Anesthesia-Induced Anxiety?

[confused1597]

Hi everyone, I had a minor surgery done on the area of skin above my left rib to have a cyst removed about 1.5 months ago now, and they put me under the lightest narcotics possible. I was out for 3 hours longer than anticipated, and my heart rate was at 37 bpm (dangerously low). It's been decided that I have both low heart rate and blood pressure explaining why I get dizzy when I stand up, but in the past month I've had several unexplainable "freak outs" (not sure if I want to say panic attacks or not). They've been brief but I've never experienced such a loss of control of my mental state and it's quite frightening. Maybe anxiety is just starting now or maybe it's after-effects of the anesthesia; either way, I guess what I really want to know is how to deal with it and get myself to calm down?
THank you

[robbertray]

I had medically induced panic attacks after I had 3 surgeries in less than 2 weeks.  It started less than 2 weeks later when I was driving down the interstate.  I pulled over @ truck stop because I had to urinate & felt stoned.  Since the surgeries were urological in nature I thought that might have been why I felt so weird.  When I stopped the car & started to get out I noticed my heart was going very fast.  As I walked to the bathroom I felt as though I was floating, hands were sweaty, skin was clamy, fingers/feet were tingling & I had a feeling of being detached.(ex-My sunglasses felt they were floating out in front of my face.)  I got out of bathroom, felt same way, & knew something was wrong.  I stayed calm because my chest wasn't hurting that bad, I wasn't having breathing problems, & all worring about it would do was make it worse.  I asked the girl @ counter to call an ambulance.  I was so calm she asked if I was joking.  She called & lucky for me there was a EMT working there.  We sat down & he checked my pulse while we waited on ambulance.  180bps.  The fact he sat there with me & had an AED helped me even feel more calm.  My heart slowed down to about 160bps while we waited for a few minutes.  A firetruck got there 1st & my pulse was still in the 160's.  I explained about the sugeries & that nothing like this had ever happened to me before.  When the ambulance got there(all of them were there in less than 10min) they hooked me up to an EKG & my pulse had slowed to the 150's.  We all talked & as the EMT had said they all thought I was probably having an anxiety attack.  After about 30min my heart rate was still in the 120s.  Obviously they wanted to take me to hospital, but since I only had VA I didn't know if they would pay for Ambulance that far from VA.(45miles)  We talked some more. I told them I hadn't been thinking or worried about anything when all of this started & that I was just driving down the road listening to music.  The head of the Emergency Responders said it could be some kind of subconscious anxiety attack.  It made sense to me, & sense the ELG was fine, I signed a waiver & just drove to the VA.  When I got there my bps was still in 120's.  They went through heart attack protacol & said the same thing as Emergency Responders.  Their offical diagnosis - Subconscious Anxiety.  They had me believeing that buy after awhile it became apparent that they were wrong.  They gave me some anxiety medicine then & some for later. The only problem was the attacks were always put of the blue.  Who wants to take anxiety medicine all the time when it makes you feel like crap.  I tried to deal with them as they happened by using medicine only as needed, using breathing technics, & stay calm knowing they would pass.  I talked with my doctor, other doctors, a phycologist, & even looked it up on internet.  It took me about a month but I finally started asking it being knocked out so many times in a short period of time could cause anxiety attacks.  The VA doctors & some others said no but most doctors & even anesthesiologist said it was possiable.  They said if it was they should start to go away & that that time frame can be different for everyone.  Sure enough the further I got away from the surgeries the less severe & less often they occured.  The VA docs said it was probably because I was thinking about the surgeries less & less.  Since I had told them I didn't think about them in a negative way they told me they were subconcious.  We'll a few months later I had to be knocked out again & "BAM" the attacks severity & frenqency got worse.  I went a year with no more procedures or surgeries & the attacks had pretty much went away.  Had to have a test done that required anesthesia & "BAM" here we go again.  A few months later I got sick & ended up in ER that required me to have another dose of anesthesia for a procedure.  Shocked I hadn't got addicted to anxiety medicine but I knew to only take it when really needed.  Start with the smallest amount & take more if needed instead of taking an entire dose everytime.  So a year & half later after the start of the anxiety, I am in a regular hospital thinking I am going to die.  Had to have a feeding tube put in me.  I got knocked out several times in few months so that made it worse.  The only good thing about that was when I went to leave the hospital they were going to send me home on Phentenol patches when I had an allergic reaction.  We'll guess what?  Phentenol is used in anesthesia.  I will never forget the doctor saying it was wierd that I was alergic to Phentenol but not anesthesia.  I was but nobody figured it out until that moment.  Official Diagnosis - CHEMICALLY INDUCED ANXIETY.  That frigging long for them to figure out what my mind & body had already told me.  Subconcious anxiety attacks with 160-180bps when you are just laying around, not doing anything, not thinking about anything, out of the blue is a croc.  Since they changed the anesthesia I haven't had to start all over with the severe attacks.  There are normal anxiety attacks that are similar but generally those are also accompanied by nervousness especially when severe.  Sorry for long story but only way to explain what caused it, how it feels, & how to tell.

[allmymarbles]

If you are suffering a panic attack and have no medication, put your hands in a bowl of ice, or frozen peas and the like. keep your hands in until they hurt. This will help cut the attack short.

[jjswartz_1]

I work in Anesthesia as an Anesthesia Assistant.  What kind of Anesthesia did you have?  Just local anesthesia and sedation?  How old are you? Are you taking meds?

Sounds like you have Orthostatic Hypotention which explains your symptoms.  I would be very surprised if anything Anesthesia related was the cause of you panic attcks.  Any medications given during your procedure are metabolized and gone from your system by now.

I think that the panic attacks warrant a visit to the doctor.  I think the cardiac and anxiety are 2 different issue?

I AM NOT A DOCTOR ----THIS IS MERELY MY OPINION

[ColleenToQuit]

Since I'm not a doctor I'm not sure what is causing your panic attacks, but since your attacks are brief I'm not sure Xanax will help unless you can anticipate an attack about 10-15 min before it's going to happen.  Luckily there is a quick and easy way to reduce your anxiety levels and panic during an episode without medication.

What you do when you feel the panic attack come on is to bear down as hard as you can like you're constipated and trying to produce a bowel movement.  At first your anxiety levels may rise, but hold in there because soon after you will feel a relief of your panic/anxiety.  The reason this works is because you're triggering your vagas nerve to reset your body functions such as heart rate and breathing telling your brain that the fight or flight mechanism is not needed.

If you want to prevent these attacks and have been experiencing them for more than a month I would suggest you see a doctor or psychiatrist if you haven't already.  There are medications that prevent the attacks from even happening such as Buspar, SSRIs, and SNRIs.  The latter two are antidepressant medications, but they also treat anxiety and panic disorders as well.  Also, on the plus side these medications have no potential for tolerance, abuse, or addiction as benzodiazepines do; however  benzodiazepines do have their benefits when used sparingly.

[allmymarbles]

At one time I suffered from high cortisol. This caused panic attacks (not every day, but sporadically). A horrible experience. My doctor put me on the lowest dose of Xanax and told me to take it only as needed. It worked beautifully, with no side effects, I even found I could manage on only half a pill. My panic attacks decreased, as did my use of Xanax.There was no dependence or addition because of the low dose and erratic use.