What happens in your body during a panic attack?
Your nervous system senses danger and gets you ready to run or fight. Your heart speeds up. Your breathing gets fast and shallow. Your muscles tighten, and you might shake or sweat.
Breathing fast changes your blood, and that's where many of the strangest sensations come from: tingling in your hands and face, dizziness, the feeling that you can't get enough air. These sensations can be frightening and contribute to the panic.
Why it seems to come from nowhere
A panic attack often arrives when nothing dangerous is happening, in a supermarket, or in bed at night. I think that's part of what makes it so scary.
But the alarm is always responding to something. It might be pressure that has been building for weeks, or grief you haven't had room to feel. Sometimes it's a body that has simply been repressing and on alert for so long that it comes on when it finds the space to do so.
Are panic attacks and chronic pain connected?
It's very common to live with both. For me, they are two expressions of the same thing: a nervous system that doesn't feel safe. So the work is similar. We listen to what the alarm is protecting you from, and we help your body learn that it can find safety.
What happens when we turn toward panic?
Most of us fight panic the moment it starts. We try to make it stop, we look for a way out, we tell ourselves something is terribly wrong. But fighting the sensations tells the nervous system there's real danger here, and the alarm gets louder.
Often, it's the fear of the panic that keeps it going.
Somatic awareness offers another way. It means noticing what's happening in your body, without judging it or trying to fix it. It's the same thing we do with pain: instead of running from it, we turn toward it and get curious.
What helps in the moment
So when panic comes, you can try to stay with it. Where do you feel it? Is it in your chest, your throat, your hands? Is it tight, buzzing, hot, fluttering? Does it move, or does it stay in one place?
It is okay if it creates discomfort. All you need to do is to notice it.
When you notice, the sensations rise, peak, and begin to ease on their own. Your nervous system learns that it can feel this and still be okay. Each time you stay, the alarm loses a little of its power.
If it ever feels like too much, come back to your exhale, or your feet on the floor. Turning toward panic is a practice, and you can take it one small step at a time.
- Lengthen your exhale. Breathe in for four, and out for six or eight.
- Feel what's solid. Your feet on the floor, your back against the chair.
- Name what's happening. This is my alarm. I am not in danger.
- Get curious. Notice where you feel it and what it feels like, without trying to make it stop.
- Let it move through. A panic attack usually peaks within minutes, and then it comes down.
With love,
Leyla
