De-escalating Panic Attacks

A panic attack is the sudden onset of intense anxiety, terror, or impending doom. Some people, but not all, feel a tightening of the chest, racing heartbeat, dizziness, difficulty breathing, fluttering heart beat, numbness in their limbs, temporary paralysis, or an inability to speak. Panic attacks come on suddenly and seemingly without warning. When experiencing a panic attack, the 3 3 3 rule helps to quickly reduce the anxiety enough to allow for the brain to function and other tools to come on board. The 3 3 3 rule for anxiety is to name 3 things you can see, 3 things you can hear, and 3 parts of your body. This will diffuse the panic attack for about 60 seconds. I know 60 seconds does not sound like a lot of time, but it is just enough time to get other tools on board.

Once we dip out of panic attack mode, and are at the place of feeling acute anxiety but not panic, we can use a number of different coping skills to deescalate to the place of mental safety and calm. Most panic attacks are triggered by a feeling of helplessness and impending doom. It is very rarely that our lives are at risk of falling completely apart. It is also very rarely that we have 0 control of ourselves or our lives. This is important to keep in mind when de-escalating a panic attack. Panic and anxiety are liars. Whatever peril your panic attack presents you to be in, it is not as bad or as permanent as it may seem when in a panicked state of mind. We need the space for objectivity to come on board. Everything we do is about creating space for our objective mind to regain control.

Once we have done the 3 3 3 method to derail the panic attack, we then move on to other calming and grounding practices. The strongest grounding practices will be ones that demonstrate that we are safe while distracting our mind. Some techniques that have worked for my clients are counting backwards from 1,000 or saying the alphabet backwards. It needs to be a task that requires thought and reflects safety. Being able to count backwards from 1,000 indicates that you have time. It takes a few minutes to complete the task. If you can take a few minutes to complete a task then the urgency of now that your panic attack is trying to create does not hold true. Very few people have things in their lives that they cannot pause for 2 to 3 minutes. De-escalating anxiety takes practice and a strong sense of self. If these tools do not work, it indicates that you may have a serious panic or anxiety disorder, and you should seek the help of a professional.