Overreactivity

Today’s Rating (5/10 – average).
Tested: 24 times.
Panic Attacks: 3

I’m debating on whether I want to give today a higher rating because I did actively apply something I’ve been trying to get myself to apply now for a while, I’ll stick with what I have now, though, because I also applied some pretty bad principles too.

I have discovered over time that diet plays a large role in my problems with anxiety (I have a minor case of reactive hypoglycemia), and so when a panic attack is about to hit, often a can of coke will bring me out of it (if it’s related to low sugar, which it sometimes is). The problem, as you can imagine, is that a can of coke will spike the blood sugar, causing it to rise, and fall again as the body begins to self-regulate; and for me, it falls too far too fast. Shortly (within 15 minutes), I’m back in the anxiety again, but this time possibly far worse. It’s a horrible roller coaster with, seemingly, no way to win. The answer, just as I was afraid, is to actually ride the wave a bit and to let the body self-regulate (well, the actual answer is to simply stay away from high-carb/sugar foods in the first place).

And today, actually, about an hour ago, I did just that – I sat through a panic attack which was (according to my monitor) related to lower than normal blood sugar levels. The body self-regulated shortly (the exact mechanisms by which it does this is beyond this post, but it is interesting), and I was feeling better. The key, however, is that this time I felt better naturally, in lieu of artificially. A major problem with this disorder, then, is the over reactiveness of the sufferer – to reach for things (behaviors, foods, etc) as an ailment when, in fact, these things are actually making the problem worse.

But we all have encountered this, haven’t we?

When we’re stressed, some of us reach for a cigarette, others reach for a sweet, some reach for alcohol, some reach for sex; the list goes on and on and on. The reality is that we, as humans, are so afraid of being uncomfortable and demand so viciously that we absolutely not have it, that we overreact in the event we do have it and fail to recognize that it’s sometimes the body’s way of telling us something: the patterns to which you’ve attached yourself are not working, find something else. We look for the safe, immediate, quick fixes; and often those very things cause us more trouble.

Today was a minor victory in that I’m learning to trust my body a bit, although it does come at a cost: I’m using a lot of sugar strips while monitoring it. I hope that slows down as I start to gain a bit of faith in my body on this matter.