New to anxiety and panic disorders

[CarlJUK]

Hi there everyone,

Recently i've been on edge quite alot, and am not sure whether it's a panic disorder or not. I'll just go ahead and list my symptoms;

• Fast Heart Beat
• Butterflies in Stomach, tingly sensations in stomach
• Diarrhea
• Sometimes my throat will get dry causing me drink more.
• Sometimes if I get really worried I will keep needing to urinate, after drinking tea.
• Constant worrying about health (keep finding myself searching my symtoms on the web)
• I feel hungry all the time but when it comes to eating it, I find it hard to eat
• Find it hard to sleep sometimes, if I can't relax
• Shaky Hands
• Minor Chest Pains

That's about it for now.. so am going to go ahead and give you some background details about myself

• I'm 20
• I don't smoke or drink
• I'm an Engineering Student
• Haven't suffered from any major diseases in the past
• I have a twin brother (twin does not suffer from this)
• I am short sighted, and recently had eye strain
• I am up quite late
• I am fan of heavy metal music (thrash, black, folk and death metal)
• I eat quite a lot of vegetables, but not enough fruit
• I have not really experiened anything traumatic

If there is any more you would like, I can give a response in this thread.

So am just going to tell you what's been happening. Well last week i got my glasses and was prescribed glasses, in which I now own. I also experienced eye strain which really hurt my eyes when i moved them about, it also caused me to have neck pain. The neck and eye pain are no longer with me. Whether this has anything to do with anxiety, am not really sure. As a student I'm constantly reminded about all the loans I have to pay back and loans I need in order to progress on to the next year. The price of a full year at university tends to rise each year, why is it rising? The recession isn't really doing any favours either, I mean I'm going to come out of University and probably going to be struggling to pay all the loans back, not to mention maitenance loans. So I think that what caused me to get stressed, it was only minor at first, like I only had half those symptoms listed above, now it got worst. The reason for this is that I didn't know what an anxiety or panic disorder was, I actually didn't think they'd be this effective. It's nto often you look up anxiety, stress and panic disorders at my age. Am supposed to be enjoying my life at university etc. So basically I looked up my symptoms first and I was lead to a site called "Wrong Diagnosis", i've never used or seen this website before. What it does it list possible causes and diseases you may have. As I didn't know what anxiety or panic disorders where back then, I started to believe I had deadly diseases. This mounted the stess on me even more, that evening I couldn't stop thinking about what was up with me and that I could be dying. I couldn't sleep, I started shaking, my heart was pounding, kept going the toilet to urinate. I finally fell asleep around 5am, I was awakened in the morning by a sibling preparing to work. Once I was awake I was downstairs felt quite light headed, due to the lack of sleep. Drinking tea. I was going to call my GP, but my mother and father explained to me that you're stressing out to much and all these symptoms are caused mentally. My father gave me that man to man talk, "be a man stop letting things walk all over you, if you let this happen to you, stupid things will keep sparking you to get stressed all the time, which may lead to depression". Now am scared that of getting these attacks and feel I have a disorder as I can't stop worrying. Is it ttrue that too much stress and worrying can cause an asthma? Sometimes if I do nothing and try and relax, I get aware of my heartbeat and that sometimes triggers me to get worried. I feel like as if i'm loosing control of my body... it's kind of freaking me out. I don't usually get upset, but the other day got me thinking I was going to die. Should I see my GP, ring NHS Direct? Anyone been in this sort of situation before, is it panic attacks or anxiety attacks?

Help me please.

Regards,
Carl.

[Paxiled]

Everyone feels stress.  Question is, are you emotionally anxious?  Our anxiety and panic here is quite strong, and we avoid things because of it.  We worry, we're afraid of things we're not afraid of, and we usually don't have a clue what's causing it.  As Mr. Green said, get a good medical workup, and if necessary see a therapist and find out if something is bothering you that you're not aware of.  At this point, I'd stay off the medication carousel, if it gets really bad you can consider it then.  But do something soon before you blow it up into something chronic.

[MrGreen]

Well man to man, let me say, listen to your own mind and what it is telling you. Go see a GP and begin the road to recovery. The longer you let it rest the worse it will become. It will embed itself deep within you. Taken you down further. We don't want that. We want to see you back enjoying life again, minus all the worries and pains you are going through. Could only take a small bit of medication and some talking. As simple as that to make it all go away. Anxiety has many symptoms. They differ from person to person. All yours are there in some people. Others might have a few of your symptoms. But you don't have to suffer. There are answers out there and they begin with your GP. Best of luck to you and keep us posted.