Panic Ataack!!! :0

I had only heard the words panic attack when I was younger, but as I grew up, people I knew started complaining of having anxiety or panic attacks. At first, I thought they were probably just being drama queens, stressing out too much about something and calling it a panic attack. However, a close friend of mine who used to suffer from depression and frequently got panic attacks explained the whole situation to me. She said that it came out of nowhere. You could literally be happily eating with a group of friends and get a panic attack. She said she found it suffocating and scary. Last year, another close friend of mine had her first panic attack. She's someone who has a lot of things in common with me, just a normal girl away from home. She isn't easily stressed and she wasn't even going through anything. She said she felt very suffocated and had to step outside. She couldn't speak and wanted to burst into tears, which was the first thing she did when she got home. When it happened with her, that made me think. I guessed that it really could happen to anyone, at any time or in any situation. I got through my first panic attack yesterday. I had a Statistics exam but trust me, I wasn't too worried about it. I had studied pretty well and I'm not one to stress too much. I also had an interview for an internship right after my exam. I was kinda nervous about the interview since it had been a long time since I had gone through an interview. I had woken up at around 6 am since I had to get to work at 7(I know, super early!), I went to two of my classes and I had the exam right after that. As soon as I got my paper, before I even read any of the questions, my heart started beating super fast. I read through the questions and figured out the solutions and I pretty much forgot about getting scared. This was super strange for me because I never stress especially not right before an exam. Anyway, I went through the exam and realized some of the questions were harder than I anticipated. I would have appreciated if the Professor had given like a 10-minute warning since I don't have a watch but he waitedpractically until the last second to tell us that time was up. As soon as he said that, I quickly scribbled some random answers onto the paper and handed it to him. Before I realized it, my heart was beating super fast. I could literally feel it in my chest. My friends were asking me about the exam and I found it hard to talk. Somehow, I managed to tell them that I had to leave. The computer lab that I work at is in the same building as the class so I rushed up there. I assumed that I was feeling panicky because I didn't do well in the exam. I went over my answers even though I couldn't think straight. I went to the restroom and saw that my hands were shaking. Only then did I realize that I was having a panic attack. I googled how to calm myself down after a panic attack. I closed my eyes, took deep breaths and realized my hands weren't shaking so badly. It was hard to describe what my mind felt like. It kinda felt suffocated, like I couldn't think about anything clearly. That was pretty bad considering I had an interview in an hour. Why me? Why today? I questioned myself over and over again. In hopes of calming myself down, and also so as to not have my stomach growl during the interview, I ate a few spoonfuls of food. I put on some makeup with my not too steady hands, put on my blazer and walked with my headphones on to the interview. Thankfully, by the time I reached there, I was calm enough to give some sensible enough answers. After the interview, I did feel relieved and a lot better. But I still wasn't back to normal. The walk back home felt like an outer body experience and I wanted to scream into a pillow. However, after talking to my friends, getting some food into my system and after watching a ton of satisfyingly calming cake decoration videos, I 'm back to normal! Now that I think of it, I guess I might have been stressing out without even knowing it myself. I had my exam, the interview and a few events with my organization that could have led to my panic attack. However, the good thing is that I got through it. I also know that it could happen anywhere, at anytime and I need to find ways to calm myself down should that happen again.

#panicattack #school #thestruggleisreal #stress