What is the cause of panic attacks?

[aFireInside]

My story I have had panic attacks since I was about 7.

 

They only occurred in my house mostly when I’m sleeping or sick in bed. I have never had them outside of the home.

I find it weird that the Psychological community knows little to nothing about the cause of them.

 

Does anyone have any theories on the cause?

 

I took psychology courses before and even text books only have about 1 paragraph on that subject and they admit to knowing little to nothing about them.

[Alan C.]

1. Stimuli (eg. sights, sounds, memories, etc.) which trigger anxiety.

2. Blood sugar imbalance (eg. hypoglycemia) which causes an adrenaline release.

3. Vitamin deficiency (eg. D, B, iron).

4. Sleeplessness, insomnia.

5. Stimulants (eg. caffeine, drugs).

6. Stress and tension.

7. Depression.

8. Inflammation of various tissues.

 

If you're asking what causes panic attacks to appear in the first place then I don't know the answer. My guess is that it's repeated exposure to something traumatic.

[PatrickC]

I did a blog about this topic some years ago, which you may find insightful. Alan has pointed out some of the more general causes rather well. I worked out my issues with a mixture of CBT therapy and talk therapy ultimately. My personal root cause came down to the bullying I received from my father, which precipitated the bullying from other adults and children too. But it can vary of course for others, but it will be trauma based.

 

I'm very sorry to hear just how long you've been experiencing them. I hope you find a way to get respite from them, because I know how debilitating they can be. All the best.

 

http://www.yikici.co.uk/2011/07/04/bullying-self-attack-panic-attacks/

[aFireInside]

Thank you both.

 

Weird thing i had bullying from my dad also. When i was young.

[Wesley]

In general, my understanding is that panic attacks often happen when you start getting anxious about being anxious.

 

1. Stimuli or other such thing as Alan listed

2. Makes you feel anxious

3. You become anxious about being anxious

4. Now you have more anxiety because you are even more anxious

5. Repeat step 4 until you pass out or are able to break the infinite loop and calm down

 

This also can happen when your self-attacks resemble the abuse that you suffered (xelent's blog post went into this, but I just skimmed it quick) which has a similar self-amplifying loop. (Self-attack which makes you feel bad which causes you to self-attack more).

 

The goal to solving it would be to process the pain and memories from your childhood with a good therapist- likely who specializes in panic disorders.

[Lens]

I found sometimes ago an answer of Alice Miller which I quote here hope it will help you :

 

AM: Panic attacks are always connected to traumatic childhood experiences. If we have access to our history we can sometimes easily find the memory and the triggers in the presence that explain the fear so that the fear disappears. In your example the woman feels panic after a happy experience. It CAN be that one of her parents or both envied her for her gifts and her success in school, in sport etc and critisised or ridiculed her after each achievement. Then, instead of being happy she felt bad, ashamed, guilty, and in her brain pleasure became connected with pain. The adult can later suffer from panic attacks after having been successful. The introjected parent repeats then what the real parent did to the child by destroying her pleasure out of pure envy. Is this understandable to you?

[aFireInside]

@Lens

 

That does help and it makes sense in my situation

[NotDarkYet]

I'm sorry to hear about your experiences.

 

Anyone who hasn't been ravaged by panic attacks has no idea what hell on Earth really means.

 

 

I was destroyed by panic attacks for a few months in high school.  And then later, for a few months in university.

 

 

For me they were negative feedback loops of worry and body tension.

 

 

In high school I saw a scary movie, and it haunted me for a while...which is normal....but my obsessive personality worried that I'd never be the same again, which created more worry, which created more worry, until I was having blow outs daily.

 

In university I had a falling out with some roomates.  It split the social groups into two parts.  I focussed so much rage/negativity/worry at the other people that I ended up having a few months of daily panic attacks.  I ended up on SSRIs for a season.

 

 

Now I don't have them. 

 

I attribute the 'cure' to these reasons:

 

 

1) I've learned how to MONITOR my body tension.  If I'm feeling tense, I relax like I'm going into a deep sleep.  BOOM, stops the cycle.  Pay attention to your shoulders, stomache, tongue, eyes.  Make them limp like a rag.  Take a deep breath and relax your whole body...feel the tingles.

 

2) Diet.  I don't eat blood sugar spiking foods.  Stick to protien and veggies.

 

3) Confidence that I can handle hard shit  (if I look back at the number of times I worried myself to death for no reason, I start to see a pattern)

 

4) Nothing lasts forever.  Everything passes.  Even life.  So whatever it is, in the grand scheme of things, meh.

 

5) Focus on what's GOOD in your life.  Appreciate things you wouldn't normally appreciate.  "Hey, I can WALK!"

 

6) Be fine with the worst case scenario.  Then everything else that happens is a positive. "Ok, I may lose my job, so what".

 

 

 

 

Ultimately, I have to lay much of the responsibility on my parents who never built a sense of confidence in me.  I viewed myself a weak player in a scary unloving world.

[cherapple]

When I have panic attacks, it's because I am catastrophizing and imagining the worst outcome in a particular situation, I feel powerless to avoid it, and suffering whatever I'm imagining seems unbearable. You ask about the cause of panic attacks. That would be a panic-inducing childhood, or parents, to be more precise. The truth of what was happening to you literally was unbearable, you were literally powerless, you literally experienced the worst that could happen (or it seemed that way), and you feared you might not survive.

 

There are many things I do to break the pattern of panic:

• I listen to the catastrophic scenario that I'm imagining, and although the temptation may be to dissociate, I give it MORE attention.
• I understand that anything that feels overwhelming points to childhood, when the world literally was overwhelming and catastrophic.
• I understand that only a part of me is catastrophizing. It may feel like it consumes me, but I know that it doesn't. I am a strong, intelligent, determined, and capable adult now, and where I am weak, I will do anything possible to work on becoming stronger.
• I look at the pattern of all the times that I've imagined the worst, and the worst has never happened. 
• I ground myself. I plant my feet, perhaps even lie on the floor, and breath slowly and deeply. I relax my body and concentrate on noticing my surroundings, what day it is, what time, how old I am, and that I am safe in the present moment.
• I exercise, sing, or otherwise activate my body to make myself more conscious of where I am. 
• I call a friend, or even my therapist, and talk about what I'm experiencing, or I journal.
• I allow myself to cry because I wasn't allowed to cry as a child. It meant further attack and greater fear. I counteract that history with gentleness.
• Once I've done even a few of these things, I begin to experience my present-day power to act in my own interest, and the panic subsides.
• In IFS fashion, I thank myself for remembering how frightening my childhood was, so that I can have the opportunity to comfort myself and support myself in the ways that I couldn't as a child. 
• I commit every day to supporting myself. Over time, the frequency and intensity of the attacks lessen. 

 

Panic attacks can be incredibly painful and frightening. You may feel like you are either going to die, or you wish you would die. I have so much sympathy for anyone who experiences them, and who had a history that inflicted them.

[Panoptic]

I have never had a full on panic attack, but I believe I have been very close to one a few times. I have some sort of anxiety disorder that I have been dealing with for 3 years now, but it only has affected me in phases, not the entire 3 years.

 

I am currently working on my anxiety, and while I haven't cured it yet I have made progress. So I hope my little advice can help out. I think it is definitely caused by childhood experiences. I am new to this whole "listing to your emotions" thing, so I can't tell you that I have figured out my root cause yet. But I will give you some advice that I have to help you get rid of it while you figure out the root in your own life.

 

Anxiety is induced by your mind. If you think about it, it is actually quite rediculous. The irrational thoughts your mind creates are quite stupid and not founded on any fact. Anxiety comes from fear of the FUTURE, but you have full control over your own future. Your brain is just trying to protect you.

 

I was recently going through a phase of anxiety. It always happens to me at night, when its dark outside and just before I'm going to sleep. One night I was sitting here in my computer chair. Anxiety was taking hold, I was slouched over, feeling miserable. I couldn't get comfortable, and it slowly was getting worse. Then, I suddenly had a revelation. I realized that I was LETTING anxiety take hold of me. I was fed up with it. I suddenly decided that I did not want to feel this way anymore. I said, I am not going to live my life like this, I am a human being, I have control over my mind and I am not going to LET this control me. I got into a mental state of determination to get rid of it. It has been working quite well. Sometimes, my determination fades, and I have to reignite it. But you must understand that you have a choice to stop it. It is not something that you can't get rid of. It is more difficult for me because I have not a single person to talk to about it. I don't have friends, and I realized this. So I decided to CHANGE that too. I am not going to be a miserable human being that suffers from anxiety and has no friends. I will change it by continuing to work on it, and it has been continuing to become easier.

 

The previous posts mentioned good ways to get rid of it. It is all mental. But you won't be able to unless you get the right state of mind. You have to WANT to get rid of it. Obviously you want to stop feeling like crap, but you have to take a step back and think of it from a life perspective. This is your life, so take control.

 

Here are some resources I found:

 

http://charliehoehn.com/2013/05/19/how-i-cured-my-anxiety/

This blog talks about how anxiety is caused by stress (or traumatic experiences, which cause stress). He doesn't mention childhood experiences, but I think that anxiety is caused in the short term by stressful times in your life even though it may originate from your childhood.

 

This girl essentially did the same thing I did. You have to make a decision yourself to stop the attacks. She talks about the cure at 11:55 I would probably avoid reading peoples' comments though. Too many people are worried about complaining about their own problems and specific situations instead of trying to actually do something about it.

 

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Panic_attack#Causes

ALSO, here is some good info on what may cause anxiety if your life. Still not the root cause, but it reveals a lot about the person who gets them. The most interesting one I read was that panic attacks usually affect people with above average intelligence.

 

"If you don't like something, change it. If you can't change it, change your attitude."

[aFireInside]

Thank you all this helps )

[jonagelle]

Panic attack is caused by too much fear. Fear happens when the adrenal glands secrete adrenal hormone which is adrenaline. Stress is the cause of panic attack. Fear and tense causes panic attack. So you must rest. Have enough sleep. This is a form of rest. Surround yourself with happy things and happy thoughts. Do activities that will make you happy. Get yourself busy with the hobbies that you like. Control your panic attack. As anxiety is not because of genetics but for biological and environmental reason. So you must control it. It is possible. If you want to live normal life. Tell your brain that it must control itself. Other strategies are to raise your muscle and tense it upward. Raise it in one area. Pull down your hat, cover yourself with blanket or quit, stay in the shadows for a while, and button up your jacket.

 

Nathanael King is a Clinical Hypnotherapist, NLP practitioner and weight loss & nutritional therapist. He also helps people suffering from panic attacks or social anxiety. He has written a book on how to build confidence instantly using NLP techniques. Please click <a target="_new" href="http://dailyimproveself.com/instantconfidencefree/">here</a> to download now. You can also sign up for weekly newsletter at <a target="_new" href="http://www.SelfProgress.co.uk">http://www.SelfProgress.co.uk</a> for your growth.