Anxiety Attack?

On Sunday of December 16, 2018, I had a strange and very unusual experience that had me request an ambulance.

I was enjoying my favorite junk food meal that I usually consume on my “cheat day”, which is on every Sunday. It’s an unusual meal that consists of a lot of hot sauce, some lemon and lots of pink salt.

As I was eating, I was watching Doctor Strange for the first time. I’ve been watching the Marvel Cinematic Universe films and shows in order.

Anyway, I don’t want to spoil the movie but in the scenes where Doctor Strange is struggling to cope with his damaged hands, his experiences and the look of his hands made me feel very disgusted. Disgusted enough to lose my appetite of one of my most favorite meals.

So I paused the movie and went to the kitchen. As I laid the bowl with some of my food almost done, I start feeling even worse. So bad that I had to sit down on the nearest chair on the dining room table.

I was starting to feel exactly how I felt when I had my blood work at the clinic 2 years ago. I even went blind, just the same.

I called for my mother, hardly able to call on her as my voice was very weak. I had to call her twice. I asked for some lemonade. Of course, she immediately started to panic as she saw me laying my head on the table and sounding weak.

She then tried calling my aunt with no luck until she texted her. I couldn’t keep track of time but it felt like my aunt arrived incredibly fast.

As both my mother and aunt suffer from high blood pressure, they assumed that maybe my blood pressure was too low because of the junk food I was eating. My aunt also started telling me that my healthy diet is wrong because she thinks that I don’t eat much (as I am very thin).

So we used my mother’s arm blood pressure device. I don’t understand the readings but my aunt said that my pressure was very low.

Maybe half an hour had passed by since the whole situation started, so we decided to go to the hospital since I wasn’t feeling any better. However, I couldn’t even hold my head up straight or I’d feel even worse. There was no way I could stand up, walk out of the house, go through the small steps and then into a vehicle.

I always told myself before that I would never allow an ambulance to come for me, but now that I was going through something so strange to me, I had no choice but to have my aunt call 911 for an ambulance to pick me up.

Since I didn’t want to leave without wearing socks and my wallet, I asked Mother to go get them for me. She was in a panicked state so she couldn’t find the wallet. I then literally had to crawl to go get it myself as I started to feel better. She didn’t like that at all.

Maybe 10 minutes later, the fire department men came instead (I had no idea they also helped in these sort of situations). They were like 6 guys. One of them just by looking at me immediately said that I was going through an anxiety attack. I didn’t understand why he said that as I wasn’t even stressed out or in a bad mood when it started.

We showed them the readings of the blood pressure device but said that my pressure was actually very good. They even did their own test with their own device but on my finger. And just as they had assumed, my pressure was normal.

They asked me why I was under anxiety. What was I doing? What activated it? Why was I stressed? But I only told them that I wasn’t doing anything special. I was just eating junk food and watching a movie.

So they asked what kind of movie and if it was disturbing. I told them that I remember seeing blood but I’ve seen way worse movies like the SAW but never felt like this before.

After a few minutes, they still agreed that I was just going through an anxiety attack and that it will pass. Going tot he hospital wasn’t necessary but they could take me if I did want to anyway. I then started shaking uncontrollably, though. It was very apparent. I didn’t feel cold at all, though, but my mother kept saying that I looked really pale and that my hands were very cold.

It took me a minute to decided and told the firemen that I’ll wait it out and that they can leave. I apologized for calling them but they said it was no problem.

Now, at this point, both my mother and aunt then started talking about things. As you may have guessed, since they are family, it’s not always good stuff. I even felt scolded soon after. And amazingly, that actually did make me feel worse again and I felt like I was starting to lose consciousness. But I didn’t say a thing and started thinking about positive things instead, to see if this really was about anxiety. And to my surprise, it was actually working!

The scolding making me feel weaker but then positive thinking recovering me made me realize more that the firemen really knew what they were talking about. So as soon as my aunt recommended that I should leave the dining room to rest up, I took the chance to leave immediately, for my own sake. They meant well and helped me through the situation, but anxiety seems to be a very delicate thing.

As I sat down, I decided to call a close friend of mine named Rigo. He’s had countless anxiety attacks before, so I wanted to confirm with him. However, I got a text message from his older brother if I had uploaded one of our Super Smash Bros. Ultimate videos on YouTube, but instead of replying back, I called him to tell him about my experience. He had also suffered from these attacks as well (and he always answers the phone, unlike his brother).

We spoke for 58 minutes on the phone. He was telling me about his experiences, how he’s gone through therapy, his car exploding, etc. He’s gone through very bad things in life and yet he has surpassed them somehow over time.

But anyway, he confirms that he is positive that I went through an anxiety attack. He says that everyone suffers from them a little different but that they are activated by any random event no matter what the mood or lack of stress at the time. Which I suppose makes sense as all I was doing was enjoying my meal and watching a movie.

Now, I’m not going to mention my personal problems here (or anywhere online, for that matter) but aside from all that, I did also go through a rage when I was playing Smash Bros. on Spirits mode. The battle that made me rage all over was one in the Donkey Kong area where it’s 3 against me and they’re using Bullet Bills. It seemed like an impossible match to win but I did accomplish it with determination after countless times.

Man, I didn’t think was going to write this much. Anyway, all I’ll have to do now is try to take it easy. I called the clinic for a physical. My appointment is like in 10 days from now. I have to relax and think more positively.

Featured image credit to Bernard