Last month I had a surgery. When I was in the recovery room and woke up, a panic attack visited me. I thought mmm “ maybe it was the anesthesia” … But who cares? I was there and I was feeling it. I didn’t say anything to the nurses or to anyone. I rode the wave ( eve though, I felt miserable) minutes later…was gone! I took it as a great exposure!
Now I’m like ‘ hey you … come and get me”… no longer afraid 🙌🏻
Always happy to hear the reminder about time! It's beginning to get easier to wait it out, and my baseline and recovery times are also dropping. Thank goodness! These have been the goals.
Your podcast also makes me contemplate even more, how much do I really need an exposure coach at this point? Since my training with my coach is the same as what you tout in your podcasts, books, etc. (Claire Weekes), I am hopeful that at some point soon, I can stop spending so much money on treatment and just do all of the treatments alone. Drew, can you share with us when you knew that you didn't need help with treatment any more and could do exposures totally alone? I'm sorry if you have possibly covered this previously. Thank you!
Agreed. It's just getting to that surrender point when you're off and running that can be tricky. The old intellectual understanding that has to make its way from the head to the gut. The AHA moment, I guess? This is what I'm intuiting from what I read in the FB group.
I was in the middle of a big one about 5 yrs ago. At home. All the fun physical and mental stuff going full speed ahead. All day. My husband was there and he's used to this. Thankfully he goes about his business as I've asked him to do and doesn't ask me any questions or try to figure things out. Any attention makes it worse for me. He had to leave around dinner time and would be gone for hours. Once the door shut behind him, I continued to writhe on the living room floor trying to focus on TV or whatever. In about 5 min, I dragged my sorry ass upstairs to the bathroom, cleaned up, brushed teeth, dressed and went back downstairs. I could feel myself slowing down. I was actually able to eat a simple snack, when earlier, I frantically told myself "OMG I will NEVER eat again. So nauseous. What then? Force feeding in the hospital?" And on and on and on with the downward spiral of what if's and the awful physical and mental reactions to those fears. And here I was crunching saltines, then adding a little peanut butter. As I had a million times in the past. I felt a bit crappy for about 60 minutes, then was completely fine, as always, except more grateful than I can describe. I felt cherished clarity and well-being. When you come down from one of those things, life truly is beautiful.
I work in psychiatric nursing. The number of patients who tell me: “I had a panic attack, so I took a Xanax, and after about 15 minutes it started working and I started to calm down”— I hear it all the time. The thing is that after 15 minutes, you were going to start to feel better anyway! Like you said, there’s nothing we have to do. Love the sunset analogy.
I love this Drew! Couldn’t be more precise!
Last month I had a surgery. When I was in the recovery room and woke up, a panic attack visited me. I thought mmm “ maybe it was the anesthesia” … But who cares? I was there and I was feeling it. I didn’t say anything to the nurses or to anyone. I rode the wave ( eve though, I felt miserable) minutes later…was gone! I took it as a great exposure!
Now I’m like ‘ hey you … come and get me”… no longer afraid 🙌🏻
Thank you. Yep, great sun analogy.
Always happy to hear the reminder about time! It's beginning to get easier to wait it out, and my baseline and recovery times are also dropping. Thank goodness! These have been the goals.
Your podcast also makes me contemplate even more, how much do I really need an exposure coach at this point? Since my training with my coach is the same as what you tout in your podcasts, books, etc. (Claire Weekes), I am hopeful that at some point soon, I can stop spending so much money on treatment and just do all of the treatments alone. Drew, can you share with us when you knew that you didn't need help with treatment any more and could do exposures totally alone? I'm sorry if you have possibly covered this previously. Thank you!
Agreed. It's just getting to that surrender point when you're off and running that can be tricky. The old intellectual understanding that has to make its way from the head to the gut. The AHA moment, I guess? This is what I'm intuiting from what I read in the FB group.
I was in the middle of a big one about 5 yrs ago. At home. All the fun physical and mental stuff going full speed ahead. All day. My husband was there and he's used to this. Thankfully he goes about his business as I've asked him to do and doesn't ask me any questions or try to figure things out. Any attention makes it worse for me. He had to leave around dinner time and would be gone for hours. Once the door shut behind him, I continued to writhe on the living room floor trying to focus on TV or whatever. In about 5 min, I dragged my sorry ass upstairs to the bathroom, cleaned up, brushed teeth, dressed and went back downstairs. I could feel myself slowing down. I was actually able to eat a simple snack, when earlier, I frantically told myself "OMG I will NEVER eat again. So nauseous. What then? Force feeding in the hospital?" And on and on and on with the downward spiral of what if's and the awful physical and mental reactions to those fears. And here I was crunching saltines, then adding a little peanut butter. As I had a million times in the past. I felt a bit crappy for about 60 minutes, then was completely fine, as always, except more grateful than I can describe. I felt cherished clarity and well-being. When you come down from one of those things, life truly is beautiful.
Thanks Drew!
This was a good one. You explained it so well & made it so easy to understand. Makes total sense too. ❤️
Loved this one. So straightforward and I appreciate you bringing in the biological reasons for it!
I work in psychiatric nursing. The number of patients who tell me: “I had a panic attack, so I took a Xanax, and after about 15 minutes it started working and I started to calm down”— I hear it all the time. The thing is that after 15 minutes, you were going to start to feel better anyway! Like you said, there’s nothing we have to do. Love the sunset analogy.
Best one yet!
So true Drew
Great sun analogy and easy-to-understand descriptions of the concept here👍🏼