Voicelessness and Emotional Survival > Voicelessness and Emotional Survival Message Board

Childhood panic attacks?

(1/4) > >>

KayZee:
Hey all,

So I wondered if any of you out there suffered from any sorts of panic disorders (undiagnosed or not) when you were kids?

I've been remembering the way I used to get really dizzy and faint when I was a kid.  My pulse would bang in my ears and the blood would feel like it was draining out of my head, and once or twice I even passed out cold.  This happened a lot between the ages of eight and fourteen, and looking back I realize they exclusively happened when I was with my NM.  Never experienced anything like it when I was at school, with friends or engaged in an after-school activity.

Most of all, these dizzy spells happened when I was having "quality time" with NM (like shopping) or in an enclosed space with her (in the car or once on a crowded train).  I can't remember how NM used to justify these fainting spells.  I think perhaps she said it was because I was growing.

At any rate, in retrospect, I wonder if these were panic attacks?  Anyone out there experience anything similar?

I was a very nervous kid...  Always fearful of home intrusions.  Fearful that the house would burn down in the middle of the night while we were asleep.  Fearful that my parents were going to abandon me in the supermarket or shopping mall.  I realize now that these fears were just twisted versions of things that had already happened: already felt emotionally abandoned by my folks, already felt like our home was a devastated place, already felt like I was being intruded upon (engulfing NM afforded me no independence or space).

thanks and best wishes, Kay x

finding peace:
Hi KayZee,

Yes I had similar experiences.

Although I am not qualified to diagnose, your experience as a child sure sounds like panic attacks to me.

As a child I didn’t understand what it was. 

I thought that everyone experienced the same things that I did.  For the most part, I thought my childhood was normal.

It wasn’t until I became an adult (and after I had children), that I realized it is not natural (as a child or an adult) to feel your heart pound out of your chest and want to crawl out of your skin or hide when you hear the garage door open, when you hear heavy footsteps on the stairs, when you are upstairs and someone downstairs coughs, to duck when someone raises their hand….(my manifestations of panic).

To this day, I have severe anxiety and PTSD.  The PTSD is so bad it can happen even over little things, and I still haven’t been able to get a handle on it even with 10+ years of therapy and knowing that my childhood experience was not normal.

I believe that the brain is hardwired to fight or flight (which manifests in a surge of adrenaline throughout the body) in adverse situations so that we can survive.

However, in the adverse situations we faced as children; we could neither fight nor flight.  We just had to take it.

At least for me, I think my brain defaulted into PTSD/anxiety (couldn’t fight or flight, so I had all that adrenaline rushing through my system that had no where to go, and it eventually manifested as anxiety). 

IME, this pattern has been very hard to change once it was ingrained.

I don’t know if you still suffer from this?

I do.

I am sorry you too had to experience this as a child. No child should ever have to experience this.

Peace

KayZee:
Dear Peace,

Thank you so much for your response.  I can't tell you how deeply I'm affected by your words and experiences.

It's funny, I always thought my childhood was normal too.  Mostly because my NM told me over and over that it was.  Actually NM didn't just say it was normal, in a truly NM way, she always said my childhood was "enviable."  What brainwashing.  What a joke. 

But you're right, as children we are totally at our parents' mercy.  Like you said, as kids, we had to just take it.  Couldn't fight back, couldn't run away, couldn't even name the feeling properly because the N's in our life were incensed by the idea of other people having feelings.

And the worst part is, when we were small children, our parents controlled language and meaning.  We felt anxiety but weren't free to call it that.  Because our parents called fear something else.  (My NM called it "being over-sensitive," "being difficult," etc.)  I can't quite believe that--at thirty one--the obvious is only just occurring to me: I was having panic attacks and it wasn't normal.  It's not in any way normal for a seven or eight-year-old kid to find herself hyperventilating. 

I really hope you find all the peace, healing and serenity you deserve.  I'm positive you will.  Like anything else, I'm sure it's a daily process.

Do you find yourself panicking in the face of your fear?  I do.  It's like even the idea of acknowledging and expressing fear is terrifying.  My fear always used to elicit my NM's rage. 

Had to take a break from therapy (I just can't afford it at the moment) and I've never tried anti-anxiety meds.  Don't get quite the same kinds of dizzy, heart-thumping spells I did when I was a kid.  Although occasionally--maybe once or twice a month--I feel a mild throat-closing sense of panic.

Oddly enough, sometimes I find just saying "I'm scared" aloud seems to calm me down and diffuse the anxiety.  For instance: I was hanging wallpaper with my husband a few weeks ago.  Well, wallpaper really reminds me of NM.  Her house is filled with it.  She's flawless at hanging it and loves to critique other people's mistakes and bubbles.  Anyway, right before we started, my skin started crawling (just as you described).  DH asked what was wrong and I said, "I'm terrified."  DH said, "Terrified of what?"  And I told him I was scared we weren't going to do the papering well enough, that we were going to fight in the process, confessed that I had a lot of strong childhood memories that involved helping my mother strip walls and repaper.  The instant I said it, I felt freer, calmer.  And of course, DH was like: "We're not going to fight over this.  And who cares if we screw up?  It's just wallpaper.  We have more than enough.  If we do it wrong, we'll just start over again.  I'm not your mom.  This isn't your childhood house.  We're us.  This place is ours."  I found myself laughing and crying.  It was like coming out of a spell.  It doesn't always work out like that, but still...

Anyway, thank you again Peace.  Deeply.
Wishing you lots of peace and love, Kay

finding peace:
Oh boy, Kay, were we raised in the same family?

So much of what you have written resonates.

Yes, I was told how lucky I was to have had the parents I had (::rolling eyes:: )

Yes, I was the too difficult/too sensitive child… (::vomiting in my mouth, while rolling my eyes:: )

Oiiiyyy,

The good thing…

It sounds like you have been able to ground yourself in the here and now when an anxiety attack hits. 

This is a great thing!

Please don’t put yourself down because you are realizing it at 31.  I am 45 and still trying to unravel how deep the brainwashing goes, and it goes deep.

Funny/sad story, kinda appropriate for the season.  A number of years ago, my mother was preparing a ham for dinner and she cut-off both ends of the ham and put it in the pan.  My Nona and her MIL (whom I loved dearly and she hated) asked her why she was cutting the ends off the ham.  She responded, that is how my family always prepared a ham – it is the only way to appropriately prepare a ham. 

Her own mother who was also there at the time said, “I only cut off the ends of the ham because it wouldn’t fit in the pan.”

Kinda funny and sad at the same time.

How deep does the pattern of wrongly learned behaviour/interpretaition of that behaviour go? 

I feel it is very much like trying to break out of a cult. 

I loved hearing that you have what sounds like the support of a great husband to help you to ground yourself (I have this too … I couldn’t have gotten as far as I have without him).

I was in better shape at fighting the PTSD and anxiety a couple of years ago, but have slipped back a bit in the past couple of years.

Thank you so much for the vote of confidence!

You sound like you are doing really, really well considering everything you went through.

I am so very glad to hear it.  Love to you, and many thanks.

You seem to me a very sweet and sensitive soul, and contrary to everything you were told as a child, IMO, this is a very good person to be. 

They were so very wrong about you. 

Much love,
Peace

KayZee:
Bless you, Peace..

That story about the ham made me laugh out loud.  And of course, its sadness also speaks volumes.  I think you're right, we ought not be too hard on ourselves.  We've been able to realize our family legacy, the bad habits that have been passed down through the generations, and that's the very first step in changing them.  Definitely like breaking out of a cult & erasing the brain washing!

And yes, we definitely seem like sisters from different misters.  I'm so thankful for the sisterhood that exists on this messageboard.  I have NC/zero relationship with my own GC sister (my only sibling).  NM has so successfully turned her and my father against me that the only contact I have with my FOO at all is through NM herself.  Talk about triangulation.

Anyway, I wonder is your NM Italian?  I noticed you called your grandmother your Nona. 

My NM is Italian.  Sicilian, actually.  And it's often seemed to me that maternal narcissism is hugely common in Italian families.  I can't find any sort of research to confirm this.  But when you think about the stereotypes of the Italian mother (engulfing, favoring her sons, being the dominant figure in the family home) they all seem pretty darn N!

I'm so glad to hear you've got the support of your husband.  Isn't it nice to have a touchstone who grew up in a relatively normal family--a partner who can occasionally say, "No you're not crazy.  You're not imagining things.  Your Mom is mental!  What happened there was really bizarre!  Most families don't function like that!"

At any rate, you've got all my very best wishes and support.
love, Kay

Navigation

[0] Message Index

[#] Next page