28/02/2022
Reposted from
Thanks for sharing .nate 💕
One morning, as .nate stood under the studio lights, his heart was racing, he was gasping for breath and sweat was pouring out of every pore as his brain screamed "RUN!". He was having his first panic attack.
It triggered an anxiety problem he still deals with today. Here’s his story in his own words.
“In that moment I thought that my career was over — something was taking control of me without my permission or understanding, and it was preventing me from doing what made me me.”
“I more than cried — I sobbed as I grieved a loss I couldn't comprehend. But another part of my brain was intrigued — what was going, and what do we do to fix it?
“Luckily, my doctor was all over it, chatted me through my experience, prescribed a beta blocker which would help reduce my body's reactions, and maybe help me get through the stress.
“Over the next few weeks I dealt with the anxiety attacks every time I stood at the weather wall, but I learned ways to distract my brain — pressing my thumbnail into the side of my finger helped to give me something else to focus on while the meteorologist auto-pilot kicked in and I floated somewhere in-between.
“I weaned myself off the beta blockers about two months later as the anxiety attacks weakened — I had mostly severed those neurological connections fairly quickly so they hadn't become hardwired.
“But it turns out that those neural pathways still exist. I've had more panic attacks since then.
“For me, it's changed my perspective on mental health — while I appreciated that things like anxiety and depression are very much real, I had no idea about the complete lack of control you can sometimes have over your brain, nor the ways in which it can take over.
“It's a powerful tool, but when things go even slightly wrong it can be an incredible burden. I still occasionally have those feelings return– in fact, as I write, even remembering my experiences have raised my hackles a bit — but talking about my anxiety and seeking treatment mean that it's something I can live with and manage.
“And it means I can keep doing the thing I love.”
