You are a healthy adult, you have friends and family that care about you and your social life is great, but then one day you begin to experience symptoms of a tight chest, your breathing becomes labored, you feel like you are going to pass out. You are experiencing an intense feeling of fear that seems very overwhelming in situations that posed no problem for you before, you cannot figure out what is going on with you.

First off I want you to know that there is hope. Your panic attacks can be stopped.

You may be suffering from a powerful disorder called panic attacks. This is usually brought on by imagined, and I do mean imagined situations where you feel like you are in danger. I want to give you some situations where you may perceive danger where there is none because you are actually in control.

See if you recognize any of these as bringing on your panic attacks.

1. Driving a car:

You may have been driving a car for a long while, but then all of a sudden you get really nervous and you have an extreme fear of stepping into your car. Nothing has happened to you to make you feel this panic, but you feel a powerful sinking feeling. Your mind begins to create a whole story in your head. “What if I die on the freeway?”, “What if I turn over into a ditch?”, “What if I get into my car and it blows up with me inside of it?”.

These are all imagined dangers. Your mind is creating the worst case scenario for you to make the perceived threats seem real to you but they are not. There is a ninety nine percent chance these things won’t happen, but the imagined fear will prevent you from wanting to drive.

2. Seeing large groups of people:

You may have been a really sociable person up until a certain point in your life, but now you are fearful of social situations because your mind is creating imagined instances of being hurt. You may be walking down the street and see a group of innocent looking teenagers coming your way. At first you are not afraid, but then you see one of them has a stick in their hands, one is smiling and you perceive it to be menacing, one of the teenagers is looking at you weirdly ( you think), you have a strong urge to cross the street to get away from the perceived danger, but there is no danger. These kids are just going to a baseball game. They even greet and smile at you as you walk past. As soon as the kids have moved on your heavy breathing and racing heart stop. Your mind was in overdrive for no good reason.

There is a way to get over these imagined feelings of danger. You have to look into yourself and ask; “what am I really afraid of’?" People who suffer from shyness do not experience the same symptoms, but it can be said that the two conditions are closely related. Figure out the source of the imaginary fear so you can get a handle on this life crippling disorder.

I've added some links to forums below this article. I highly suggest you have a look at these forums as they can help you in many ways;

1. You will realize that you are not alone in this

2. You will realize that you are not crazy

3. You can learn tips and techniques that others have tried that have worked as well as those to stay away from that have not worked.

Wishing you the best of health,

Chris