Anxiety Advice.

Noelieboats

I've asked about this before the saga continues. I suffer from post traumatic stress as a result of an accidental XTC over dose when I was younger and somehow even dumber. I have suffered from chronic intense anxiety fear ever since. I have tried hypnosis extensively, EMDR some talk therapy and every tape exercise etc that you can think of. I am basically terrified of my own heart I have a stigma or phobia about my heart that it's going to stop or fail or basically I'm going to die, this means I can't eat or sleep or go out or watch a movie it has consumed me and nothing helps so I'm basically close to giving up. My girlfirend is great and she's breaking her back daily trying to figure out something that will help we even tried to sign me into a mental hospital after a bad panic attack but they asked me if I had tried to take my own life when I said no they just sent me home. Anybody ever experience anything like this?

Miss Fluff

Have you looked into CBT?

Noelieboats

Tried it once with one girl and to be honest I didn't think she was very good she was just telling me about all the stuff that I already know. I left feeling depressed and wait for it..................anxious! I can't claim to have given it a proper go but I have tried so many things with absolutely no success what so ever I'm hard pressed to try anything else I'm feeling scared and very defeated .

Danniboo

How do you accidentally overdose on Ecstacy

Noelieboats

Well I thought it was a tray full of skittles,

Taking the XTC was on purpose taking as many as I did with red bull and painkillers wasn't. And yes I am just THAT stupid.

Peggypeg

Noelieboats wrote: »

Well I thought it was a tray full of skittles,

Taking the XTC was on purpose taking as many as I did with red bull and painkillers wasn't. And yes I am just THAT stupid.

Hey OP,

You really don't need to put yourself down and call yourself stupid. Everyone here has a history and has made mistakes. No one is perfect and neither are you, making a mistake does not make you a bad person so stop being so negative about yourself. You went through something that left you scarred emotionally, being down on yourself will not help you, try to be good to yourself and look after yourself.

I suffer sometimes with anxiety but it takes the form of night sweats so it's not something I can help you with as it goes as soon as I wake up, sorry about that. What I will say to you is to keep trying, I've heard really good things about CBT so maybe give that another go with a different therapist?

Best of luck OP

Danniboo

I see wasn't sure what you meant. So sad that some stupid things you did in your youth have had such a negative impact on your life. I went through anxiety and panic attacks myself but hypnotherapy helped me greatly. Would you visit your GP and explain this to him as holistic therapies don't seem to be working in your favour. Maybe see a different hypnotherapist or something

cafecolour

Interesting. I might be leaping, but it almost sounds like on all the drugs your heart went into overdrive (amphetamine OD can cause an irregular heartbeat) and you became aware on it while on the drugs. On the drugs you may have been hyperaware and sensitive to your body changes, but now you no longer are, and aren't terribly sensitive to your body. Even though it's returned to normal, it's still fixated in your head as off.

So a couple things:
Have you gone to a GP to get a check up to make sure everything is okay with your heart?

Have you tried breathing exercise - not only to calm yourself, but to become more aware of your body and heartbeat?

Hearts don't stop randomly without warning. If you educate yourself more on heart issues, and learn to pay attention to your body more (instead of worrying blindly), it could help.

cafecolour

Well, ignore the above, I went back and read your prior posting and you seem to be ahead of me there

It looks like you have hypochondria around the specific heart issue. Honestly, this is exactly the sort of thing CBT is supposed to be be perfect for. I'd try a different therapist who actually specializes in CBT (and even hypochondria).

CBT isn't terribly mystical or anything. It's basically training you to recognize the start of the thought process that escalates into panic, and saying 'stop, not going there' when it happens.

And on the complete opposite end of the spectrum - make sure you've 'forgiven yourself' for the XTC OD. You could be carrying around some internalized guilt about the whole thing ('illegal' drugs, the embarrassment of friends and family finding out, wasting hospital time) that's subconsciously making you think you 'deserve' for your heart to stop.

As peggypeg said, a lot of people make mistakes like that. Don't beat yourself up about them, best thing to do is to be there to help (and not to judge) when people you know make their mistakes.

BumbleB

Noelieboats wrote: »

I've asked about this before the saga continues. I suffer from post traumatic stress as a result of an accidental XTC over dose when I was younger and somehow even dumber. I have suffered from chronic intense anxiety fear ever since. I have tried hypnosis extensively, EMDR some talk therapy and every tape exercise etc that you can think of. I am basically terrified of my own heart I have a stigma or phobia about my heart that it's going to stop or fail or basically I'm going to die, this means I can't eat or sleep or go out or watch a movie it has consumed me and nothing helps so I'm basically close to giving up. My girlfirend is great and she's breaking her back daily trying to figure out something that will help we even tried to sign me into a mental hospital after a bad panic attack but they asked me if I had tried to take my own life when I said no they just sent me home. Anybody ever experience anything like this?

OP one thing to clear up is this preconcieved notion that you are stupid ,you are not stupid ,you may indeed be foolish but not stupid or Dumb.So cease thinking this way as it does not serve you.

Instead of focussing on the fact that youre heart is going to fail ,spend time focussing and visualising on what a wonderful piece of engineering it is.Focus on the positive aspects.

Read up on it ,find out how it exactly how it works .It's not going to be easy ,but you are going to have to break the negative associations you have regarding this .

Grow to love your heart ,its a wonderful thing .

LegacyUser

OP, I am exactly like you without the ecstacy overdose. I'm convinced my heart will stop any second. I have a slight irregular heartbeat which has been extensively investigated and it is totally benign, but still I get panic attacks.

First of all, you need a good, sympathetic GP. Someone who will answer your questions about your heart function and whether or not it is impaired (it's 99.9999% likely not to be, btw, but I know you won't believe an anonymous girl on the internet. Hearing it from a doctor may help).

Secondly, there is a book called When Panic Attacks by Dr. Aine Tubridy that I found very good. It explains exactly what happens to your body when you have a panic attack and because the author is a doctor, she goes into a lot of detail about the physiological stuff and explains what each feeling is and why it is not dangerous.

These helped me a lot anyway, I hope they may make things easier for you.

It's not easy overcoming panic, OP, but you really shouldn't put yourself down so much. You made a mistake, you didn't hurt anyone, you obviously have a lovely girlfriend and you're incredibly brave to be facing the kind of fear you're facing. I really hope you find a solution - also, you sound pretty young and I've been told panic peaks in your twenties so with any luck it will naturally reduce somewhat as you get older.