July Newsletter

  LONDON MARATHON 2007

 Our sincere thanks go to Marcus Head and his friend David Badock who ran the London marathon on our behalf.  Marcus said that they both enjoyed the race even though it was the hottest Marathon on record.  ‘We both struggled mid-way through the second half, however persevered and now talk of running the next and bettering their times.  I completed the Marathon in 4hrs. 9 mins and David in 4hrs 29 mins. 

The crowd support was truly amazing and was the highlight of the day.  There was lots of music  -  bands and DJ’s at various points/pubs along the way too.  We also managed to spot a good number of friends and family en-route which was also extremely uplifting.  We have raised over £2000 pounds between us before Gift aid, so when it’s all in we hope to have over £2.500 for Anxiety Alliance’. 

Our grateful thanks go to Marcus and David for their efforts, and the money raised will go towards setting up a call centre to enable sufferers to contact our volunteers using  local rate telephone service.   

The Anatomy of Panic Attacks, taken from the book by Christine Ingham called Panic Attacks. 

Although there appears to be a lack of awareness among the general public about panic attacks, the medical profession have known about them for at least 90 years.  At the turn of the last century, if you experienced them you would be variously diagnosed as having neurasthenia, irritable heart, anxiety neurosis, or DaCosta’s syndrome (named after the doctor who noticed its common occurrence in front-line soldiers.  But it wasn’t until as recently as 1980 that panic disorder was recognized as something quite separate from general anxiety and given its own list of diagnostic criteria to help doctors identify it in patients. 

Perhaps its relatively recent appearance on the medical scene explains the lack of both public and professional awareness, as well as the dearth of literature available for the layperson.  And in order to learn how to deal with panic attacks and take an active part in your own healing, you do need information.  So let’s start with some facts. 

How Common Are Panic Attacks? 

Panic attacks have been identified the world over.  Many studies have been carried out to ascertain the number of people who experience them, and the results show that between one and two percent of the population have panic attacks on a regular basis, i.e. at least four attacks in a four-week period. 

Around 10 percent of the population have intermittent panic attacks, and one extensive study in the USA revealed that a startling 35 percent of people have had at least one panic attack – a staggering 87 million Americans. These figures hold true for other countries, this means that, for example in the UK over 20 million people may have had at least one panic attack, and nearly 9 million in Australia. 

Based on these figures, the chances are that everytime you sit on a bus with twenty people, seven of them could have experienced a panic attack.  Knowing this makes it understandable why panic disorder is noted as being the most common anxiety problem for which people go to seek help.  So you certainly need not feel alone in what you experience, and you can take comfort in knowing that many, many others are in the same position as yourself.     

When do they Begin and Who Has Them? 

Most people have their first attack when they are adolescents or in their early twenties.  Apparently it is rare for them to begin past the age of forty, although people can continue to experience them beyond that age. In terms of differences between the sexes, some clinical trials appear to suggest that it is as common for men to experience them as women, but other studies suggest that more women than men have them. 

Many factors come into play as to when, why and to whom they occur.  It’s a complex picture but in general it’s been suggested that people who panic tend to show a high degree of conformity; always doing what they’re told and what’s expected of them.  But that really is only one element; there are many more to consider. 

The First Attack

 Many people’s first attack tends to follow the same pattern.  You will be doing something quite ordinary like reading, driving, watching television or eating out when…………zap!! Before you know what is happening you find yourself in the middle of your first panic attack. 

Some people have their first attack while they are asleep and find themselves abruptly shocked into waking, but not because of a bad dream.  Instead, they will have been sleeping quietly when suddenly it strikes; this must be very disconcerting. 

Most people have their first panic attack spontaneously, apparently with no prior warning; but some do have them during a particularly stressful moment, such as when they are giving a talk to a group of people, taking an exam, or attending an important meeting in which they have to take an active part. No matter where or when they start, there is a great deal of similarity in the symptoms people have. 

Whatever you experienced in yours, you can be reassured that others will also have felt the same. Feelings of unreality are common either prior to having your first attack, during one, or in between them.  It can be an unsettling experience.   These feelings of unreality are described as either depersonalization or derealization. 

To distinguish between the two, depersonalization is when you have a feeling that you are somehow detached from your body; as though you are floating some way above or just outside yourself. 

Derealization is apparently more common and is when you are grounded in yourself, but you can’t quite find your place in relation to things around you.  You might even feel unsteady on your feet.  

 Although these feelings are very disturbing they too are protective mechanisms.  Isaac Marks, researching into this phenomenon has suggested that the mechanism comes into operation when your feelings of anxiety have reached too high a level.  Other research suggested that during these feelings of unreality, your anxiety levels actually drop significantly.  So if you experience feelings of either depersonalization or derealization, you should be quite pleased with yourself.  Your body is acting on your behalf to save you the unpleasantness of experiencing any more anxiety. 

There is nothing to fear from the feeling  

OCD as a Family Disorder – taken from Brain Lock, Free Yourself from OCD by Jeffrey Schwartz 

Obsessive compulsive disorder is, in the truest sense, a family affair. Typically, people with untreated OCD find themselves increasingly isolated from others, preoccupied with their terrible thoughts and urges, and choosing out of fear or shame, or both, to share their awful secret with no-one. Within families, this can be devastating. 

Commonly, people with OCD fall into a pattern of using their OCD as a ‘weapon’ in interpersonal conflicts.  In one frequently observed personality disorder, the person with OCD becomes dependent to a pathological degree on the people he or she lives with to get things done. 

Family members become part of the OCD – enablers – actually doing the compulsive behaviours for the person to keep peace in the household.  The person will demand ‘Check that lock for me’ or ‘Scrub the walls for me’.  By giving in, of course, the family only ensures that the person will continue to get worse; nevertheless, out of sheer desperation, they usually give in. 

A child with OCD can totally disrupt a family, waking them many times during the night with demands and dictating their lives down to where they must sit in a given room, and at precisely what time they must do X, Y and Z. 

Too often, parents allow themselves to be sucked into this behaviour because they have heaped built on themselves, convinced that they are responsible for the child having this awful illness.   

Although the family cannot force the person with OCD to get well, they can take charge of their own lives, refusing to participate in enabling symptoms, to be prisoners in their own homes, or to be what in popular psychiatric jargon is called co-dependent.  The confrontation may not always be pleasant, but the end result is that the person is apt to improve.  The bottom line is always this:  Is the family member helping or hindering the person’s efforts to do the Four Steps? 

Consider the case of a family in which one member has a contamination obsession.  Parts of the house may become off-limits to the entire family.  The person keeps everyone out because of an overwhelming fear that they will make the area dirty and he or she will then have to start on an out-of-control cleaning binge.  (Ironically, when cleaning compulsions get really bad, whole rooms may become profoundly filthy because the person with OCD is afraid to start cleaning, and no one else can enter the room). 

In some cases, and they aren’t that rare – people have actually ended up living in tents in their back gardens.  Even when the obsession doesn’t get to that stage, the usable inside space tends to keep shrinking and shrinking.  In addition, objects become off-bounds; perhaps none of the dishes or eating utensils can be used, or certain items of clothing cannot be worn. The partner or spouse must take a stand. 

When those with OCD ask others to help them do their dreadful tasks, they may simply be so overwhelmed by intrusive thoughts and urges that they feel they need more hands to help them perform their bizarre rituals.  On the other hand, they may well have a hidden agenda that they may not he aware of themselves; people with OCD frequently use it as a weapon in interpersonal conflicts. 

For example they want to annoy another person or get even for some real of imagined hurt, or if they perceive that they are powerless in the relationship and that their OCD can give them power, they will be less motivated to fight off their urges and the uncomfortable feelings the urges cause.  Moreover, when they feel that their suffering is being demeaned or underestimated by other family members, they may be especially apt to try to get even by making other people’s lives miserable, either quite wilfully or only half-consciously.  A psychological tug-of-war ensues. 

In time, through faithful practice of self-directed behaviour therapy, people can and do change their brain and conquer their OCD symptoms.  But as the person with OCD gets well, family dynamics are apt to change, often with devastating psychological consequencies.  Roles become reversed, and the once powerless partner may make a power play.  Others in the family may resent that the person has improved because now the family has to start facing its own realities and shortcomings, which may not be related to the OCD.  The person is no longer an excuse for the family’s failings or a doormat.  He or she is someone with newfound self-esteem, demanding to be dealt with as a fully functioning member of the family.  Suddenly, there is a stranger in their midst. Thus, when the person starts to improve, the family may unconsciously begin to undermine the treatment. 

For example, for years one woman with OCD had made her husband jump into the shower as soon as he came home from work because she thought he was contaminated.  When she began to get better in therapy, he preferred to keep doing so than to have a well wife who might start asserting herself in more worrisome ways. When families work together, however, wonderful things can result.   

Overcoming Depression by Paul Gilbert 

If you suffer from depression, you are sadly far from being alone.  In fact it has been estimated that there may be over 300 million people in the world today who suffer from it. Depression has afflicted humans for as long as records have been kept.  Indeed, it was first named as a condition 2,400 years ago by the famous ancient Greek doctor Hippocrates, who called it melancholia.  It is no respecter of status or fortune.  Indeed many famous people throughout history have suffered from it including King Solomon, Abraham Lincoln, Winston Churchill and the Finnish composer Sibelius.  What should be remembered is that depression is not about human weakness. 

What do we mean by Depression? 

This is a difficult question to answer because a lot depends on who you ask.  The term was first applied to a mood state in the seventeenth century. If you suffer from depression, one thing you will be aware of is that it is far more than just feeling ‘down’.  In fact, depression affects not only how we feel, but how we think about things, our energy levels, or concentration, our sleep, even our interest in sex, so depression has an effect on many aspects of our lives. 

Depression affects our motivation to do things.  We can feel apathetic and experience a loss of energy and interest; nothing seems worth doing, everything is so pointless that it’s hopeless even to try.  If we have children we can lose interest in them and then feel guilty.  A work project that we might have been very keen about becomes boring.  We have to drag ourselves around.  Each day can be a torment of having to force ourselves to perform even the most minor of activities. 

People often think that depression is only about low mood or feeling fed-up.  But although we lose the ability to have positive feelings and emotions, we can experience an increase in negative emotions, especially anger.  We may be churning inside with anger and resentment that we can’t express.  We might become extremely irritable, snap at or children and relatives, and at times, lash out at them.  We may then feel guilty about this, and this makes us more depressed.  Other negative feelings that can increase in depression are sadness, guilt, shame envy and jealousy. 

Depression interferes with the way we think in two ways.  First, it affects concentration and memory.  We find that we can’t get our minds to settle on anything.  Reading a book or watching television becomes impossible.  We also don’t remember things too well, and we are prone to forget things.  However, it is easier to remember negative things than positive ones. 

The second way that depression affects our thoughts is in the way we think about ourselves, our future and the world.  Very few people who are depressed feel good about themselves. When we are depressed, the imagery we use to describe it tends to be similar.  We may talk about being under a dark cloud, in a deep hole or pit, or a dark rook.  Winston Churchill called his depression his ‘black dog’. 

The imagery of depression is always about darkness, being stuck somewhere and not able to get out.  If you were to paint a picture of your depression it would probably involve dark or harsh colours rather than light, soft ones.  So darkness and entrapment are key internal images. Our behaviour changes when we become depressed.  We engage in much less positive activity and may withdraw socially and want to hide away.  Many of the things we might have enjoyed doing before becoming depressed now seem like an ordeal, because everything seems to take so much effort, we do much less than we used to.  If we become very anxious we may also start to avoid meeting people or lose our social confident. 

Depressed people sometimes become agitated and find it extremely difficult to relax.  They feel like trapped animals and pace about, wanting to do something but not known what.  Sometimes the desire to escape and run away can be very strong.  But where to go and what to do is unclear.  On the other hand, some depressed people become very slowed down.  They walk slowly, with a stoop, their thoughts seem stuck and everything feels ‘heavy’. When people become anxious about something their bodies can produce a surge of adrenaline.  And depression can result in other biological changes, affecting our bodies and our brains.  There is nothing sinister about this. 

To say that our brains work differently when we are depressed is really to state the obvious.  Indeed, any mental state, be it happy, sexual, excited anxious or depressed will be associated with physical changes in our brains. We can also experience a host of other unwanted symptoms.  Not only are energy levels affecting, so is sleep,  If you are depressed you may wake up early, sometimes in the middle of the night or early morning, or you may find it difficult to go sleep.  There are some depressed states, however, in which sleep is increased.  In addition, loss of appetite is quite common and food may start to taste like cardboard; as a result, sometimes there is weight loss.  Other depressed people may eat more and put on weight. 

Even though we might try to hide our depression, it almost always affects other people.  We are less fun to be with.  We can be irritable and find ourselves continually saying ‘No’.  The key thing here is that this is quite common and has been since humans first felt depressed.  So we need to acknowledge these feelings and not feel ashamed about them, for if we do it will just make us more depressed. It should be remembered that – 

• Depression is a very varied problem.  It ranges from the mild to the severe.  Some depressions are associated with much anxiety, others with much anger.  Some come on slowly, others quite quickly.
• There is a psychological component to every depression, but this does not mean that psychological change is all you need to get out of it.  Some people benefit from medication and others require a change in social circumstances.
• If you have a number of problems in your everyday life, it is possible that changing to way you think and behave can help you approach these in a different and helpful way.
• Self-help books can be very useful, but not necessarily eliminate the need for professional help. 
• Shame can be one of the main reasons why you may be reluctant to seek help, but try to remember that depression is one of the most common problems that mental health professionals work with.  You are far form alone.  A similar case can be made for talking with friends.
• Although you may need extra help, there are also many things that you can do to help yourself, or at least avoid making your depression worse by the way you think.
• Getting out of depression often takes time, effort and patience.

 Whatever judgements of ‘you’ that your emotions come up with, they are about as reliable as the weather.  The more compassionate you are with yourself, the less you will be a ‘fair-weather friend’ to yourself.  If you can stay a friend to yourself even thought depressed, you are taking a big step forward.  You’re on the way up!  

If you have any comments on this Newsletter, or would like to let others know about any mental health experience you have had, good or bad, then please let us know.  We would love to hear from you.