My Cervical Vertigo And Panic Disorder (Chapter 1)
A lot of people try to put anxiety and panic disorders into a box. You can’t do that. These so-called gurus say that anxiety is not due to a chemical imbalance and that it is all in your head due to past trauma and/or fears. They are wrong.
Yes, trauma and phobias may very well indeed be the main source of your anxiety or panic disorder, but is it the end all be all? Absolutely not.
WHERE IT ALL STARTED
I was told that growing up I hated elevators. The cramped space in a box where you don’t know where it is going, could very easily scare a four-year-old Alex. It must have been early stages of claustrophobia, which to this day, still haunted me from time to time. So it is completely warranted that my first MRI wasn’t exactly pleasant.
I ran distance track in high school and on a day of 400 repeats my lower back went out on me. Rounding the last turn on the sixth or seventh lap, I felt a stretch, a stretch, and then a pop. I fell to the ground.
It was an excruciating pain that I had clearly never felt before. I could barely walk, I couldn’t bend over, and sitting was darn near impossible.
I went to a chiropractor and did my six weeks of physical therapy before I was finally allowed to get an MRI. I thought nothing of it. Sure, I’m going to be in a tube for an hour, who cares? I thought. But about thirty minutes in, with the loud clacking, beeping, thumbing, and laser gun noises, I started to feel something.
It started off subtle, at first and it’s not like my thoughts were negative. They weren’t. But something hardwired and programmed within me started to panic.
My heart rate and blood pressure started to rise and my hands clammy. My breath picked up, so I peaked. Opening my eyes to see a white wall six inches from your face, only made it worse. I started to squirm; not exactly great for imaging.
But as quickly as it started, it began to fade. When it was all said and done, I went on with my life as if nothing happened, but unbeknownst to me, this would be the first of many to come…
(To be continued)
“I know you are tired but come, this is the way.”-Rumi
Click here for Chapter 2