Hi Maria,
Yep. I totally agree. To me personally panic and agoraphobia is more a symptom than the disease itself, but it's different for every sufferer. If you compare it to a headache, I'm sure that for some people the headache is the only problem. Once it is cured that's it. Likewise, if your panic is caused by a mislearned reaction that got reinforced through repetiton then you do CBT and Bob's your uncle. If you just have too much of whatever transmitter then you take medication and you're sorted. There's no further mystery behind it, problem solved.
However, I think for many of us it is necessary to get to the root of the problem. Going back to the headache analogy, while the aspirin can get rid of the pain it makes more sense to find out if it is caused by a bad tooth, stress, tumor, bad posture etc.
The way you go about unravelling your personal mystery varies from person to person. Like you said in another posting, I too find it absolutely fascinating. It's a long process. For some people yoga and meditation may work, to me talking to my therapist does, but the ultimate aim is to untie your 'knots', find out where you are blocked, where you have manoeuvered yourself into a hole. Just as each one of us has had a lifetime of experiences that got us to be the people we are, it may take just as long to find our own way out of it again and find a place where we don't 'need' to have panic attacks.
Marianne (feeling very deep today...)
