I'm a bit depressed and sad today, Byzantine, but otherwise I am doing fine. Thank you for asking!

Thank you all so very, VERY much for all of your insight and information. I am processing it slowly because this is such a deeply troubling issue for me and my energy has been pulled everywhere else lately.

All of what you've said about panic/anxiety attacks being controllable, at least to a certain degree, rings really true with me. It's really hard for me to realize that and act on it because, once the attacks are gone, where is my excuse for failure? For not being able to do things? If I don't have a problem then what is keeping me from being perfect? Just myself. Which means I'm not good enough.

Oh my God. I thought I'd gotten over all of that. o.O Talk about your spur-of-the-moment revelations.

It's true though. I've been trying really hard to better monitor my attacks in the past month or so and I've also been trying to control/lessen them with different thoughts, breathing, that sort of thing. I can't quite do it yet--whenever I try I get a few moments of calm and then it spikes back up, almost like it's snapping back at me for trying to control it and the buildup is released. But I realized during the attack I had on Mother's day that my other emotions (my "real" emotions, like a normal amount of frustration, sadness, and hurt) were making it a lot harder to control and I was in effect making the attack worse. Huh.

Araya, what you experience sounds almost exactly like what happens to me! My mind isn't really clear, though; while I mostly keep a handle on my thoughts, my mind goes kind of blank and fuzzy, like there is static made of barbed wire and awfulness churning around in my head. I have thoughts like, "Oh God this is so awful, I have to do (whatever), what is wrong with me..." that sort of thing, but I'm not exactly clear-headed. ^.^