Extreme Levels | Health And Wellness Tips

Panic Attacks Psyche Your Self

Consulting a psychologist, or a behavioral therapist for that matter, regarding panic attacks may be the best course of action you could do for yourself. That is, if you are not convinced that you can actually help your self out of your condition. But you cannot forever rely on drugs and medical practitioners to give you help. Somehow you have to take action; you have to learn to cope. Here are some ideas that could help you psyche yourself into coping with panic attacks.

You are what you think. If you think that you are fearful of something, you would actually become fearful of that thing, regardless of how irrational that fear could be. If you expect that you would have panic attacks any time soon, you might actually enter into one. The mind is so powerful that it could trigger experiences that are frightening enough to cause you extreme levels of panic sensations. With this similar capacity at your disposal, you could reverse the power of your mind and use it to your advantage.

Based on the principles of Cognitive Behavioral Therapy, a psychotherapeutic approach, a person has the capacity to manipulate dysfunctional reactions, emotions, cognitions and behaviors in order to arrive at a more cohesive and healthier well-being. Given that your panic attacks are triggered by your brain, you could help your brain tone down certain symptoms by just trying to fix its dysfunctions. While simple positive thoughts can help you direct your experience of panic attacks, more intensive and systematic Cognitive Behavioral Therapies can provide you an atmosphere of peace that is free from panic attacks.

Run towards the object of your fear. People have the natural tendency to get away from things, places and events that caused them bad experiences. But the thing is, running away from something would not help release you from your fear, it may actually aggravate your condition. This is because you are somehow reinforcing your fear by feeding in more dosages of fear to your current condition which is the last thing you should really want to do.

No matter how difficult the idea of facing your fear may seem, it is actually among the most effective ways to help you cope and overcome panic attacks. Once you confront the object of your fear or the cause of your panic attacks, you can gain more courage to subdue the symptoms without having to resort to pills and medications.

Win over yourself. Sometimes, it is much easier to accept your lack of sense of control after undergoing panic attack symptoms. One thing will lead to another until you find yourself completely powerless against your condition. Unfortunately, many people have become victimized of their own disorders only because they did not try anything to save themselves from panic-triggering episodes.

If you could try to gain power over yourself and over your symptoms little by little, you can possibly cope well with the disorder until you either have learned to effectively live with it or entirely remove it from your system.

It sometimes the self that causes people with panic attacks the most serious problems. It is also sometimes the mitigating factor to the progression of the condition and its symptoms. If you can gain some control over your own predicaments, half of the trouble is already resolved.

Chronic Fatigue Treatment Options

Patients of CFS or Chronic Fatigue Syndrome respond differently to various treatments. Some of them recover after drastic changes in lifestyle, some of them are more responsive to pharmacological treatments. Here are the most common treatment modalities to which CFS patients are subjected and to which most of them respond well.

Self-Care/Management Techniques
Some patients can facilitate self-care treatments. This can be done by monitoring the level and pacing of activities such that prolonged and extreme levels of exhaustion are prevented. This can also be done by preventing the urge to rest. Since CFS is not relieved through rest, regardless of the duration, health care professionals do not advise the patients to rest excessively. Some form of physical activity must be maintained. This is oftentimes recommended by the physician. When trying to manage the symptoms of the disorder by yourself, it is best to keep the pacing and the level of the activities under control. Otherwise, symptoms may occur at a more debilitating rate.

Cognitive Behavioral Therapy
CBT or Cognitive Behavioral Therapy is a psychological therapy that delivers relief of symptoms but not necessarily cure. This helps the patients understand their conditions and can therefore better guide them in forming their beliefs, perception and attitudes towards the syndrome. It is believed that through a more accurate depiction of the condition, the patient can better respond to the symptoms and they can cause lesser inhibition of the recurrence of their symptoms.

Graded Exercise Therapy
This therapy involves the introduction of incremental changes in the patients’ levels of activity. While concrete evidence are yet to be established, many experts believe that integration of activities is very important in managing the disease. Under this therapy then, the patient will have to monitor his own activities and exercises. As the therapy progresses, he moves to higher intensities until he gets back to the doing activities he normally participated in prior to the onset of the condition.

Pharmacological Treatments
Managements of the conditions through pharmacological treatments can involve the following medications:

Antidepressants are primarily used to manage mood swings and secondary depression. Low dosage antidepressants, on the other hand, are helpful in managing sleep disturbance and pain.

Autonomic nervous system stimulants are used to help improve concentration and short-term memory which are greatly affected by the disorder.

NSAIDs or Non-Steroidal Anti-Inflammatory Drugs are prescribed to CFS patients to relieve them from muscle and joint pains.

Anxiolyticagents are used to target symptoms of anxiety.

CAM or Complementary and Alternative Medicine
The use of dietary supplements in managing Chronic Fatigue Syndrome is central in alleviating the symptoms of CFS. According to some pilot studies, supplements of Carnitine, essential fatty acids, Magnesium and polynutrient supplements have shown strong indications of symptom reduction among patients.

Because the origins of Chronic Fatigue Syndrome are not yet fully understood, treatment options are more directed to managing the symptoms and not really in curing the disorder. The main objective in producing relief from symptoms is to reinstate the conditions of the person as well as his well-being prior to the onset of the disorder.

As a result, majority of sufferers do not fully recover and even if they do, they recover gradually. For people who expect better and faster recovery, frustrations often ensue which for most of the cases, worsen the condition. It is therefore recommended to undergo a treatment at a very slow but well-managed pace.

Chronic Fatigue Syndrome Overview

With no known definite cause, Chronic Fatigue Syndrome is a popular name for a disorder or group of disorders with varying debilitating effects on the individual which persist for at least 6 months. According to some sources, the syndrome results from an infection. As of yet though, the syndrome is not yet fully understood although it is quite a common disorder.

Onset
The onset of CFS is usually characterized by sudden occurrence of symptoms which are somewhat similar to the symptoms accompanying flu. It is believed to begin with an infection caused by non-viral and viral pathogens which trigger subsequent symptoms. In a smaller fraction of patients, the onset begins after exposure to prolonged extreme levels of stress. Thus, it is believed that CFS can begin either from high levels of stress or infection. Current studies are focused on investigating on these causation models.

Causes
Although there are no definite causes to chronic fatigue syndrome, there are however, known conditions that are closely related to the development of the syndrome. They are as follows:

1. Chlamydia pneumoniae, a bacterium which causes pneumonia and related illness.

2. EBV or Epstein-Barr virus which causes mononucleosis or the kissing disease, a very common respiratory disease that has symptoms resembling flu.

3. Onset of serious case of bronchitis and diarrhea.

4. Continuous subjection to stress, both physical and mental.

Symptoms
There are two criteria in determining the presence of Chronic Fatigue Syndrome. They are as follows:

1. Unexplainable chronic fatigue is experienced for more than 6 months and all other diseases and disorders that can lead to long term experience of fatigue have been ruled out by your health care provider. This fatigue does not root from physical exertion and cannot be relieved by rest.

2. The presence of four of the following symptoms: a) decreased cognitive function or chronic impairment of short-term memory, b) fatigue that is not relieved through rest, c) muscle pains or myalgia, d) severe headaches, e) prolonged sickness and exhaustion, f) recurring and frequent sore throat, g) joint pains without redness or inflammation, and f) abnormal lymph nodes with notable tenderness.

Treatment Options
There are several ways of managing the disorder but there is no one universal treatment option that is recommended for all patients. For some patients, dietary changes, changes in lifestyle, use of pain killers, physiotherapy, medications and Complementary and Alternative Medicine work. The most common unconventional treatment modalities are CBT or Cognitive Behavioral Therapy and Graded Exercise Therapy.

Prognosis
The average recovery rate of untreated patients is pegged at 5%. On the other hand, those patients who have received a number of treatments are 40% more likely to benefit from full recovery.

Occurrence
Due to the absence of concrete and definite parameters for identifying people with CFS, it is quite hard to determine the exact number of people who are affected by this disorder. Estimates range from 75-420 people in every 100,000 people have this disorder. Women are more susceptible to developing this disorder by 20% although there are strong indications that this disparity is due to unreported cases among men.

The syndrome occurs across all ages but is more common among people aged 40 to 59 years old. It is found across genders and ethnic backgrounds. It is also seen to run in the family.