Health related information and news from around the world.

Why meditation?

As I have been discussing throughout the book, our recovery depends upon learning to manage our anxiety and attacks ourselves. Understanding and accepting our disorder are the first two steps to taking the power back. Learning to manage the attacks and anxiety are the third and fourth step.

This chapter will look at meditation; what it is and why it works. In the next chapter two different meditation techniques will be described.

Managing them means we need to follow a disciplined approach to a formal relaxation program. At first glance some people hesitate. Although they want to recover they don’t like the idea of having to become disciplined in their approach to relaxation.

Meditation can become a superior relaxation technique if it is practised daily. In one way, ‘having to relax’ is a contradiction to the practice itself, but many of us find we reach the stage where we do it because we want to, not because we have to.

*62\94\8*

Cynthia

Cynthia had panic disorder but didn’t avoid anything. She went to work and did everything she had to do, but it was very difficult. She went to see a specialist, although she had to wait five months for an appointment. When she got there he was three hours late. He finally arrived, but didn’t apologise for keeping her waiting. Although Cynthia had an hour appointment, it only lasted for twenty minutes. She told the specialist about the panic attacks and he kept asking her what she was scared of. Cynthia kept telling him she was always scared and anxious that she might die from the attacks. The specialist kept saying she had to be scared of something and Cynthia wasn’t sure what he was getting at. In the end she said she had always been scared of elevators, but that was long before the panic attacks started. The specialist told her to go into the foyer and get into an elevator and go up and down in it until her anxiety disappeared. With that he finished the appointment and told her to book another with his secretary. She was so confused and angry she never went back.

Alice, Toni, Carlie

Alice asked the local discussion group what she should do about her therapist, who always went to sleep during her appointments. Toni and Carlie looked at her and told her their therapists always went to sleep too. It didn’t take long for them to realise they were talking about the same therapist. When the group asked them why they didn’t speak to him about it or try and find another therapist, the three of them said he was obviously very tired and they didn’t want to hurt his feelings.

*44\94\8*

Medication

Drugs are another control people use. The risk of dependence on drugs is well researched. Medication is one of the main treatments for the disorder, yet the anxiety and panic attacks can blast through our ‘chemical calm’. In many cases the dosage is increased, either by ourselves or by our doctor. When attempts are made to withdraw from the medication, anxiety and panic attacks can return in full force, along with withdrawal symptoms. In an effort to stop the increased anxiety, panic attacks and symptoms of withdrawal, some people will continue with the medication and become trapped in the cycle of dependence.

Depression

With little or no effective treatment many people may develop a major depression in reaction to their disorder. Until recently this depression was also seen as a primary condition. Although steps were taken to treat the depression, the primary cause—the anxiety disorder—was rarely considered, let alone treated.

*25\94\8*

It is the lack of diagnosis and the lack of adequate treatment services which is the driving force behind the development of the secondary conditions of these disorders. Although the symptoms of panic disorder were first noted in the 1800s (Boyd et al. 1991), panic disorder was only classified as a separate anxiety disorder by the American Psychiatric Association in February 1980 (APA 1980). As a consequence there was little understanding of it, not only by the people who suffer from it, but by the health professions generally. Many people have developed secondary conditions such as agoraphobia, major reactive depression, and drug and/or alcohol abuse.

The development of major depression can lead to suicide. According to one American study, 26.5 per cent of people who experience panic disorder will attempt suicide. People who have not been diagnosed as suffering from panic disorder, but who nevertheless experience panic attacks, are seven times more likely than the general population to attempt suicide (Malison et al. 1990). Other studies confirm that 10-40 per cent of people with an alcohol dependence had an anxiety-related disorder before their dependence developed (Cox et al. 1990).

The recognition of the sometimes severe disabilities associated with anxiety disorders has seen the inclusion of the more severe forms of panic disorder, obsessive compulsive disorder and social phobia into the category of serious mental disorder

(Andrews 1994). This is not to say people with severe disorders have a serious mental illness. Rather it is the recognition of the extreme disablement caused through the disorders.

*9\94\8*