Diva, Your fellow members gave you some great responses. I can only echo them. Your panic attacks may very well be related to the physiological responses that occur in the body when we become very happy. Lorlee gave you some great advice. Trying to slow down and building your tolerance for increased states of arousal may be the way to go. Keep persevering and kudos on challenging that anxiety! Danielle _____________________ The PC Support Team

Hiya Lorlee! I just noticed you had answered too. Wow, i should pay better attention :) Thank you so much for sharing that with me. It is so comforting to me to know that I am not alone in getting this. And thanks for confirming that some of my coping strategies are the right ones, since I am not quite sure what this is I am often not quite sure how to deal with this. At least now, I am capable of realizing I am having a hyper-spazzy day and keep things under control. It took me a long time to figure that one out lol. Anyway, thank you so much for sharing your story with me it helps me tremendously to know, others have days like this too. Have a nice day! -Diva

Well seeing it that way, that it really was a success of the way i took care of myself really does make me feel better about the whole thing. Thanks for pointing that out to me :) Put a smile on my face :) Also, thanks for sharing that you get this hyper-spazzy thing too with me. I dont feel quite so alone with this. It makes me feel a lot better. Thanks again and have a nice day :) -Diva

Hi Diva, I have had many of those kind of days myself. I was diagnosed borderline manic/depressive a few years back and even though I don't seem to get it as often as I used to I can still experience an odd day or two of hyper activity. The only good thing is I sure do get alot accomplished on those days. I can usually feel the mania coming on. I get this real happy, butterfly feeling in my stomach, and my speech speeds up. I whisk around the house jumping from one chore to another. I feel so giddy inside and tend to giggle aloud. I think people must think I am a little cuckoo!! You did the right thing trying to slow down and relax. When I feel it coming on I have to force myself to recognize that the feelings are over the top and I need to settle down and focus. What can be difficult though is at times I like the feeling and all the energy I have, I swear at those moments I feel like I could do anything but of course it does not last and the coming down to reality can make me very sad and anxious. I hope some of this helps a little. ;p

Hi Diva I think you should've posted this in the success stories! You challenged your anxiety several times that day and won good for you!! As for the hyper-spazzy, I get that too and have always just thought my anxiety levels were extremley high when it happens even though I don't know why.

Thank you so much for sharing that with me. It is good to understna dthis better. And now that you wrote it plainly black on white for me it sure makes a lot of sense that happy stress is still stress and can still trigger attacks. Thank you a lot for sharing with me :) Understanding part of this helps. And knowing I am not alome being triggered by happy stress is nice to know I am not so alone in this. Now i just have to figure out the other side of the equation which is the hyper/spazzy part of this lol! -Diva

I know that stress of any kind is still stress and is experienced in pretty much the same way by your body. So even happy stress can lead to increased heart rate, etc. - which (as we all are learning through this program) our minds/bodies for some reason tend to mistakenly perceive as something scary or dangerous. So we have panic attacks. At least that is what makes sense to me, based on what I've learned here (and what I know about the effects of stress in general). I don't really get manic/hyper days randomly like you're describing, but I have had panic attacks during events and at times when (up until the attack at least) I was having a lot of fun and was totally happy - but I was under "happy" stress. I recognized this link even before I found this site and started learning what causes panic attacks and what to do about them. So you're not alone - I'm pretty sure it's normal for people with panic attacks to have them triggered by any kind of stress - positive or negative.

I didn't know where to put this post but I am not sure it is the appropriate place for it since I don't really consider all this as a setback, just another tiny bump in the road is all. But I had a very odd day. The last few weeks I have been getting a lot of very good news and that has snowballed in the last few days. First I found an honours thesis director, then came in to some very unexpected yet needed money out of nowhere, then in the last three days I learned that on three of my four classes I have not only received my grades unusually early but that they are all good grades, then today I woke up totally hyperactive and incredibly giddy which is highly unusual for me. I did some quiet stuff to try and get myself to a more stable place but then I just got going and was being super productive managing to solve many little things in one fell swoop of completely frenzied activity. Managed to contact friends and organize a get together, talk to my brother and find two project that are very artistic and intellectual for us to collaborate on, write e-mails to all my friends and family, my mom even said my e-mail was poetic and made my step-dad read it to cheer him up... Then I got the news that this job I had been aiming for, for the summer, is mine if they have the budget to hire me, so I won over all the other applicants... by then I am completely hyper and out of my mind ... It is not really anxiety but my body is still on high arousal and I know (by history this has happened to me on a semi-regular basis over the years...) that this can lead me to have a major panic attack. So I decide to take steps to take care of myself, so I watched a good movie and sat quietly. Then my hubby came home and started on supper. And then while we were eating and playing cards, yes I know odd way to do supper lol I had a panic attack. It was like a mini attack, I managed to keep it very small and hide it from my husband. I talked to myself in my head and eventually managed to start having fun playing cards again which is good since that is part of my exposure work lol. Then I went for my daily walk (also part of my exposure work). During my walk had another panic attack which I managed to keep relatively small, so I toughed it out and kept walking till I felt my anxiety go d