You said you journalled your heart out. Now can you group all the common core beliefs together to find the root. Often core beliefs spring from a root and some times they are twisted just enough to hide it. Some times the root appears to be unrelated but it is. In my case all my core beliefs were sprung from a root core belief that said I should believe them.
People do live by themselves some times, It does not make them weird, just that they like it that way. Usually they can live both ways just prefer to live alone. If they have a core belief saying it is wrong then although they continue they suffer for there pleasure of being how they are. If not then they enjoy who and what they are. I can live in both worlds but I prefer to live alone, just not totally. (see I am here being social) I have managed to live very happily with some one and still be alone. And I will do it again, but with more finesse. Alone can be a state of mind rather than being.
You can never get rid of negative thoughts only bury them deep enough you can't find them to bring them to the surface.
Here for you.
Davit.
Some times I repeat myself so people don't have to go looking for it, especially the new.
I finally found your post about experiencing "setbacks" around the same time I did in terms of having about a month without an attack and then having one (or in my case several). As Davit has suggested, it is partly a way of checking to see if thye are still there (he words it better than I) and of course it is and he says encouragingly that with time we'll stop looking to see if the panic can still be there. I hope that is true. I trust it is.
I just wanted to say thanks for your posts and I get a lot out of reading about everyone's experience so as to reinforce my hope it can get better but the setbacks are a part of it.
I am still working with figuring out the core belief tied to my recent attacks. It is around being alone. I am working with it. It is slow going. I journal my heart out sometimes in search of the answers. Getting my brain to put two and two and two together to come up with some insight, some ability to believe a positive instead of a negative thought . My setback attacks tell me there are negative thoughts that are still having a grip on me. Stay strong!
Hi everyone: I have done that and still do when intrusive thoughts keep coming. I yell STOP to myself each time they come. It helps. another suggestion is to literally, go to the garbage can (whatever you call it) and throw the thought into the garbage. Not only is this physical, it's a distraction doing something else. Next, a big glass of water, (cup of herbal tea) sipped slowly and that seems to break the cycle. This can be used for any anxious/stress feelings.
Hi Jsquarred, i look for the dragons to not conciously my concious mind is telling me i am feeling good and positve, but i can feel my subconcious mind trying to take over sometimes, i say out aloud (if i can) NO i want to do this, or i want to go there, but i would like to hear other members tips also, good work as well jsquarred, learnt from reading your posts
Hello, thank you everyone for the support and kind words. :D Just reading them makes me feel calmer. Flint, that makes since that it would be harder because of higher cortisol levels. It's cool that you boulder too, I've only been bouldering in a gym. My friends and I mainly do it for the fun, health, and strength benefits. We'll see if we decide to actually do real bouldering though. Today so far has been pretty good for me. I'm a Type 1 Diabetic, and my blood sugar was low this morning, I started feeling the symptoms of my low blood sugar after about an hour of waking up. Well hypoglycemia symptoms are some of the exact same symptoms of anxiety/panic symptoms. So that did get my anxiety level to rise this morning, but I was able to keep myself from panicking from it by journaling and positive self-talk. Not the best way to start the day, but I made it through. But even though I had a good day yesterday after riding through my attack, I have the feeling like I'm still "searching for the dragons". And I would like to know a good way to overcome this challenge. I'm doing good at keeping the negative thoughts at bay, but I can tell that my mind is still looking. I don't wanna try and "run away" from this either, I wan't to face it and actually change it. If anyone has any good techniques or tips they can tell me for changing this, I would love to hear them.
Info from a previous discussion I had with my psychiatrist: anxiety and panic tend to be harder to deal with in the morning because your cortisol (stress hormone) levels are higher upon waking -- evolutionary thing. Eating something solid for breakfast (not just milk or juice, I'm assuming you don't do caffeine) will help to lower your cortisol levels. Meditation and/or breathing exercises in the morning may also help.
It's very inspiring and insightful to hear what you're doing to deal with anxiety and panic. Keep up the great work! BTW, I'm also a boulderer, but have been limited to gym climbing due to agoraphobia issues. Hoping to get some outside climbing time with friends soon for exposure work.
Juanita, yes, it is amazing. Thank you for being supportive. :D It feels great when you can actually learn something about the panic and not feel like you just need to "escape" from it. And me being relatively new to the program, I want new people to learn that this does start to work, you just gotta stick with it. I wish the best of luck for anyone trying to manage their panic/anxiety.
I just read your post and am so happy for you. Isn't it amazing when that light bulb goes off? this is a great accomplishment and I'm sure you have inspired alot of people!
Davit, thank you again for your replies and support. :D It really does mean a lot. Anyhow, I just got done reading the setback post from Loves Trees. This is pretty much the exact same thing that happened to me. Before I found out about this site, I was just doing muscle relaxation and breathing techniques. it was in mid-November that I started to feel my general anxiety level diminish. And basically The end of November until about the 22nd of December I felt a whole lot better, almost myself again. Then around the 22nd of December I was in the shower and an attack hit, and since I hadn't had one in a while it felt really bad. Well, my general anxiety level rose to about a 2 a day, and I have attacks here and there. So it's been a little over three weeks now. The good news is, I decided to lay down, do some box breathing, and get myself calm. It was a bit hard at first, but I started to mellow out after about 5 minutes. After maybe a couple minutes of feeling calm, a wave of panic came over me. Since one hand was on my chest and the other on my stomach, I noticed my elevated heart rate, which has sometimes been a trigger for me lately. But I was able to REALLY challenge my negative thought process about it and roll through the panic while doing so. I have read some of the forum posts that talked about exposure work, and know that it works best if you do it for an hour. So after riding the wave of panic, I laid there for an hour and relaxed and just kind of thought about the panic and challenging it(I fell asleep for a min here and there towards the end of the hour, lol). YES! An accomplishment! :D Since doing that, and seeing how I can accept these symptoms, another light has clicked on for me. The grip of the panic is loosening for now and I am becoming me again! Just thought I would share, I hope other people can find strength in my strength.
