HealingWell
Search Close Search
☰

Morning panic attacks

Support Forums
>
Anxiety & Panic Disorders
✚ New Topic ✚ Reply
❬ ❬ Previous Thread |Next Thread ❭ ❭
Posted 10/21/2012 12:59 AM (GMT 0)
Does anyone else who suffers from panic attacks suffer more in the morning?  It seems like right when I wake up I am jittery and nervous about the day....I try to talk myself out of it but if I don't take a clonozepam pretty quick I will have a full blown panic attack while I am trying to get ready....I get to work and then after about 10 I start feeling normal again....I just don't know why this has been happening...I don't really have much stress at work so I don't know why mornings are so hard for me.....I think i am going to try zoloft again next week...I took it for 4-5 years and then got off of it for 1.5 years and didn't have any but then again in May started having then regularly .... it has been a long summer...I don't know what i would have done without my clonozepam but now I think it is time I start back on the zoloft just hoping the start up side effects are not as bad as last time....Thank God that I have found this forum site to see that I am not alone and that everytime I look on here I find someone else with similar stories and symptoms as mine....Thank you.
Posted 10/21/2012 2:00 AM (GMT 0)
velaineg,

When my anxiety is the worst, it is always in the mornings. That is when your body's cortisol level is the highest ( cortisol is stimulating) and that accounts for probably part of what you are feeling.  Cortisol is the stress hormone, your body produces when you are under stress. 

The paradox of stress/cortisol is that anxiety produces cortisol, which produces anxiety which produces more cortisol, which causes you to feel more anxious etc. 

Soon you find yourself in this never ending cycle of anxiety and depression.

What you must do to get better is accept your anxiety.  You must accept your feelings and not try to fight them.  Do this long enough and an interesting thing happens,  the anxiety goes away.

Keep on talking with us and know that we are here for you. 

Posted 10/22/2012 11:46 AM (GMT 0)
Thanks, I am trying that this morning and so far so good...but I did just get up but I am relaxing while I get ready...thanks so much!
Posted 10/22/2012 2:05 PM (GMT 0)
This is EXACTLY what I have been experiencing over the last year or so.  I wake up nervous and jittery and consequently can't go back to sleep.  I feel nervous and anxious for anywhere from one to three hours and then I seem to get better.  I have heard the comment about the cortisol level before but am wondering why that hits in the morning.  I have always had anxiety but never used to have it in the norning....as a matter of fact I used to feel the best in the morning and now it's the exact opposite....I'm panicky, anxious, jittery, depressed...the whole nine yards.  I take a small dose of xanax every morning but now wondering if I should increase to whole pill(.5).  That was what my doc prescribed anyway but I've never wanted to take an entire pill at once, as I'm scared of becoming addicted (because on top of everything else I'm a hypochondriac and medication-phobic).  Anyway, just wanted you to know you are NOT alone.  We just have to keep fighting and turn to this forum when we're at our worst...,.,it really helps alot.
Posted 10/22/2012 3:24 PM (GMT 0)
Well since May I have become a hypochondriac and pill phobia person too I think.....I just worry about everything....I was on zoloft for 4 years and then felt great....I then felt like I was over the panic attacks and so I got off of the med....well here it is 2 years later they are back...I have just been too afraid to go back on it b/c I don't want to gain weight but I am going to go ahead and start it up again...just worried about getting thru the start up side effects for about 3 weeks but I can do it b/c I need to be able to function and I am TIRED of this feeling....now especially in the mornings ....but this morning was fine until I got to work....then I get so nervous....I take 1/4 of a clonozepam every morning and then 1/4 later in the afternoon right now but my dr said I could take a whole 1mg pill too but I just don't want to....anyway it is nice to hear from someone who is feeling like me.....except I wish you weren't feeling bad :-)
✚ New Topic ✚ Reply