Intimidating Panic Attacks
Trying to find a win in the judgmental fire
The thing they don’t tell you about panic attacks is the shame you feel after you have had one. Especially when someone you don’t know witnesses it and, after you try to get the words out as to why you are having one, they give you an exhaustive look like you’re being dramatic.
I had a full blown panic attack yesterday afternoon.
It’s been awhile since I’ve had one but when it came I wasn’t surprised. Just 5 minutes earlier I was getting bombarded with text messages asking if I was ok. I was in the process of getting ready to go out for the evening when the steady stream of pings came through on my phone. Confused, I responded I was ok and inquired why there might be a reason as to why I shouldn’t be. That is when one of my friends said there was a fire and they wanted to make sure my house, and I by extension, was ok. I went out my front door and saw nothing. I turned around and walked through my house to step out my back door and that is when I saw the flames and felt the heat of a fire raging across the back alley from me. As I ran out repeating “no no no no no no no not again” that’s when the wheezing started and my chest tightened. My essential tremor went into high gear and sent my entire body into convulsions making it that much harder to send a text message to make sure other neighbors were aware and were ok because I knew I wasn’t alone in my reaction. As I was trying to navigate this, another neighbor, whom I don’t know (not uncommon; sad but not uncommon) caught my eye and I immediately tried to explain why I was freaking out because I understood how ridiculous this might appear. “I was here three years ago” was what I remember blurting out and at that moment, I could see the impatience in his face as he told me to “just take a deep breath” and walked away.
I don’t blame him, honestly.
Here is a fire happening, that has not reached my house and has no effect on me other than proximity, and here is this woman having a full blown panic attack steering attention away from what really mattered. If I were him, I might be a little impatient too. But it was happening and, thankfully, as my fellow neighbors who went through the same experience three years ago approached, we hugged each other tight and cried together. All having the same feeling of “not again.”
PTSD is a motherfucker. Not going to sugarcoat it. You try your best to “deal” with it and, just when you think you’ve got a handle on it, it reminds you of its presence. The attack surprised me more than anyone. It had been since the lock downs since I had one like that and I consider myself “stronger,” “more resilient” than that because that’s what I am supposed to be, right? I’m the one who is supposed to be there for everyone else. I’m the one who “figures it out” time and time again. I don’t have time for panic attacks and have a good handle on everything.
Clearly, though, that is not the case sometimes.
Once my nervous system started to regulate and my breathing eventually settled, I did fall naturally into that role - advising everyone around me to practice their own version of self care once the fire was under control and things were wrapping up telling one neighbor to go sit with a glass of wine and another one to devour a chicken box. I then went back into my house, calmed myself down, and pushed myself out the door to go to the show I was getting ready for previously. I was exhausted, but I made it and I was glad I did. It gave me a much needed reset to my nervous system (live music really does soothe the soul).
It got me thinking though… This was the third thing to happen in a string of bullshittery over this past week. One other instance kept coming to mind as I replayed my neighbor’s reaction to my panic attack. It was an incident at my day job that bothered me and my coworkers that occurred just a few days earlier. As a meeting was wrapping up, a male colleague who is at the same management level as me thought it was the right time to inform me that members of his staff are “afraid of me;” that I am “unapproachable and intimidating” and suggested I examine my attitude and work to change it.
…..
There’s a certain visceral reaction that women have to hearing that they are “intimidating” because we hear it so much if we hold any sort of decision making role. Our bluntness and directness get labeled as intimidation. Our show of strength is seen as overbearing. Yet when we show perceived weakness, we are painted as “attention-seekers,” “over dramatic,” and “weak.” It’s exhausting trying to just exist sometimes because we are truly damned if we do and damned if we don’t. I didn’t expect anyone to help me yesterday because I wasn’t the one in serious harm and, quite honestly, I am so accustomed to living this life on my own that I figure out how to get myself back to center each time. But the cumulative events of this week make me realize more than ever that sometimes we truly can’t win with some people. That no matter what we do or how we act their reaction to us will still remain not worthy and what we need to remember is that is their problem. Sure, sometimes I can be dramatic on both sides of the spectrum and I own that in a lot of ways, but we have a society that puts too much onus on everyone else to fix the way the present themselves to the world rather than be focused on how we react to all that because at the end of the day that is what we can control. We control how we feel and react to the world around us, so why not root that in kindness and empathy rather than judgement and slight?
As my neighbors and I hugged each other in the alley as the fire was burning, we were reminded that there is still community and people out there who do lead with kindness. After everything settled, we started to focus on helping out where we could and just merely taking space for those that need it as they try to put their lives back together. Because that is what is going to keep us moving forward. Not judgement but kindness. If you want to see change, start there. You never know who is going to need it.