Panic attacks of life being a dream

Hello all,

I have been suffering with anxiety since I was 14 and am now 25.  I can have years of calm and relatively no anxiety but lately a new fear whalloped me pretty good.  All of a sudden, I fear that I am living in a dream world (I think I watched Inception too many times or something ).  I fear that none of this is real and the very thought sends me into a panic that I will start believing this and go crazy and do something horrible.

Some things about my life right now that are high stress: my husband just deployed (he is in the Marines) and I just moved in with a good friend.  I work full time and go to school part time and both of these things are being affected by this fear.  It is all I have been thinking about for the past week and I can't concentrate on anything.  I am also on 30 mgs of Lexapro but it may be time to switch medications also and I do have an appointment with my doctor in a couple days.  I also have hormone issues (low progestrine and low Vitamin D, which I take both).

Anxiety and depression run heavily in my family.  My mom has a light case of it and my 2 sisters and brother have struggled with it as well in addition to some aunts and a grandma or two.  My family is very supportive and my hubby is as well (though I haven't been able to talk to him very much).

Please help!

Thanks for the reply Scaredy Cat. I've been refreshing this for the last hour every fifteen minutes or so hoping for some comfort so that was nice to have on my lunch break.

I know anxiety and unwanted thoughts are a cycle so it just seems they keep circling around. I have found ways to rationalize other phobias so they leave and eventually they do but this one I'm finding hard to grasp because it's so WEIRD and that's probably what is giving it its power in the first place.

OOPS. Im sorry- didnt realize I was running on. My anxiety n panic comes frm a handful of reasons as many do. When my son was deployed to Korea and during 911 I didnt exhale for a year! Internal and external things or nothing at all can set mine off. Like u, I am going thru some unusually difficult situations rite now so its kicked into high gear at the moment. I have medical problems that mass release stress hoemones unchecked so Im kind of a wreck rite now. But 4 the good news, you will find good feedback and ways to manage this here. Learn as much as you can about a/p and youll find you identify with almost everyone here. I DO. Welcome!

Blu Angel - what medical problems do you have that releases those stress hormones?  I am going to see both my hormone specialist and my regular doctor tomorrow to try and figure out why it came on so suddenly.  Lexapro was working for so long that I don't understand why it just stopped working and it's frustrating.  I get to a place in my life where I am comfortable and am independent and it just shuts me down!  Ack!

Thank you for the nice words stkitt.  Money problems do usually cause anxiety in me unfortunately too.  And I do notice that when I do get up in the morning - the anxiety is usually a lot higher and I spend my mornings before leaving for work talking myself down to some point.  It really started in after my husband deployed and when I moved in with a friend.

Also having trouble finding a good reliable therapist...how long does a good one take to call you back for a first appointment?

Thanks!

Thanks for the advice and I love the screenname Scaredy Cat (I am a total cat person :)  It's also nice to know that I'm not the only person going through these feelings right now...makes me feel less abnormal  

I will ask my doctor tomorrow.  She is pretty helpful when it comes to anxiety and panic because she herself suffers from it.  There is no judgement and that is nice in the medical field for once

Thank you again!

Thanks sweetie :) I often think "Why me?" too. But then I think that life could be a lot worse. I could be in a third world country which still sees any kind of mental health issue as something to shun. I could be suffering from a worse mental disease or physical disease. I could be one of the many unemployed right now or not have an understanding, wonderful boss who doesn't judge me.

How old are your boys? I don't have any children yet but when my hubby gets out of the military we want to start trying. But I do have plenty of nephews to play with in the meantime :)

What kind of chronic illnesses do you suffer from?

Anasong - I had a hysterectomy so I have to take estrogen. Without that Id have even more emotional hoops to jump through. Pregnancy is a rollercoaster w hormones. Just get checked out well. I take buspar zoloft lorazepam estrogen triazolam trazedone gout meds steroids for addisons iv iron injections of b12 n pain meds. The first 3 r for A/P. Had one earlier 2day that was pretty bad. Better now.

Well I don't know if you're ever going to get back on this website, but just in case you do, I was amazed when I read your post because this kind of panic attack was the same kind that I suffered from. I was always for some reason embarrassed to mention that the thought of this life not being real would panic me, what would trigger them the most was when I'd look at my mom and think oh no she's not real, my mind couldn't handle that idea, my symptoms were a bit different, my heart would race and may face would get flushed, I felt the blood google to my face, it was the worst feeling in the world. I never thought I'd recover from it, I remember begging God to take it away from me, and couldn't understand why He wouldn't. I went to psychologists and they couldn't help. One day it was way too much pressure, I was in the midst of having the attack and all of a sudden I cried, I cried for everything that I never cried about, all the emotions I locked inside were gushing out of my eyes, and for somereason, the panic left me, I still get feelings of derealization ( iwas surprised to find out our condition had a name) bt panic hasn't hit me. It is very rando
That I thought about this; mostly because this happened to me a very long time ago but I was at this girls concert tonight, her name is JJ heller, and she talked about how she suffered from panic attacks and didn't understand why she had to suffer from this, check out her song, it was quite touching and I just had to share it with you, even though you haven't been on this site for awhile, there's a slight chance you may check on this: in ur time of trouble, here's the songs name: in your hands by JJ heller, it's beautiful.

Thank you for the repines scaredy cat! I am hoping it could help someone out there suffering from these attacks, do look into the song it's cAlled Your Hands she wrote it specifically because of her panic attacks,
Thank you for the friendly welcome
-amar

Well this blog has taught me maybe it's smart for me sometimes to read up on others posts that are alot like my own.  When I seen the title of this post I just had to read it.  It's the main reason why I struggle everyday.  It's that out of it feeling, cloudy, life isn't real, dreamlike, lacking emotion, feeling disconnected from everyone.  It's absolutely terrible.  It makes me think ridiculous thoughts.  Causes me to think that I'm crazy, I'm not in control, I'm stupid (struggle learning anything new ever since this has started), and my memory is absolutely terrible.  These were problems I never had until 2 years ago.  I thought it was just me, I've been posting and posting on here for awhile and others have had great insight and tips on how to seek out help.  Currently though, up to this point anyway, it really hasn't helped much unfortunately.  I still have the same feelings.

Hibee's most recent reply though hit home with me more then anything.  Deja vu.  Holy crap do I have that feeling ALL THE TIME!   I feel ilke I'm stuck in a revolving dream/nightmare.  And it's not even scary things that trigger it, it's stupid things.  For example, having a conversation with one of the customers that comes in my job all the time, I try and make small talk to help the day pass a little bit.  But sometimes out of nowhere I'll get that out of it, deja vu, nobody home feeling.  That scares the absolute crap out of me.  My mind wanders off and starts spinning and I'm no longer even engaged in the conversation.

Lately my doctor seems to think I suffer from OCD.  He said that the derealization/depersonalization is a very common symptom with OCD.  I'm hoping it's OCD because it doesn't seem like one of the more serious mental illnesses, but either way whatever it is, it is.  It's been too long dealing with this stuff.  I walk around the darn house like a shadow of my old self, not knowing who I am or where I am or what's going on.

I was just glad (kind of pathetic that i'm happy about this) that somebody else experiences the same exact thing.  I would hope that the original blogger was still posting on this site to see how they were doing.  I could really use a positive story about somebody who suffers from DP/DR constantly and has come out of it alright.  I worry that it's not going to get better and I'm just going to isolate myself.  That's what slowly has been happening, losing touch with friends and family, not talking or going to social events because it makes it worse...it's getting lonely and annoying.  But atleast I know I'm not the only one battling this.

Thanks Amar I really hope it does. It's getting pretty unbearable. I just hate feeling this terrible. For example today I went out and had a few drinks with friends during football (something I would always do before all these anxiety problems) and something I FORCE myeslf to do recently to try and bring back some feeling of normalcy. I still have that feeling like I have no idea whats going on, I don't know what day it is, time it is, what's going on around me. It's like everything is just fake and it drives me nuts.

Amar are you on meds? Is that what helped you? Or was it therapy? I've been going to therapy once a week for the last 3 weeks for the first time on a weekly basis....I'm not seeing much results though. I'm going to stick with it and my therapist wants me to 100% meet with his psychiatrist in december to try a new medicine to see if that helps. I've alawys just been worried about the meds. I struggle so badly with the fact that this has happened to me. I used to be fine and be able to make it through the day without any problems, do whatever i felt like, never second guess myself.....I miss those days man, i really do.

Just got home now from hanging with friends and I'm just still feeling down, have this heavy headed, cloudy, feeling and just overall feeling alone. It's so annoying and I'm so tired of this. It's good to hear that it gets better but I still can't wrap my head around how these feelings happen. I'm not a very religious guy but I've been praying lately to make it stop.