I just want to get this off my chest: I have panic disorder and it is in FACT a Mental Illness. (When I am not on meds) It is very debilitating, and before I got put on meds it severely impacted my function at school (which i had to come home many days) and social life (which it did not let me have) and work (in which I got fired from). Panic disorder is hardly ever taken as seriously as it ought to be. If you've never had a true panic attack, its impossible to understand. They say it can last "up to 10 minutes"... Try 2 weeks, nonstop , only sleeping 1 hour at a time and when wake up within 5 mins, panic attack continues, throwing up everything you try to eat. Yeah. It's a mental illness.