Panic and Anxiety Disorders

[Rachel421]

wolf, im going to try that exercise as well. i developed panic back when my thoracic tumor was effecting my lung and windpipe, but i still have anxiety (free floating mostly).  thanks for all the candid discussions guys, all of you. panic is something i get embarrassed to talk about, but it sure did take root in my nervous system and psychie, the tumor and respiritory difficulties are gone, but the tendency to panic is not.   id sure like to lessen it, if not get rid of it.  80 steps?  not sure if i can work up to that, but ill start today. 

[Theo]

it may not be neccessary to work up to that amount, i've always stayed calm through near enough anything so there may be a nature/nurture thing involved.

but in reality it is flexing your mind, you're body can take it. if you want it enough then it's yours to take.

i also think something that i should have mentioned before is that breathing is truely the barrier between mind and body.

if you breath silently, your mind will be silent, if you breath quickly, you can psyche yourself up, emotionally charge yourself.
observation of your habits can be a great tool in personal development and can eliminate the unneeded stress from stressful situations.

[Renegade]

I saw the doc this morning and he thought I looked a lot better than when I saw him 2 weeks ago, more colour in my face. I asked about the blood/slaiva tests, and he said he could do the test for me but he didn't think it was necessary at the moment. Also, this time I decided to ask whether or not the problem was being aggravated by eating too little of the right things, but he didn't think so.

...in reality it is flexing your mind, you're body can take it. if you want it enough then it's yours to take. I also think something that i should have mentioned before is that breathing is truely the barrier between mind and body. If you breath silently, your mind will be silent...

Wolf, I've been trying out the breath holding whenever I can, and got up to 40 steps yesterday evening. It's actually quite a challenge, which makes it even more fun to do.

And breathing really is a huge barrier between mind and body, whether meditating or training. I remember spending 3 days in a Zen temple in the north of the prefecture where I live back in the spring of 2003. We practiced zazen (seated meditation) in front of a wall for 15 hours a day. No, that's not a typo! We were woken up every morning just before 4am, by which time we had to be in the main hall and seated ready. The session began, and we sat until 9am. Every hour was broken up with a short period of kinhin (walking meditation), then we resumed zazen. Between 9am-10am we were free to eat a small breakfast and relax, the the next 5 hour session started at 10am. At 3pm we stopped for another hour and ate a small lunch, then did the final session of the day from 4pm-9pm. That was when we went to bed. The whole time, no-one was allowed to speak. I had planned to stay there for 5 days, but caught a cold and left early. Man, that cold was a blessing in disguise!

[Renegade]

I got a reply back from Ori today, but unfortunately he didn't mention anythng about a connection between undereating and panic attacks. He did make a few suggestions as to adjustments I could try making to my food choices during undereating, as well as mentioning a few supplements such as PLPA and Tyrosine and SAMe.  He also spoke about boosting Dopamine, which is an anti-deprasment, anti-panic hormone, as "there is evidence that disruption in the dopamine system could be a possible underlying cause of brain de-synchronization and panic attacks." The supplement he recommended for this is Mucuna.

To be honest, I don't think that the changes he recommended for undereating will help very much (using Warrior Milk as an undereating snack), but I might try the Mucuna. Obviously it's difficult for him to make more specific recommendations without meeting me in person, but I might try calling the Defense Helpline number sometime. Although awkward with the time difference between the States and Japan, if it helps it'll be worth it. For the time being, though, I'll stick to what I'm doing with my overeating in the day as I feel a lot better at the moment

[Theo]

lol 15 hours

maaaan aren't i glad i'm not a monk/taoist/zen dude lol

[Theo]

http://www.urbanmonk.net/101/expanding-your-comfort-zone-like-a-champion-fear-and-anxiety-cures/

hey man, i found this, thought maybe it would be of use to you.

urban monk is a good self improvement site i recommend to anyone that anyone likes that sorta stuff, it's also good, as the article suggests, for analyzing and mastering insecurities, apathy, flaws in general i guess.

[Renegade]

Thanks for the link, I haven't read through all of it yet but it looks like it might be helpful. I got up to 56 steps yesterday with the walking/breath holding, it felt like my body was going to turn inside out! My average is about 40, however did you get up to 80?!! Do you sit and rest between attempts or just keep walking and breathing at a regular pace?

[Theo]

i don't know that i could get eighty now, i might have to work up to it, i reckon i could still get sixty okay, apparently some of the training stays as a permanent and some goes.

that's fast progress though, well done. are you feeling the benefits?

when you reach a certain point your body shunts the blood from your legs into your brain to keep you going, it' called the divers response as you might guess because they were the first to experience it frequently and live to talk about it.

i used to do it to and from college, in winter months it's quite a quiet route, which was better because by the time you get to sixty steps you look like you're about to collapse or something lol but yeah you needn't stop you'll recoer quite quick but you shouldn't practice for more than 10 minutes intensively.

your body can go longer than 56, longer than 80, you just gotta keep going, it feels like your glottis is a balloon about to explode doesn't it lol

i copied and pasted the benefits below for motivation

• Increases red corpuscles and hemoglobin in the blood
• Teaches the body to use oxygen more economically
• The chronic level of brain oxygenation will be higher
• Corrects bad breathing habits - breathing becomes deeper
• Improves peripheral circulation
• Increases capacity for effort.

yeah, this will also help you to push yourself in training too

another thing is clothing and luggage makes a difference, take off your shoes and you'll get about ten more steps i reckon so you have to be observant in marking your progress, but you are already quite far, it is written that most struggle around 40 steps before they get their second wind,
which i pretty consistent with what you're saying, i found that if you fix your eyes on something it makes it easier, i think eye movements must need quite a lot of oxygen.

and finally you'll probably think in a couple of days, maaaan my legs are sore, that's a side effect of this. technically speaking you are subjecting your legs to anaerobic function when you hit the diver's response so you needn't worry about that.

but yeah man fifty-six steps in four days, that's really good, i wonder how rachel is getting on?

[Rachel421]

ummm, i think i might be "afraid" of this exercise. i keep getting caught up in kefir, dogs, work, plants, blogging, ect....knowing i want to give it a go. had a wonderful workout today. did my "overweight tabata" for 16 minutes, lifted more compound type weights.  but the anxiety training needs attension.  tomorrow is another day!  keep you uns'  posted. 

[Renegade]

Another thing is clothing and luggage makes a difference, take off your shoes and you'll get about ten more steps i reckon so you have to be observant in marking your progress.

Yeah, I noticed quite early on that when I walk to work after having just eaten and with a litre of water in my bag, I struggle to get 40 paces. However, after my foods been digested and the water's gone from my bag at the end of the day I can go much further. Perhaps the darkness helps me to focus a little more, too. Tonight I made it to 64 steps! The last 10-15 paces was so tough, I thought I was going to squeeze the bunch of keys I was holding into a solid lump of metal!

It's still a bit early to say what the benefits are, but I feel like I can take a much deeper breath after just this few days of practice. I'm already itching to get back onto night-time eating, it's just that every time I've done it before the anxiety comes back much worse. I think that this is also something that my mind's cooked up and keeps rienforcing with negative thoughts. I'm trying to work out a way to "reset" my thoughts so that I no longer make a connection between undereating in the day and having heightened anxiety/panic attacks. I've been looking through various resources by motivation/success coaches such as Bob Proctor and Vic Johnson, some of their methods for creating a "new you" in business seem to transfer well to any area of life. I'll see how it goes.

[Theo]

shit man, sorry i forgot to mention, doin it after eating will take away from digestion and you won't get as much

[Renegade]

wolf, this is totally unrelated to topic ( i hate it when i do this) but today i finally dove in and did the "hold your breath while you walk" exercise.  it was a pretty big deal, since oxygen starvation has been a big problem in my health challenges.   i believe being SOB is what started my panic disorders. well, 25 steps, again and again.   by the fourth or fifth time i got up to 27. my last set was 30.  i never thought id be so good at it, or that it would improve so rapidly.  im going to do this everyday as i walk the puppy.  thanks for the exercise. ive needed to increase lung capacity and poise for the longest.   cheers all!   

nothing to do with sex on this one,

rachel, lol i was looking for your post, i thought it inpolite of me not to reply but i lost the post ><

but yeahh, i'm glad you're doing so well and you're welcome for the exercise, it's from trans4mind.com, well a product i bought from there.

you could take a look there, i have a two disc compilation of their main stuff and it is probably the best thing i've ever bought for myself, i'm always so careful with them just cause the more i use em the more valuable they seem, it's where i learnt the eyesight improvement stuff etc from too.

lol i digress,

i'm glad you're enjoying the exercise

i

Rachel and Wolf,

I thought I'd try and get you both posting back on this thread instead of the 'Sex' one, it seems more appropriate. Thanks for the web address Wolf. I'm still doing the exercise whenever I find myself walking anywhere. My average is still around 30-40 steps, but sometimes I manage to get 60. The first attempt during a session (if that's what you'd call it) always seems to be the best, with subsequent attempts getting shorter until I can only get around 20-25 paces. Maybe I need to rest for longer between attempts.

Good work Rachel, keep it up. I'm feeling much better lately, with just the occasional bout of panic (maybe a couple of times a month). The doctor changed my medicine recently, but I really can't wait to be off it completely.

[Theo]

lol much appreciated, you got your medication reduced?

[Renegade]

lol much appreciated, you got your medication reduced?

No, unfortunately not. I told the doctor that although the anxiety side of things were coming under control, I'd started getting a sort of tight, constricted feeling in my chest during the day. I think I was still letting myself get stressed out about a whole load of things that weren't really important (making this diet work was probably one of them ), so he changed the the benzodiazepine (from Alprazolam to Bromazepam) and also gave me an anti-depressant to take at night (Fluvoxamine). So it seems I'm taking even more than before! Still, the constricted feelings gone and I'm not getting stressed out about stuff. The downside is I'm finding it very hard to get motivated to do anything.

[Renegade]

all the concepts on that site are very interesting.  i started at 25 steps, now im up to 42-40 steps.  not sure if that big jump is about learning not to fear oxygen starvation or what, but ill see next week as i keep up the exercise.  i wonder if renegade is keeping it up? 

no biggie on answering, you're very polite, and one of so many on here with great ideas and guidance!   

Hi Rachel,

I posted a reply back on the original thread (Panic and Anxiety Disorders) this morning, with a note to you and Wolf. I thought it would be better to continue the conversation on there where it originally started, instead of on one about the sexual preferences of ancient warriors!!

Up to 40 steps! That's brilliant