panic_attacks ovenbird At 4 am my daughter throws open the door to my room. She's standing there, backlit and trembling, her broken arm still suspended from the sling around her neck. I can hear her desperate breathing. She's sucking in air like there isn't enough oxygen in the whole world to keep her alive. “I feel like I can't breathe!” she says. She's crying, terrified. “My chest is too tight. I'm not getting any air.” The panic feeds itself. I pull her into bed with me. “But you ARE breathing,” I say. “But it FEELS like I can't!” she insists. This panic attack is worse than the others I've watched her have. The somatic aspect is violent. She is afraid she's going to die and that fear whips up further symptoms in the body: increased heartrate, a feeling like the lungs are being squeezed, chills and shivering. I try to talk her out of it, but nothing is working. I'm beginning to think I might actually need to call an ambulance. Then I remember that we have a pulse_oximeter. I stumble down two flights of stairs in the dark to find it tucked away in a drawer. “Hurry!” my daughter cries, certain that death will soon claim her. I try the pulse oximeter on myself, find the batteries are dead, scramble in the dark some more and come up with the two triple As necessary. I try again. My own pulse comes up elevated. 128. I've been running around the house and I'm worried about my daughter. I clip the device to her index finger. At first we can't get a reading. Her fingers are small and the pulse oximeter isn't meant for children. Her panic rises. But then it works. It shows her heartrate: 115 and SpO2: 98. I show her that her heart is working and she's breathing just fine. Her blood is carrying oxygen like it should. We try box breathing. I coach her through it–in for four, hold for four, out for four, hold for four. After a few rounds of this we try the pulse oximeter again. Her heart rate is 85 and oxygen saturation is 100 percent. I can feel her calming. “Look how powerful your mind is!” I tell her. “You've already brought your heart rate down from 115 to 85 and your oxygen levels are great!” She begins to believe she's not dying. She's no longer gasping for air. By 5:30 she's sleeping again. I go back to my own room. Toss and turn as the sun rises. I've lived with generalized anxiety my whole life and always considered it a curse, but if it means that I now have the skills necessary to carry my daughter through her own panic attacks and show her how to tame the anxiety then I will consider it a gift. “I'm glad you know all about anxiety,” my daughter says when she's calmer. “Me too,” I say. The knowledge was born from terror but its applications are love. 250927 ... ovenbird It starts before she even falls asleep and nothing I do will disarm it. We breathe together and visualize every beautiful thing. We do a body scan and watch comedy videos on YouTube and hum. At 3 am she is gasping for air, insisting she can't breathe, convinced she's going to die. I call an ambulance because I'm no longer sure this isn't a real medical emergency. Her heart rate is 150. The paramedics are here in five minutes. They confirm she isn't dying. She calms down a little. It's almost 4:30 am. We're in my bed watching Ratatouille. Neither of us have slept at all. I've run out of strategies, I've run out of energy. My own body is collapsing from exhaustion, my own rising terror sending tremors through my body. I have failed to soothe her. I have failed to save her from the fangs of her own mind and I have no idea what to do next. I brush the sweat soaked hair from her face. She could be me as a child. I look into an echo of my own eyes and see a familiar desperate fire. It's 5 am and I have no idea how to stop her world from burning. 250929 ... ovenbird Soothed on the syrup of every placebo I can conjure she sleeps dreams that she owns an ice cream truck and wakes bleary but whole. 251001 ... e_o_i Oof, that sounds really tough for both of you. I hope you've gotten more of a chance to rest. ... My first panic attack was at 12. It was also prompted by medical issues, though much less traumatic than a broken arm: The Return of the Asthma. I hadn't needed a puffer since I was 7, and here I was, wheezing again. Now, it was fairly mild asthma. But puberty, for me, came with a heaping side dose of hypochondria. So yes. I was 12. I woke up early one morning from a dream about piano pedals, which seemed to represent the phlegm in my throat. I might have had a cold. I coughed some, but the sensation of not being able to breathe well enough remained. The worry must have made me hyperventilate, which made me light-headed, which made me worry more, which made me hyperventilate more... I stumbled into the hallway. Blots of light, as if I'd just rubbed my eyes, clouded my vision. The ringing in my ear grew loud and blocked out other sensations. I pounded on my parents' door, screaming that my heart had stopped beating. Dad, groggy from having just woken up: "I'll call the ambulance." Mom opened the door and semi-pulled, semi-lifted me onto their bed. I hadn't blacked out completely (I wouldn't until a few years later, and that only for a few seconds), but I was pretty wobbly. As the ear-ringing receded, I heard my heartbeat - three times as fast as the tick of seconds from their bedside alarm clock. Too fast, but it was beating. It slowed to twice a second. I was able to answer her questions, although I only understood that I'd almost fainted. I didn't understand why. I could breathe all right now and felt well enough to go to school. ... Panic attacks would attend early adolescence, sometimes disguised as asthma attacks - ages 12-14 University stress - 19-21 University stress, job anxiety, health anxiety, trauma-induced anxiety (my fault for hitting someone in my MA cohort; it's a long story) - 23-25, at least Pandemic-attendant panic, though not necessarily about the pandemic itself - 31-34 ... So I haven't had a panic attack since around 2022, but one trigger after 2012 is being in a building alone, especially at night. I'm not so afraid that someone else will hurt me, but I fear I might have a medical emergency and die alone or "go crazy" somehow. And I'm afraid, yay for circularity, that I'll have a panic attack. ...So I was worried last night when I couldn't sleep. Not that I would have a panic attack right then, but that being so tired would make me more likely to have one the next day, being home_alone. (My parents and brother are visiting Aunt Sarah in Ontario; I was the one who suggested they take Y., since he couldn't go with me before because of a job interview.) The stupid thing was that I was up on YouTube late at night, not wanting to fetch the bedsheets I'd washed that were still on the line outside. An ADHD-ish "block" - "I can't do other things; I'm to busy avoiding THIS thing." And it was an easy thing after all. But when I got to bed, I couldn't sleep, and I worried. Soon, I'll be alone. I'll worry more. The panic attacks will come back. The room was getting lighter before I finally drifted off - around 7, but it proved I *could* sleep, which made me feel that I *wouldn't* panic just from staying here alone (well, with the dog). And I didn't. But being tired meant I didn't do much useful stuff today either (I didn't have any tutoring classes, so nothing that could drag me into a schedule.) Ah well. Time for a hopefully relaxing, re-setting slumber. 251001 what's it to you? who go blather from