panic attacks and anxiety.

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hi-. . . . . i have been wondering whether other people with Asperger's have panic attacks and high levels of anxiety. i do.

i stay indoors a lot to avoid going out, as i find walking down the street to be stressful; mainly from the noise of other people, rather than traffic, and from the random and unsaviourary behaviour of other people. i dislike being around other people, and spend most of my life alone. i ironically have claustrophobia, so have to go out at some times.

i would imagine that people with Asperger's have a higer predisposition of suffering with anxiety in some form, since they would find many 'normal' things to be stressors, but the actual symptoms seem to get less of a mention. i get panic attacks, and use to have nervous breakdowns each holiday from school- as i found being around other people so stressful throughout term that i would just collapse each easter/summer/christmas etc.
though i live alone and mix very little now, i still get exhausted from speaking to people simetimes, though at the time will appear outwardly normal.

what are other peoples' experiances? how do you cope??

Oh honey that sounds tough.

I don't have an asd but i know that anxiety is common.

Cognitive Behavioural Therapy might be able to help, as can chinese medicines such as acupunture and reflexology, although those require going out and being touched. Medication might also be an option.

I hope you can find a way round this.

thanks- i have tried cbt and thought it was the most illogical thing on the face of the planet! how can getting me to write down - on a scale of one- to-ten etc - how stressed im feeling if i the emotions im feeling equal- im facing death?? which is what panic attacks are-a flight or fight response to imminent danger. my Asperger's thinking does not allow me to retrain my though processes in that way at all! most annoying.

I used to get panic attacks every day when I was at school. And I still get really anxious about going out and being around people. I'm quite heavily medicated now, which helps, although it does depress my mental abilities somewhat. I don't really cope that well, but I find that as long as I have a way out of the situation, I'm not so bad. If I'm stuck in a crowd and I can't get out, I'm pretty much beyond help. If I'm stuck in a crowd but I can see the exits, I'm ok. That's the only advice I can give.

g'day- and thank you, too. i am at least glad to know im not alone. i am always surprised to read of other people with Asperger's having jobs and relationships and comparativly normal lives; it is so difference to my experiance. i feel quite locked up by it- shackled. lots of the things one reads are very positive; the nagative side of feeling imprisioned by it seems to be downlpayed, so i cannot guage whether only a minority of people are so affected, or it is not mentioned.

it seems surprising that people who have sensativity to sensory stimuli, or are stressed around other people, or confused by group conversations etc should not have high sterss levels. i dont have breakdowns anymore- thankfully, but then i have no social life either- its a poor trade off.
even going to the supermarket can cause panic attacks...
sorry you are having side effects from your medication- can you not try somethnig else? that is also no way to live.....

I used to get panic attacs a lot, not anymore since I've been taking anti-anxiety meds though. I still do get anxious at times but comparing to what I used to go through it feels like a walk in the park.

Yes, I think the sensitivity to stimuli does cause high stress levels. I think there are probably quite a few people on here who get stressed by these things. I'm sorry you feel shackled by your anxiety - I used to feel like that too. But I actually do have a somewhat normal life these days. I have a job and everything (in a library). I can't try new medication - I'm on it for reasons other than anxiety. But I'm gradually coming off it.

thank you anna banana, and animal. good luck coming off the meds- i have always been too scared to try anything, as i have seen some reall bad effects in friends. my dream job used to be to work in the british library- and when i was young i used to sneak into the local universitry one and read the most obscure tomes! and i am still a very bookish person!

I haven't had many panic attacks at all, but I went through many years of almost constant anxiety.

It's a lot better these days, though I didn't seem to do much to fix it. The worst one was when I got into some big fights at work with a couple of management bullies. I was shaking most of the time, barely able to concentrate, couldn't even get my thoughts straight to summarise my defense. My GP was utterly useless - he tried to fob me off by saying that the world was a cruel place and that I had to just get back in there and fight back. I got angry with him and he offered me some sedatives, so I took those. Better than nothing I guess.

Even my partner seemed completely unsympathetic, and continued to put pressure on me as if there were nothing wrong with me. I think it was only the sedation that allowed me to survive her verbal tirades, it was kind of screening me off from her attacks.

But the tablets didn't help apart from that, they just made me feel weird. Luckily the problems at work went away - the bullies couldn't break through my defenses, and eventually one of them took early retirement because he couldn't stand his job any more, the other was moved to a position where she can't do so much damage. It seems that the management had received so many complaints about them that they had to step in - though it was all done without anybody admitting to any wrongdoing.

That was the worst time of my life for anxiety, and the cause was pretty clear - it was natural for me to be scared, those bullies wanted my job on the line. But I've often been more scared of losing my job than I've needed to be, and I began to see that I had a kind of morbid fear about that.

These days I get a lot less trouble from anxiety, though I used to spend ages noticing this or that peculiar mental "loop" of anxious thought, and wondering why I was doing that. I told myself I needn't worry so much, but it took me years to improve. I think it may need that repeated reassurance before it does any good. Probably carries more weight coming from a friend.

I have little direct advice for fellow sufferers, because I don't know if I got better or if it was just the world around me that got better. If you can share your fears with a sympathetic friend, that must be good. I never had that. If you can identify what thoughts are recycling your anxiety, that's helpful. But knowing how silly the thoughts are doesn't necessarily ease anything very quickly. Cognitive therapy might help, replacing negative thoughts with positive ones. Try to determine if there's a real threat or not. I always feel tons better when I finally get off my butt and implement my defense - nothing's worse than brooding over a threat without lifting a finger to intervene.

I took a fairground ride once - the scary kind - I couldn't enjoy it because I thought I'd get killed through an accident, but once it was done, it was as if I'd used up all my adrenaline, and I felt great for an hour or two.

There were physical exercise techniques to reduce the muscular tension, but I was usually too nervous to attempt them properly, feeling I had to get on with some "proper work" so that my world wouldn't collapse.

My longest-lived anxiety pattern revolved round the idea that I'm going to finish a task too late or make a fatal mistake, and let somebody down - usually an authority figure. Often I would see an ocean of tasks I hadn't started, and was afraid while doing one task that all the others would get forgotten.

Often I just didn't know why I was anxious - but honest introspection can often give valuable insight into the ideas that trigger the anxiety, and sometimes the cycle can be broken. Often I could only see the cause years after the events.

One of the nice things I read was that people who have suffered anxiety problems can turn out to be the bravest people, I guess that's because they're used to the feeling and have developed coping strategies.

hi- thanks so much for that. well done for coming through it. ive been bullied at work,a nd very badly at school,. but it only made me depressed and quiet.

my general life- anxiety is really different to yours.
if i sit in a cafe, or bus or somewhere. sometimes i can block people out, but most of the time it feels like lots of small children are surrounding me, screaming and fighting and crying; the noise is painful and they are all demanding my attention. and because they are so small, i cant hit or shout. sometimes it is worse, feeling like large, fat, semi naked people are breathing and sweating on me, shouting too. i dont mean it feels like that- but that wuold be the level of annoyance and revulsion a normal person would feel- i want to scream and hit them off me- i want quiet.
but it is generally hard to explain, and i just want to run for cover, and hide in bed, in the dark, indoors. like avoiding hail.
when i used to work, or go to school or uni, id get hyper, then depressed, then stressed, then have a breakdown. just fom mixing with people.

Until very recently, I used to get panic attacks every day, sometimes up to 5 times a day. But I've started taking Anafranil, and it has literally changed my life. It is the only thing I've ever tried that has helped my OCD and has helped my panic attacks. I stiil get panic attacks when there's an extremely stressful situation, but I no longer get them for silly things (like waking up with one). Sometimes, my panic attacks are due to AS (change in routine; lack of sameness), but they usually are associated with my OCD. I started having panic attacks when I was three; the first time I can distinctly remember the feeling of one was at age five. Thus, I never knew any better, so I quickly learned to cope with the symptoms because that was all I ever knew. I just assumed that everybody had that level of anxiety.
-OddDuckNash99-

I have had some pretty severe anxiety attacks in my life. However, since I've been married, I haven't had any. I think the reason is, I have a husband who's always around, and whenever I start getting stressed I talk to him about it. He's very good about simplifying, reminding me it's really not a heart attack (cause it sometimes feels like that), and calming me.

I think if you can find one person in your life who is always going to be around for you, and just call them up, that's enough. Maybe next time you can call your mom, or other relative, or a friend? It really does help to talk things thorugh.

Anxiety has been something that has followed me since childhood. I have also experienced panic attacks mostly as an adult. I don't take any medication to help, though a lot of people require it. As an adult, I have learned to recognize the onset of the anxiety & possible anxiety attack & "talked" myself down from them. Last one I had was induced by an energy drink. I love them, but they are not worth the crazy anxiety so I quit drinking them.

hi- thanks for all your replies. i, too only found out about Asperger's in the last year, though i had realised several years ago that the problem i have with other people was they are just other people. its not really a phobia, as such- i get wound up if i hvae to work in the same room as other poeple,a nd used to get really angry when my parents would come in to watch tv in the same room as me, when i was growning up. we had a large house, so it was not always an issue; i mostly hid in my room.
thanks for all your replies!