techniques learned in meditation classes have worked wonders. I would highly recommend seeing if there is a meditation or Yoga class locally to see if this will help you. What have you got to lose?
As for depression, I definitely think there is a chemical or hormonal imbalance which leads to some, and not all, depression. Studies have shown depression can run in
families. Women have been shown to have monthly fluctuations related to hormone changes in relationship to their menstrual cycles.Women also can have depression
at Menopause when their hormones significantly change. I, myself, suffered unbearable depression when I contracted kidney disease (Dah, who wouldn't), and noticed significant
change because my body started functioning in a lowered state. It's hard to describe the difference in my "before" and "after" functioning
due to ESRD except to say my nephrologist explained it was because my body is now out of balance. No matter how hard we try to keep our bodies in balance
with medicine or vitamins, the fact remains that with Renal Disease we are NEVER normal. It makes complete sense to me that the imbalances caused from Renal Disease can contribute
to depression or panic attacks. After all, the whole human body functions from chemical reactions firing away within.So why wouldn't it be possible that some of these
chemical reactions are mis-firing?

[KICKSTART]

For panic attacks it always helps me to go into a meditative-type of state wherein I "go" somewhere else where I have been happy
at some point in my life. This in conjunction with breathing techniques learned in meditation classes have worked wonders. I would highly recommend seeing if there is a meditation or Yoga class locally to see if this will help you. What have you got to lose?
As for depression, I definitely think there is a chemical or hormonal imbalance which leads to some, and not all, depression. Studies have shown depression can run in
families. Women have been shown to have monthly fluctuations related to hormone changes in relationship to their menstrual cycles.Women also can have depression
at Menopause when their hormones significantly change. I, myself, suffered unbearable depression when I contracted kidney disease (Dah, who wouldn't), and noticed significant
change because my body started functioning in a lowered state. It's hard to describe the difference in my "before" and "after" functioning
due to ESRD except to say my nephrologist explained it was because my body is now out of balance. No matter how hard we try to keep our bodies in balance
with medicine or vitamins, the fact remains that with Renal Disease we are NEVER normal. It makes complete sense to me that the imbalances caused from Renal Disease can contribute
to depression or panic attacks. After all, the whole human body functions from chemical reactions firing away within.So why wouldn't it be possible that some of these
chemical reactions are mis-firing?

This is exactly what i was told , that its an imbalance in chemicals and hormones  causing my depression/panic attacks.

[paddbear0000]

I've been having a BIG problem with panic attacks lately. I first started with them about 5 years ago at a job. One of the employees there hated my guts and was making my life miserable. They stopped for a few years until recently. I get rolling attacks for hours, where the symptoms are constant, but increase in intensity for a few minutes, every 5 minutes or so. Lately, they've been getting worse and worse. It used to just be spasming intestines and stomach and light headedness, but now I've added vomiting to the mix. The last time I had one, I even passed out! I have an appointment with my doc next week, so I plan on bringing this up. My Lexapro is helping my depression, but definitely not the anxiety attacks.

[spacezombie]

Well, now I can really sympathize with you! I just had a massive panic attack today while my nurse was trying to change the bandage on my permacath. I felt dizzy, tingly, and utterly panicked. I told my boyfriend I was going to pass out so he should be sure to catch me. I did and throughly freaked out the nurses. When I woke up there were a bunch of people in the room, my feet were elevated, and I was on oxygen. I then  proceeded to throw up. Panic attacks are real and they are frightening. If I had been able to go lie down in a quiet room things probably would have been fine, but that just wasn't possible at that moment. Hang in there! The docs gave me the lowest dose of Ativan available so I can take it before my next procedure. 

[stauffenberg]

I enjoy being depressed, as paradoxical as that may sound.  If I see something in the world that affects my intellect in such a way as to arouse my anger, disapproval, disappointment, or regret, then I find it perfectly healthy and pleasurable to be able to feel the appropriate and corresponding emotion to the full, which is depression.  What I hate is having to pretend to feel something I really don't, either because I am hiding the truth from myself or from others.  The pleasure of self-realization in feeling depressed when you encounter intellectually depressing things is enormous, and it is the pleasure of enjoying the harmony between the negative stimulus in the outside world, the assessment of it in the mind, and the mood in the emotions.

To take a pill to destroy that harmony is to make yourself insane by destroying the unity of emotion, perception, and thought.  The term 'schizophrenia' was coined by Dr. Manfred Bleuler in 1911 to describe a condition in which patients' moods did not match their thoughts, so their drives ('phrenia' in Ancient Greek) were split and opposed to each other ('schizo' in Ancient Greek).  In terms of this etymology, giving anti-depression pills to people who are experiencing realities in their lives which would make any normal person feel depressed amounts to turning them into schizophrenics!

[spacezombie]

I'm just trying to destroy the unity of vomit that flies out of my mouth before a procedure.

[KICKSTART]

I enjoy being depressed, as paradoxical as that may sound.  If I see something in the world that affects my intellect in such a way as to arouse my anger, disapproval, disappointment, or regret, then I find it perfectly healthy and pleasurable to be able to feel the appropriate and corresponding emotion to the full, which is depression.  What I hate is having to pretend to feel something I really don't, either because I am hiding the truth from myself or from others.  The pleasure of self-realization in feeling depressed when you encounter intellectually depressing things is enormous, and it is the pleasure of enjoying the harmony between the negative stimulus in the outside world, the assessment of it in the mind, and the mood in the emotions.

To take a pill to destroy that harmony is to make yourself insane by destroying the unity of emotion, perception, and thought.  The term 'schizophrenia' was coined by Dr. Manfred Bleuler in 1911 to describe a condition in which patients' moods did not match their thoughts, so their drives ('phrenia' in Ancient Greek) were split and opposed to each other ('schizo' in Ancient Greek).  In terms of this etymology, giving anti-depression pills to people who are experiencing realities in their lives which would make any normal person feel depressed amounts to turning them into schizophrenics!

Interesting comments but ... it is not a case of suffer depression or take a pill and become a zombie ! When i first started on my 'depression tablets' i thought they were slowing me down but was asked to carry on taking them and give them a chance to do their stuff , the results of which are really good now .Believe me i dont walk around an unfeeling emotionless zombie by any means as you seem to think taking tablets does to someone. All i can say is i dont  get  that racing feeling of agitation now in my chest , nor the heart-attack like pains . I can still react to outside events by expressing anger , happiness etc , im not numb to any sort of emotions at all , in fact i just feel like my old self !!!

[paddbear0000]

I'm just trying to destroy the unity of vomit that flies out of my mouth before a procedure.

 

My anti-depression meds don't do that to me either. Before I was on them, I would cry all day, everyday. I stopped going to classes and going out with friends and my husband. I was even suicidal. Now, I am happy, and feel like being a productive member of society once again. I still "feel my emotions." I cry if something upsets me, like a normal person. I get angry if my husband does something stupid  . I felt the way you described while taking Paxil, but that was a long time ago. Now I am on Lexapro. It works in a totally different way on the brain than most anti-depressive drugs. Not every drug works the same way for everyone either.

[willieandwinnie]

paddbear, I'll have what you are taking. 

[stauffenberg]

But can you still feel your emotions when you encounter something which objectively deserves to be experienced by the feeling of depression?  No: you have chemically blunted the natural response of your brain so that you cannot respond to the reality around you, at least in certain respects.

One Jungian therapist I heard lecture theorized that depression is characterized as a disease only in modern capitalist societies where it is deemed important for people to remain constantly upbeat so they will continue to be productive at work and to buy products durng their free time.  Since depressed people do neither, this natural human state is not good for the economy, so it is defined as a sickness, thus justifying numbing the brain with chemicals to stop it and thus keep the hamsters turning the treadmill of producing and shopping.  In contrast, in many other societies depression is celebrated as a noble state to be honored as an essential part of being a human.  Thus in the Middle Ages the figure of the 'lovesick knight' was celebrated by minstrels, and in the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries melancholia was indulged in as a way to deepen consciousness (Cf. Burton's "Anatomy of Melancholy").

[paris]

Can you still feel emotions that deserve the feeling of depression?  Absolutely!  I still grieve, worry, get "down in the dumps" but I can find my way back now.  My family has a long history of depression.  I am so glad to have something help balance my life, but still allows me to cry and be sad.  I am not a zoombie, or just going through the motions. I am living.

[KICKSTART]

I will second that Paris ! Im not quite sure how Stauff expects us to feel or behave, it seems to me his idea of treatment involves the production of unfeeling zombies devoid of any emotion. I mean how do you define depression ? its different things to different people .. i didnt have 'mood swings' highs and lows , i just sat quietly and thought i was having a heart attack , i didnt hyperventilate or sit in floods of tears feeling suicidal. Now the only thing the tablets i take have changed is the panick attacks that manifested, my moods are neither highs or lows they are what they were before and no one can see a difference in my behaviour ..so are you really saying Stauff that to enjoy life to its fullest i should go with the chest pains that manifested ?

[stauffenberg]

I applaud anyone who has panic attacks over dialysis, since dialysis is so horrible it objectively deserves that response in people of normal, sane sensitivity.  Oppressing sick people with an utterly inadequate form of treatment and then stuffing them full of pills when they react to that inadquacy with panic attacks looks to me more like a system of totalitarian social control than therapy for the patient's own good.  "Don't criticize the system implicitly by your negative response to it!  Instead, let the system define you as 'sick' because of the way you are manifesting your criticism of it and dope you up so you stop making the system look bad.  There there now, good patient.  Now the private dialysis facility and the doctors can get back to making tons of money by offering the patients catastrophically inadequate care without anyone screaming in the background to call the whole neat arrangement into question."

[KICKSTART]

Stauff why do you think we are 'doped up to the eyeballs' ? I for one am not 'doped up' at all to please the system. I am sure that there is more than me on here been diagnosed with depression/panic attacks that are not walking zombies ..something you keep insisting we are to keep us quiet and please the system .

[paddbear0000]

I chose to be put on anti-depressants. I walked into my doctors office and said, "please put me on an anti-depressant." No one told me to take them nor did they force me to.

[stauffenberg]

Not being able to respond to situations which objectively call for a reaction of profound depression amounts to being emotionally crippled -- at least in that specific context.  Wanting to be numbed in this way represents the way the current, dominant social ideology has shaped your perceptions about how you are supposed to feel, even in situations that cry out for a depressive reaction.  If you lived in a different time and place you might be more equipped by your cultural matrix to respect rather than reject the feeling.

Having panic attacks or being deeply depressed about something the majority healthy society is dishing out to you and saying is 'fine,' all the while it is constantly feeding you the propaganda that 'you too can lead a normal life on dialysis as long as you do what the good doctor says,' etc., is a profoundly revolutioary act, which no system of social control wants to permit.  Maybe if all dialysis patients had a perpetual panic attack over the inadequate treatment we are being offered then the majority healthy society would be forced to listen to us and make some improvements, rather than, as is now the case, stupidly assuming that we are satisfied, that dialysis is a 'cure,' which many laymen think, or that patients are simply uncritically grateful for having their life saved, as the medical profession assumes.

[kidley]

Depression and panic attacks are not states of mind that we can just call up for the purpose of demonstrating our outrage at societal injustice.  They arrive unbidden and impair our ability to be productive (not just consumers).  And as the consciousness raising properties of melancholy, I doubt that I would have lived long enough to reach a deeper level.  Because every time I drove onto an overpass I wanted to just floor it over the edge.  Thank God for Lexapro!

[xtrememoosetrax]

Right on, kidley! Well said.

[stauffenberg]

I never said depression and panic attacks are anything other than spontaneous, natural, uncontrolled responses to negative stimuli in the surrounding world.  Their spontaneous origin does nothing to keep them from serving as an important protest against a society which is not providing people with an environment adequate to what they require.  On the contrary, the fact that it is spontaneous and cannot be controlled by the person experiencing it shows that the responsibility lies with society for imposing intolerable living conditions on that person, not with the person's own option as to how to respond to them.

[Sunny]

Yah,Yah,Yah! Enough already.
The fact is, we still must find a way to function in This society with This disease.
If that means getting drugged up on whatever it takes to makes ourselves fit in and function, then so be it.
Unfortunate that it is, those are the facts. Better for me to find a way to want to get up in the morning since
my kidney disease isn't going away any time soon. I have tried being drug free and functioning with this disease,
and drugged while functioning with this disease. Either way, I find it difficult. Antidepressants do make it more bareable.

[dialysisdtr]

My mother has been on dialysis for just over a year and has began to experience panic attacks during dialysis.  It is to the point where if she hears the word dialysis she will cry.  She has also stated that she does not wish to contine with dialysis because of the attacks.