Panic attack Saturday night

Saturday night we went to a friends house for her birthday. We swam at the lake, cooked out, and had a really fun evening. On the way home we stopped at a drive thru to get a drink. As I reached through the window to take the drink, something popped just above my left breast. It hurt, but quickly went away.

No biggie.

Got home, rinsed the kids off from the lake and sent them to bed. I was laying in my bed on my stomach looking at my phone. When my husband came to bed I put my phone down and pushed up with my left arm to face him. Suddenly this searing pain shot through the left side of my chest. It HURT! I knew, rationally, that I must have pulled a muscle or something. Unfortunately my anxiety brain took over and I fought against thinking it was my heart.

I went right into breathing exercises, repeated mantras like crazy. I eventually calmed down and the pain subsided a little. But then I got freezing cold (I always do right after a panic attack) and started shivering like crazy. It took forever to warm up enough to fall asleep.

The next morning my husband let me sleep in while he took care of breakfast for the kids. I woke up at 10:30 and felt exhausted and mentally drained. I forced myself to eat lunch at around 11:30 and sit outside for a bit, but then I went and lay back down. I slept until almost 4! But then I felt a lot better. Unfortunately I woke up to my youngest having a fever and crying that his ear hurt. No break around here lol.

All in all, I weathered this attack far better than my earlier ones. All the techniques I've been taught are really helping. The 'hangover' period afterwards was much easier and shorter as well. It's good to know all this stuff actually works!

S.C.

Yes, in the past I've always let them turn into a vicious cycle that lasted days or more. And the 'hangover' period as I call it was always terrible and draining.

It's empowering knowing I have this sort of control over them.

I did feel a teensy (very, very teensy) bit guilty for sleeping so much the next day. But my husband took care of the kids so it was fine. And my youngest just had an ear infection so he's fine. Daddy spent a lot of the time cuddling him. Real hard work lol.

I've journaled about it so I can go back a see how well I did later.

Thank you! Not going to lie, I'm pretty proud of myself!