Hi JayDee,

 

Once you complete all the required program components then your homework will unlock automatically. Try moving farther along in the program if this doesn't work.

 

 

 

I usually only have time for the computer during meals and coffee breaks and it is lunch time. You will find a part of the program where it mentions assertive. This is different from aggressive.  Assertive is being confident and having the will power to use it. Assertive is part of taking back control. It is different in that it is aimed at yourself rather than others. Aggressive on the other hand is very negative. Assertive is being able to tell your triggers with confidence that they are wrong whether they be situations or people. If you have a core belief that says you are to be subservient then you will have trouble with being assertive and anxiety will have the upper hand. You will also have more than the average amount of triggers and have difficulty with changing thought patterns. If you have any core beliefs that tell you you are anything you would rather not be then change them. This can be hard because most core beliefs are built in the first seven years of your life so are well established. Mine were that I was ugly, stupid and no one liked me. Well they have all been proved wrong. But even then it took a lot of work to overcome believing them. 

Assertive is actually for the most part in a round about way aimed at yourself because as time goes by you will see that it is not triggers that cause anxiety and panic but how you treat them. To many cures for panic treat the symptoms only with coping skills rather than treating the cause with how you perceive the trigger. Coping skills are important but perception is more important. As is attitude and belief. These three are corner stones to getting better.

Back to work, no rest for the retired. I'm making bread, something I really like to do and something I do for me which builds confidence and pride. Just another CBT technique.

Davit.

Davit,

 

I wish I would have read your reply before I went to the grocery store. I actually made it there today. But, as with you, the bottled water I needed was in far back corner of the store. I did get the water. In my head, I kept thinking to myself, you can't take your meds without the water. Of course, I only came out of the store with enough groceries for 3 or 4 days. I am going to remember your mantra. I "want to" -whatever it is that needs to be done.Out of the 3 books I have read thus far, and this page, that has made the most sense to me aside from the breathing techniques. How simple and yet so profound.

 

JayDee

If you look close at all phobias you will see they are all or almost all sub phobias of Agoraphobia which is a fear of not having control of the situation. It manifests itself as a fear of open spaces because that is usually where you have the least control of your surroundings. Other people, noise, street lights and any number of things are not of your doing. But to get control you need some relaxation and coping skills usually in the form of distractions and one simple change to thought patterns. That change is a simple use of two words to replace two words that appear similar but are not. Replace "have to" with "want to". I "want to" gives you control, I "have to" gives the situation control. Do this for a while and the negative "have to" soon translates to "want to" because you do and the fear fades away into the background. 

An example. I used to have to take Ativan to go shopping. I would be blotto but could sort of do it even though I would often come home with just the basics and about half what I wanted. I was driving and shopping in a tunnel with only the few feet in front of me important. 

One day I got very mad. Mad is a distraction technique as long as it isn't aimed at anyone but yourself. I was sitting in front of the store and couldn't get out of the car. I was almost in tears I wanted to do this but couldn't. I didn't go home. I accepted I had a panic disorder and said what can happen. "I want my damn groceries" (taking control). So head down and playing a mantra in my head "I want to do this" over and over (distraction and positive thought) I got out of the car and entered the store. I stood there blank as I realized the tea was in the far isle. My God, I have to walk that far. No. I don't have to, I can go home or I can get the tea because I want to. Lean on a shopping cart and play the mantra in my head "I want to, I want to". That was the first time I got everything I wanted and went home not upset. Then it hit me. 

The fear. Could I do this again, could it be this simple. So next time the Ativan stayed in the car and I did it because I wanted to. And the next time it was easier till I did it without the mantra. This change of thinking has helped with everything. Recently I went for cataract surgery. With only a very minor bit of claustrophobia when my face was covered. I'm actually looking forward to getting the other eye done. Nothing bothers me any more. Everything is just an experience now. Some concern, but no fear. And life got a whole lot better. I'm probably using coping skills still but if I am they are subconscious. And that is okay. Distractions and relaxation skills are okay. This is why they are necessary before CBT. You can't use them even subconscious if you don't have them.

Good luck and remember we are here for support and information anytime you want or need it. The object is to get better.

Davit.

Thanks Davit,

 

I did use the contact us form asking for my homework to be unlocked. Hopefully soon I will have the knowledge to get through the attacks and work on the phobia.

 

JayDee

I can't remember how to unlock the homework. If you go to the bottom of the page it says "contact us" and you can ask Ashley. She is on weekends and should have answered you by now. 

I'm just a member with a lot of experience and some information acquired from my therapist that isn't common knowledge even to the extent that some of it isn't on the net. Understanding how the mind works and how it controls our thoughts and actions was an eye opener and did make doing CBT more understandable. It would seem that just changing thoughts from negative to positive would be simple enough and one could do that every time they panicked, but that is only coping not a cure. Still it is a necessary part. There is only one reason why people have panic attacks since they are not normal. It is learned. Why you have more than one and why triggers set them off is due to memory. But not just memory since a large number of past experiences influence how memory works. Mood, attitude, medication and of course the infamous core beliefs all affect how memory does its job. Getting ahead of myself. Memory is the key. How do you know how to do anything. It doesn't just happen. Memory working at the speed of light tells you how and mostly subconscious so you never realized it was doing it. till now, till I told you it was. We have an advantage over all other creatures in that we can learn by reading. Every other creature has to learn from experience. They have one advantage over us they are born with some knowledge which we are not. This is why they mature faster than we do, but they have a limited capacity to learn which we do not. We can learn from others experience. They can only learn from their own.

This ability to learn from others is a contributing factor to core beliefs. A part of memory that dictates how we think and act. How we interpret this ability to learn can make these core beliefs true or false except that either way they are always true to our thinking. So we can have very warped thoughts due to the fact we will see false thoughts as true because they have become core beliefs. A trigger sets off a core belief and the core belief dictates the action unless you change the core belief the action or thought will always be the same. This is all memory in action. What you don't realize is this thought or action goes back to memory as an update on how to handle the next thought or in the case of panic the next trigger. CBT is the process of changing the thought from memory before it becomes an action so that what updates memory is what you want rather than what it has been giving you so that next time it will give you what you want now rather than what it was giving you before.  Repetition sets it as a core belief that from then on dictates your actions and breaks the cycle. 

But this can work to your disadvantage if you have developed a negative personality. Because that is one of the influencing factors that dictates what choice memory makes from a number of choices. The memory of how to panic from a trigger never leaves memory, it just gets buried so you can still access it. Changing thought patterns may seem impossible with all these controls and checks keeping you thinking the way your mind thinks is appropriate. Especially with core beliefs being so strong. It isn't impossible but it does take some work. But just as the unwanted thoughts are strong so will be the changed thoughts and the old thoughts will have no influence unless you give them control and with the right attitude this is not likely to happen. You in fact become a changed person. Conditioned to think on the triggers in a way that you want rather than how they were. There becomes no reason to panic, so you don't because the trigger no longer calls for that action. And yes that really is what happens. A changing of thought patterns for the better.

You will lose nothing from memory, you will justreact to it different.

Davit

Davit,

Thanks again for the reply. How do I get to the CBT part? I have read two books thus far, mostly on the causes, possible causes, different scenarios and breathing techniques.I have actually stopped reading on third book which I paid the most for, because, its just mundane literature referring back to previous editions, which of course, I haven't read. I am even considering hypnosis at this point. Does anyone recommend that? I'm trying everything I can find in searches regarding holistic approaches and am keeping an open mind. I have a Dr's. appointment on 26th, but until then, I'm trying to avoid the emergency room yet again as I have been twice already this month. It makes sense that I need to change the way I think towards many situations. I just don't know how since it's programmed in my mind. How do I get my homework unlocked? I don't want to go forward on the sessions without completing that as I feel it won't give me the best results if I'm not doing the program properly and jumping ahead of myself.

 

Jaydee, 

You will find that a lot of books and sites on the net treat anxiety and panic with coping skills and relaxation techniques and they do work, but you will want to take it one step further. But they are necessary as a starting point. The program is designed to build your skills one step at a time in sequence. It is important not to skip any of it. Feel free to ask about anything you may not understand. Once you are capable of handling panic with relaxation and coping skills you will want to start changing your thought patterns. Your mind constantly upgrades so that you stay relevant with the present situation. But that relevance may not be what you need in fact since you are here it probably isn't. Your mind and memory can only deal with what you put into it. Some where along the line it has started dealing with things in a way you don't want to. There are a few reasons why, but the biggest reason is core beliefs. These are the things that dictate how when and why you do things based on past experience and information. Repetition sets them and they can become quite controlling and quite hard to change. Not all are bad. We can not function without them so we want them to not cause anxiety. These are thought patterns and if they are causing anxiety then we want to change them. There are other things that affect thought patterns but core beliefs is the biggest influence. This is just conditioning and can be changed but it does take time and conscious effort. And this might sound surprising but it needs a reason to change or it won't. Your thoughts and actions will just go on doing what they have always done because memory says that is what is appropriate to the situation. When you have a panic attack it cycles back to memory as the appropriate action for the situation and that action is what is called for the next time there is a similar situation. This is upgrading to stay relevant even if relevant is not what you want. But if you handle the panic in a positive way that positive way becomes relevant and is stored in memory as the way to deal with that and similar situations. This is CBT. Changing the way you think so situations that caused panic don't turn into attacks but are discarded as not appropriate if that is what you really want. The trigger doesn't go away, it just triggers a different reaction, a harmless one. This changing of thought patterns works then for anything similar so that improvement speeds up unless you tell it not too. Negative thinking in that case. You are already trying to do positive changes. But they won't stick in memory unless you believe they are the right action and I mean really believe because conditioning is going to want you to believe something else.

Does this make sense. There is a saying that this is the hardest simple thing you will ever do, but believe me if you do it it will also be the hardest thing to change back again and that is what brings you the freedom you want. And only CBT can do that. We call it recovery. Getting back on the right track and staying on it. And it does work. Even if you have never been on the right track. I had anxiety all my life and don't anymore unless I go looking for it. (relapses)

Davit.

Davit,

Thank you for replying. This morning, I attempted to try to start back on a normal routine. I was applying makeup for the first time since my surgery and I started having chest pains, my fingers started going numb. I had to tell myself repeatedly, its just makeup...I'm not dying, this isn't a heart attack. I did some deep relaxation breathing and I successfully managed to finish and did my hair as well. If not for that reading the first session, I would have sat around, worrying and waiting for my next attack. I didn't leave home though as I was supposed to go to the grocery. But after reading another chapter in a book a purchased in regards to coping with panic disorders, I walked to the mailbox as well...Baby steps. Now, I'm here to read some more and hopefully get this under some sense of control.

Jaydee

Josie or one of the moderators will have to unlock your homework. What do you consider having panic gone? It never actually goes away it just goes back to being appropriate. It is normal to panic during a crisis because this is a survival skill and as that it is different from a panic attack. Attacks are when panic inflates or is there when it is not necessary, and that you can change. Short term panic when you have to do something new is normal and CBT will teach you how to keep it to a very short period as a concern instead of an attack. Basically it teaches you to separate your panic and anxiety into relevant and non relevant and how to treat each. Non relevant you learn to ignore and the relevant you learn to deal with and move on which is how normal people deal with anxiety. It will also become subconscious making it pretty much unnoticed. Attacks are a lot conditioning and I could explain how and why this happens but it makes little difference because the treatment is the same. CBT is a process of changing thought patterns so you think and see in a way that prevents attacks from happening. You can have relapses so the last stage of training is to cause triggers so you can see how and if you can handle them. You will get to the point where nothing conscious or subconscious  bothers you as anything more than a mild nuisance. A person who has had panic attacks always has the potential to have another. CBT makes them minor or as can happen, not a concern. 

I have gone from very messed up to very calm in situations that should cause panic. It isn't blocked like medication does, everything is noticed it just is separated into important and not important. And the important gets dealt with without panic.

The unimportant is noticed, is interesting but nothing worth panicking over anymore.

Davit