4 terrible secrets. Panic attack and cardiac neurosis

Why do panic attacks occur during VSD?

To date, doctors have not identified any specific cause that causes panic attacks. This is a polyetiological disease, the development of which is influenced by many factors.
Among them are: Hormonal disruptions - for example, in adolescents, when active puberty occurs, in women during pregnancy and during menopause. This also includes endocrine diseases.

• 
  chronic diseases - cardiovascular, osteochondrosis, alcoholism, neuropathies;

• mental disorders – most often various phobias.
• We should also highlight the so-called triggers - factors that provoke attacks against the background of an existing chronic disease:
• psycho-emotional stress;
• exposure to chemicals - medicines, drugs, pollutants, poisons;
• severe mental or physical stress;
• changes in weather or geographic areas.

However, there are also forms in which panic attacks can occur suddenly, against the background of complete well-being.

Drug treatment

Coping with terrible panic attacks can sometimes be done with the help of pills.

It is recommended to treat a panic attack with the following list of medications:

Sedative medications:

Validol

Novo-passit

Motherwort tincture

Valerian tincture

Tranquilizers:

Beta blockers:

Important! It is not recommended to purchase, let alone take, medications to stop a panic attack on your own without a doctor’s prescription. Since the consequences can be unpredictable, and medications can cause mental disorders. Treatment can be carried out independently, but only after consulting a specialist.

Seizure symptoms

Unlike purely psychological diseases, the symptoms of a panic attack during VSD are also accompanied by autonomic disorders, that is, disturbances in the functioning of internal organs.

Certain triggers provoke the activation of the release of stress hormones - cortisol and adrenaline. As a result, patients develop anxiety and some autonomic disorders occur. A spasm of blood vessels occurs, which leads to impaired cerebral circulation. He does not receive enough oxygen, which is manifested by a feeling of lack of air. This further stimulates the production of fear hormones - a vicious circle arises.

Fears and phobias

At first, only minor anxiety and obsessive negative thoughts may appear, which can then turn into real horror. Often, due to specific symptoms, the patient develops various phobias:

• 
  Thanatophobia – fear of dying;

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• stroke phobia;
• fear of losing your mind;
• claustrophobia – fear of closed spaces.

Constant attacks can lead to depression over time.

Autonomic disorders

Panic attacks are also accompanied by somatic symptoms:

• dizziness;
• cardiopalmus;
• pain in the heart area;
• suffocation, lack of air;
• chills or hot flash;
• nausea, vomiting;
• tremors in the hands;
• increased sweating;
• numbness, a feeling of crawling on the skin and other unpleasant sensations.

Signs of a panic attack during VSD can last from 2-3 minutes to several hours. After the end, severe weakness usually sets in.

Panic attack: symptoms and causes

An attack that occurs for the first time can throw a person into shock and, due to a lack of understanding of what is happening, the patient’s condition can worsen. A person simply cannot calm down and fight on his own; he does not know the reason for what is happening to him or her. In one moment, a thought that enters the head can cause a severe panic attack, fear and anxiety cover the entire body.

An attack of PA causes a person to experience the following feelings:

• strong pressure in the throat, sensation of a lump;
• the mouth becomes dry;
• changes in voice and speech;
• loss of self-control and control;
• cardiopalmus;
• lack of air;
• intermittency of breathing;
• increased sweating;
• fear for your life;
• fear of various kinds of dangers;
• trembling in the body;
• muscle tension throughout the body;
• the desire to hide from everyone or close yourself off;
• clouding of consciousness;
• sensation of either heat or cold;
• symptoms of myocardial infarction.

Attention! To combat this disease, you need to understand what is the root cause of a panic attack.

The following causes of attacks are identified:

• unhealthy diet (alcohol abuse, overeating, eating junk food, excessive amounts of coffee, etc.);
• sleep disturbance;
• inability to perceive any innovations and changes in life, to fight independently;
• presence of stress;
• frequent depression;
• perceiving everything in a negative light;
• loss of control over what is happening;
• the emergence of new circumstances and lack of experience of behavior in them;
• the return of fears that you could not fight on your own, for example in childhood;
• lack of physical activity;
• passive lifestyle;
• focusing only on one’s own illnesses;
• high level of exposure to external influence.

Urgent Care

Despite the fact that this disease does not pose any danger to life, the sensations that arise with it are very scary and unpleasant. The more scared a person is, the worse he becomes. Therefore, self-help is aimed specifically at restoring calm. The following measures must be taken:

• 
  control your breathing. Try to breathe deeply, calmly and rhythmically;

• try to distract yourself from what is happening in your body. For example, look out the window or remember something pleasant;
• open the window to provide fresh air;
• use sedatives - for example, validol or valerian tincture. You can also make your own tea from mint or lemon balm.
• Take a warm shower or bath.

What to do if you have a panic attack

If symptoms appear that indicate an increase in anxiety, you should follow the recommendations:

1. Try to concentrate on breathing, increasing the duration of inhalation and exhalation.
2. You can take a plastic bag and breathe into it to normalize your heart rate and calm your breathing.
3. Wash your face with cool water, open the window and walk around the house. Try to switch to pleasant thoughts.
4. If a person is alone in a room, you can pick up the phone. This is very reassuring, as it gives confidence that you can call an ambulance at any moment.
5. While on the street, try to switch your attention to the people around you.
6. A contrast shower and medicinal tea made from soothing herbs help a lot.
7. If anxiety is severe, you should take the medicine recommended by the doctor.

The choice of behavior when panic symptoms appear is individual. Each person diagnosed with neurosis must choose the most acceptable and effective methods for himself.

Further treatment of a patient prone to panic attacks

As already noted, VSD and panic attacks must be treated comprehensively. The basis, of course, is drug therapy. The following drugs are used:

• tranquilizers – necessary to combat anxiety and increased emotionality;
• antidepressants are stronger drugs that help get rid of depression and neuroses;
• vitamin complexes - help strengthen the general condition of the body;
• soothing herbal remedies of valerian, motherwort - for minor manifestations of the disease.

One of the main means is also psychotherapy. Many areas of this field of medicine are used - psychoanalysis, cognitive behavioral psychotherapy, group therapy.

An effective method is physiotherapy, which includes therapeutic exercises, breathing exercises, reflexology, and health resort treatment.

Despite the non-dangerousness of the disease, you should not treat yourself - a doctor’s advice will make this process faster and better.

Treatment

First aid

The attack lasts up to half an hour, and during this period you need to try to help the patient overcome the attack, since such conditions can be repeated up to 3 times a day. This greatly depletes the patient's nervous system. The syndrome occurs suddenly, regardless of where the person is (at home, on the street, while driving), and often occurs alone. Therefore, it is important to be able to facilitate the patient’s attack at home. There are several rules that can help stop an attack.

1. Perform a breathing complex. You need to breathe evenly and slowly into cupped palms or into a bag. This will make it possible to restore the normal rhythm of breathing, since during an attack it is rapid and causes hyperventilation of the lungs, which leads to a change in blood gas exchange.
2. Switch the patient's attention to performing any work. He needs to concentrate on something (an activity, a conversation).
3. Engage in self-hypnosis, repeat that everything is fine, panic is in vain, your health is good and your bad condition will now pass.

In order to help a loved one suffering from panic attacks, you need to have an idea of ​​the problem and be able to relieve the syndrome before the doctors arrive. The attack is often confused with an attack of heart pain, since it begins with pain in the area of ​​the heart, which has a stabbing nature. But unlike her, panic is not removed by Corvalol.

Traditional healers advise in such a situation not to take any pills (for the heart, stomach, etc.), since there are no pathologies of organs and systems. A good effect is obtained by taking tinctures of valerian root, motherwort, and hawthorn. Medicinal decoctions should be drunk between attacks.

Drug treatment

Before prescribing medications to patients with panic attacks during VSD, you need to make sure that they do not have organic changes in the brain, and that there are no tumors in the cavity of the cranium. For diagnostic purposes, an MRI is performed. If the result is negative, then to combat the attack the following is prescribed:

• antidepressant medications;
• neuroleptics;
• tranquilizers.

Medications are selected for each patient individually, depending on the cause of panic. Tranquilizers (Relanium, Phenazepam) help to quickly relieve symptoms of fear and anxiety, and when taken systematically, they can prevent subsequent attacks. But you need to be treated with these drugs for a short course (symptomatic therapy), since they are addictive.

Complete relief from panic is possible with the use of antidepressants (Zoloft, Lerivon). They do not cause addiction, reduce the level of fear, anxiety, and the risk of relapse. Medicines in this group do not provoke negative reactions, since they are prescribed with a gradual increase in the concentration of active substances. Side effects are observed only at the beginning of treatment. I take the pills for three months, reducing the dose to a minimum.

For a more lasting therapeutic effect, additional medications are added - neuroleptics, which gently relieve the symptoms of panic attacks caused by disorders of the autonomic nervous system.

Psychotherapy

Drug treatment alone is not enough and relapses develop after a year. The reason for their appearance is the lack of self-control skills. The task of a psychotherapist is to teach a person the ability to control the situation and be able to get distracted. Most patients are deeply convinced that only medications help them, without which they will not survive. The goal of psychotherapy is to dissuade the patient from this, to convince him that he can cope with the situation himself. Combined treatment is used (medicines and psychotherapist sessions), gradually eliminating medications.

A psychotherapist conducts individual sessions with a person. The cognitive behavioral method of therapy is used. The doctor gives instructions on the conditions under which the patient has bad thoughts that provoke an attack. The doctor helps you understand the situation and change your attitude towards it from negative to positive. Sessions are carried out not only during the acute period, but also after the symptoms subside. This makes it possible to consolidate the therapeutic result. At the end of the treatment, the patient is recommended to visit the doctor occasionally so as not to miss the onset of a relapse. It is the psychotherapist who will tell you how to cure VSD and panic attacks forever.

Helper Methods

To reduce the risk of panic attacks, patients need to strengthen their nervous system. To do this, you should change your diet, add seafood, more vegetables and fruits to it. They will fill the body with vitamins and minerals. It is necessary to exclude fatty and salty foods, alcohol, strong coffee and tea. You should also give up smoking. Meals should be taken in small portions, but 5-6 times a day. This will help prevent low blood glucose levels, which leads to fear and anxiety.

In addition, you should perform a set of exercises aimed at relaxing muscle tone. Gymnastics will help reduce the level of tension in the whole body and calm down. It is useful to do such exercises systematically. Fitness classes and swimming in the pool give good results.

Is there a need to adjust your diet and lifestyle?

We are what we eat, the ancients said. This is also true for VSD. It is recommended to exclude coffee, strong tea, energy drinks and alcohol from the diet, which can provoke attacks.

On the other hand, you should eat foods that are good for the nervous system:

• seafood rich in phosphorus and iodine;
• nuts and vegetable oils, which supply phospholipids;
• dried apricots, dates, bananas - contain many trace elements and vitamins.

Symptomatic picture

The manifestation of neurosis in VSD is divided into two types - somatic and mental. Somatic symptoms are a deterioration in a person’s physical condition due to the effects of a disease:

• headache;
• frequent visits to the toilet;
• tightness in the chest;
• continuous feeling of fatigue;
• drowsiness;
• sweating;
• pressure surges.

Psychological symptoms:

• constant anxiety;
• oppression;
• irritability and aggression;
• obsessive thoughts;
• panic attacks;
• sudden change of mood.

During attacks, a person develops a fear of a stroke. Often the symptoms of vegetative-vascular dystonia resemble a stroke, so every time the patient is afraid of death or disability. The patient is able to cause these kinds of symptoms himself by focusing on negative emotions or memories from the past.

Signs can intensify either in a person with low self-esteem, or when character traits such as categoricalness and restraint are present.

Before answering the question of what to do in order to cope with panic attacks, you need to understand what symptoms are inherent in the presented pathology.

Typical panic neurasthenia can be manifested by the presence of cardiovascular symptoms:

• tachycardia;
• interruptions in heart function;
• painful sensations behind the sternum, which make patients think about the presence of pathologies associated with the functioning of the heart;
• attacks of neurosis are characterized by a significant increase in blood pressure;
• During the onset of the disease, there is a significant fear of developing a hypertensive crisis; as a result, people constantly measure their blood pressure.

And also typical panic neurosis is characterized by a number of symptoms:

• each attack is accompanied by a feeling of suffocation;
• there are flashes of cold and heat;
• feeling of nausea;
• dizziness;
• fear of death;
• derealization.

Atypical neuroses are characterized by the presence of the following symptoms:

• muscle cramps in the legs and arms;
• deterioration of visual or hearing functions;
• development of aphasia;
• change in gait;
• constant presence of a “lump in the throat”;
• frequent loss of consciousness;
• incessant vomiting;
• pseudoparesis.

System-vector psychology of Yuri Burlan explains that the sound vector is dominant in any combination with other vectors in humans. This means that the dominant sound vector significantly suppresses the visual one, so first of all, such a person will show symptoms of deep sound depression and panic attacks will be in the background.

However, the degree of unfulfillment in the realization of their innate properties is different for each person. So, for example, one of the areas through which a sound engineer can partially make up for his lack is playing music or participating in scientific developments.

If the sound deficiency is partially compensated, and the properties of the visual vector are not realized at all, then a panic attack will come to the fore, and the picture of depression and its symptoms will be partially smoothed out.

conclusions

Panic attacks during VSD are considered a very severe exacerbation, which significantly worsens the patient’s quality of life. At the same time, this is not a fatal disease; this must be remembered and not worried about again.

Dealing with VSD and panic attacks is not so difficult - it does not require surgery or complicated medication regimens. First of all, you should realize that this problem is in the head.
This means that thinking needs to change. Another important factor is a healthy lifestyle.

How do panic attacks develop?

The mechanism of development of a panic attack is always a sequence of states that does not change. Physiological processes that change under stress are considered as a basis. The catecholamine version is based on the fact that a stressful state appears due to an increase in the concentration of biological substances in the blood - catecholamines. Such substances are a product of the adrenal glands; they act quickly on the body. When a panic attack develops, the concentration of catecholamines in the body is enormous.

Some scientists adhere to the theory that PA develops as a result of hereditary predisposition. When people with such pathologies are born in a family, it means that they can manifest themselves in everyone.