My 60-Second Cure for Panic Attacks

Yesterday, I had a panic attack.

The truth is, I’m not even sure what specifically brought it on… I suppose it wasn’t one specific thing, but many things all converging at once to create the perfect mental, hormonal (chemical), and emotional storm within me and thus yielded a panic attack.

The last one I had, and I’ve had VERY few in my life – less than one hand-counts worth – was when Marcus got sick with peritonitis in March of this year. Peritonitis is an infection in one’s abdomen commonly associated with gunshot wounds. It's something peritoneal dialysis patients are especially at risk for and it can be deadly if not treated quickly enough. We'd already been to the hospital and he was on antibiotics, but I woke up in the middle of the night hyperventilating, gasping out things like, “Two is not enough.” “We need more than just us.” “You can’t die on me.” “What would I do without you?” “Tribes are better.” And the kicker, “I don’t want to do any of this without you.”

No, I wasn’t espousing song titles or James Bond books, but the random panic-addled thoughts that were occurring to me as I gasped and sobbed out my fears of losing my partner, my man, the love of my life…

But there was actually a deeper philosophical thing that I couldn’t articulate at the time, considering I could scarcely breathe! Our society currently encourages nuclear-family-ness and relative isolation. When economic or housing-market troubles happen, the nuclear family is hit hardest. All of us have heard about extended families having to live together because of financial woes. I often think the tribal system was actually better – when the extended “family” of your tribe would help each other out. Each tribe had elders, healers, seamstresses, chefs and warriors, (or the tribal equivalent) and essentially the tribe would ensure no one would go hungry or homeless or hurt without help and support.

Towards the end of yesterday’s panic attack, I said to Marcus, “I don’t think tribal people had panic attacks.”

"Probably not," he replied.

Years ago I read the book “The Last Hours of Ancient Sunlight” by Thom Hartman. Hartman talks about his research into nomadic, indigenous, tribal people having the reverse of what we have in our modern society – an abundance of free time. He estimated that pre-modern tribal people had approximately 80% free time because they all worked together for food and shelter. When it was time to relocate the camp, all would work together, but once set up, apparently they had a lot of free time. Time for dancing around the fire, making ornamental clothing or costumes (probably for dancing around the fire), playing drums and music, and generally playing. As much as I wish I could find a way to actually observe these cultures, the majority of them have been wiped out by death, disease, or assimilation into modern “society.” I can’t help but think maybe that way was better. Well, all that was sort of bubbling up out of me during that panic attack.

Marcus comforted and supported me through it, and within 30 minutes it had subsided.

This one yesterday was similar, but it was daytime and it was brought on by… worrying! Pretty much the same thing as the other one, but less specific. Money. Where & when we’ll live or move. Work. Money. Water. Dumping (of waste). Heat. Money. Heat.

Did I mention it’s been unbearably hot lately?

This is my first time really living in a desert-type climate, or in extreme heat. All the places I’ve lived cap out around 85-90°F in the summer. I grew up where we rarely saw temperatures above 85°. Sure, I’ve visited Death Valley and Florida in the summer, and it was miserable at times, but I always had AC on 100% of the time where I was staying (what other option is there at 105°F??), and only visited these places. 

In June we moved to “the valley” of Los Angeles.

Plainly put, the valley of Los Angeles (aka San Fernando Valley) is hotter than the devil's scrotum.

If witch's tits are the coldest of cold things, I figure devil's scrotum's are the hottest of hot.

The valley is in the northeastern part of Los Angeles, and it’s away from the ocean, over the small coastal mountains and shielded from the lovely ocean's cooling breezes. But the valley is where we found a lovely, ranch-style place with a horse, two goats, chickens and a llama, to park our RV and live until we move to the rocky mountains.

And since we’re running our RV on 90% solar (trying to use the generator only when necessary), we ration our air conditioning.

So far we’ve made it work, but the heat makes me feel crazy. Maybe I’m having minor heat stroke, but I feel like I can’t function or think with the heat once it gets above 95°F. Forget about it when it's 105° with 60% humidity, which it has been lately!

Oh, did I forget to mention that I was also PMSing?!

Now here’s the shitty part about my PMS. Even if I’m aware that I’m premenstrual and hormonal, and I usually am because I track my cycle, and it’s creating mental and emotional unrest... That doesn’t necessary help ease the emotional shit-storm caused or exacerbated by my hormonal imbalance. Fuuuuucck! Right?

Now most of you know that I’ve made a commitment to do a yoga routine (The Tibetan Five/The Fountain of Youth) and meditation every day. While I’m not perfect about doing it every single day, my commitment (from more than 5 months ago) is still intact, and part of my practice is to be kind and gentle with myself if I miss a day here or there. I’m at about 90% and I notice the practice helps tremendously with my mood and general feelings of well being. In the last month or so, I started using binaural beats in my meditation. Binaural beats are two contrasting beats listened with headphones that encourage the brain to go into different brain-wave states depending on the hertz. I’ve done mostly theta and alpha. Alpha is a waking but relaxed state, theta is deep relaxation just before sleep.

Well, the goddesses must’ve been whispering in my ear yesterday (though it took me a few hours to listen) because after the panic attack and most of the day feeling up and down, but mostly down... I put on my headphones (at Whole Foods, no less), intending to just check if my new binaural beats application was actually working properly.

I’m not kidding, after only about 60 seconds my state changed. I set it for “relaxation (alpha)” with the frequency at 10 hz and base tone at 266 (Bb) hz.

Almost instantly I felt lighter and calmer and… well, giddy, but relaxed! It was amazing!

After about 5 minutes, my neck and shoulders dropped inches as I relaxed. I wandered around Whole Foods feeling like a kid. Looking at stuff, wanting to try stuff, dancing and goofing around. I probably seemed high to any on-lookers.

It’s explained as this (by dear Marcus): The PMS adjusts your hormones which adjusts brain chemistry which adjusts brain waves, which governs perception.

It really was the perfect storm for a panic attack or melt down.

Listening to the alpha binaural beats helped my brain come back to a more relaxed brain wave state.

Now this may sound all fluffy and hippy-dippy to some of you, but I’m telling you it fucking worked for me.

Amazing!

Here’s the crazy part. Meditators will practice meditation for thousands of hours and many years before being able to consciously go into a meditative state – usually alpha or theta. Reportedly, monks who’ve been meditating for 50+ years can achieve a waking delta state (sleep state) and can bilocate and levitate and shit like that. Well, these dual tones create the brain chemistry that mimics meditation… BUT, most people can’t stay awake when listening to delta so you probably won’t be able to bilocate or levitate. Sorry! But it should help you relax or really relax or sleep or focus, depending on which hz you listen to.

Fucking technology can be great sometimes.

For anyone who’s interested, the one I used yesterday was “binaural beats” and the icon is black with thin red and blue sound waves. The name/creator is Adlai Holler.

Please let me know how it goes.