Coping With Anxiety And Panic Attacks

Source: Amazon

What is it?

The 1997 book Coping With Anxiety And Panic Attacks by Jordan Lee.

Source: Amazon

What is it about?

Here is an editorial review on Amazon that does a great job describing this book:

Editorial Reviews

From School Library Journal

Gr 7 Up–In the first section, Lee identifies the different forms of anxiety and panic and explains the human body’s physiological response to both.

She also defines and clarifies the differences between simple and social phobias, obsessive-compulsive disorders, and ordinary anxiety.

The author then examines the biological and emotional causes of anxiety, including stress, trauma, fear, and rigid parenting.

This section also discusses the physical consequences of anxiety such as ulcers, sleep disorders, and increased risk of other illnesses.

The next part explores the treatment of everyday anxiety and provides practical advice on stress management.

The final section outlines treatment options for more severe disorders.

This book is readable and well organized; its clear style, realistic examples, and practical advice guarantee its usefulness for both self-help and reports.

It moves beyond Michael Maloney and Rachel Kranz’s Straight Talk About Anxiety and Depression (Facts on File, 1991) to make an important and clear distinction between common, everyday anxiety and more serious disorders.

Sheila G. Shellabarger, Fordham Health Sciences Library, Wright State University, Dayton, OH

Copyright 1998 Cahners Business Information, Inc.

What do I like about it and what might other people like about it?

I like that this book was a quick, simple, and easy read that surprisingly gave a pretty good short overview of anxiety and panic disorders and some straightforward practical advice that you can apply in your life now to help you cope and / or overcome them.

Final Thoughts

This book was so short and easy to read that I was able to finish it in a couple of days, probably making it the first book that I have finished reading this year so far (I paused from two other books to finish this one first), and so you know that it is an easy read if I actually can finish it and finish it that fast.

I am amazed that something so short and basic actually gave some simple advice that I can apply now, and so it gave me some things that I have heard before in an easier to follow format that left me feeling more capable of adapting some of it to my life now.

The end,

-John Jr

Naked With Black Socks

Source: Wikimedia Commons

The Daily Post had a Daily Prompt today called Naked With Black Socks, and this is what it said:

Are you comfortable in front of people, or does the idea of public speaking make you want to hide in the bathroom?

Why?

And this is my response:

No, I am not comfortable in front of most people, and the idea of public speaking does makes me want to hide in a bathroom.

Because of social anxiety disorder and any other anxiety disorders that I might have, shyness, introversion, negative past social experiences, not being properly trained and adapted socially, not agreeing enough with or fitting in with or being associated with any group or groups, isolation, and many other reasons known and unknown.

The end,

-John Jr

Happy Endings

Source: Wikimedia Commons

Daily Prompt

The Daily Post had a Daily Prompt today called Happy Endings, and this is what it said:

Tell us about something you’ve tried to quit.

Did you go cold turkey, or for gradual change?

Did it stick?

And this is my response:

I tried to quit using contractions when I write/type many years ago when I was in public school, contractions were looked down on when doing research papers and reports et cetera, and so I decided that it would be easier to just avoid using contractions in all of my writings. 😀

I stopped cold turkey.

Yes, it stuck mostly, but I probably still use contractions when I talk.

Dream

Somehow I forgot the rest of my dreams that I had last night and I forgot the earlier parts of this dream and I did not voice record this dream, but I still barely remember part of my last dream which took place during the day inside a maybe one-story building that was possibly a business/office with house-like areas.

Most of my family and I were there except for my brother CC, no one seemed to be in the business/office-like areas like it was closed, and we were in the house-like areas but I am not sure if we lived there or not; and the house-like areas were along the walls which were mostly made of glass and/or had a lot of windows so you could usually clearly see outside, and it was a nice view into the quiet parking lot in a quiet neighborhood.

I remember sitting, walking, talking, maybe watching television, maybe eating and drinking, looking through the walls/windows, et cetera with my family and alone until an unknown married couple (husband and wife) joined us.

The husband was a somewhat older possibly balding man with whitish colored skin and the wife was a short woman with yellowish/whitish/light-brownish colored skin with blackish colored hair whose family was from a country in Asia, and I remember them being very relaxed and friendly; and they treated us like we all knew each other, like friends, and I remember talking with them for a while until I left the building alone at some point.

It was a nice day and I remember walking through the neighborhood until I reach a trail that crossed a mostly cleared out wilderness area with a bit of water that crossed into a small field that led to another neighborhood, I remember stopping on a natural dirt/grass/island or bridge that crossed the shallow water, and maybe there was a bed or table or something there; and I remember changing some of my clothing for some unknown reasons.

While I was trying to put some pants on and some of my other clothing, a group of kids from the other neighborhood ran over to play, and I remember a boy with dark-brownish colored skin stopping to ask me questions while I was trying to finish putting my clothes on; and I remember answering his questions as I got dressed, and when I was finished dressing I started to walk to cross the other neighborhood.

My former male schoolmate and one-time classmate GR was walking from the other neighborhood, he recognized me and he greeted me, and I remember him asking me some questions; and I remember him asking me where I lived, when he found out that I was still living in the city of D he was surprised, and he said that if he had known this that then he would have been visiting me; and it seemed that he was going to start doing that.

I was not comfortable with the idea so I started trying to ease into explaining why, I remember starting with mentioning my problem with several anxiety disorders (social anxiety disorder, generalized anxiety disorder) and I was going to slowly start to explain what they were and some of the ways that they have effected/affected me, and my former schoolmate/classmate GR immediately interrupted me and he started saying something about them causing problems with anger; which is not so accurate in my case, he started explaining how that anger can build up and things like that and how it was not healthy, and I listened uncomfortably as I waited to explain some of the ways that my anxiety disorders have effected/affected me but I woke up.

The end,

-John Jr

An Only Lovers Left Alive Inspired Dream With Sherlock Holmes

Source: Wikimedia Commons

This morning I was awakened by someone at a critical time during my last dream which caused me to forget all of my other dreams and most of my last dream, which is very annoying because I did and I would have remembered some of them if it were not for the interruption which included an unnecessary phone call, the person who woke me up meant well but they caused me to forget things that I wanted to remember and waking me up turned out to be completely unnecessary causing me to lose two hours of sleep which I will not get back now and to lose most of my dreams that I wanted to remember (I did take this time to finish a job application, and so I will probably get a job interview in a week or two because everyone automatically gets a job interview for this job; which I do not like because I do not like job interviews or job applications, but this is positive news while also being neutral and negative news and it is for a job that I substituted for in my last job so my chances are better than usual); but even after all that amazingly I barely remember part of the end of my last dream which seemed to be inspired by the film Only Lovers Left Alive, which I watched before going to sleep, and maybe one of my other dreams was inspired by this film as well.

I can not remember exactly how this dream was inspired by that film but I do know that the dream had a slower paced feel/atmosphere/mood/et cetera with a focus on things that are not normally focused on in dreams (small details and topics in life that often get over-looked in dreams) and there was some good and personal and unique dialogue with the other dream characters, there was also a focus on music and musical formats/media (CDs, et cetera) and on personal/mundane/philosophical/et cetera topics and on people in history, and more things that I can not remember.

At the end of the dream I think that it was night and Sherlock Holmes played by the actor Benedict Cumberbatch from the BBC television show Sherlock, a woman with whitish colored skin with maybe yellowish colored hair, a boy who was possibly the woman’s son or young brother, my mom, maybe my brother GC, and I were out in the countryside of the city of D down a country road outside of a house; and it seemed to be an emergency situation, and Sherlock drove us there in his car.

It seemed that we were picking up the woman and the boy who were in a panic like they/we were in danger or something and we needed to get them away and leave quickly, earlier in the dream Sherlock and some of the others and I possibly went to this location earlier in the dream to maybe drop them off and some other things happened in the dream that I can not remember, and as we were preparing to leave I remember adjusting some objects in Sherlock’s car including some music CDs.

As we were leaving I remember talking about music and picking a music CD to listen to, we talked about history and people in history, we talked about the emergency situation, and we talked about various interesting things in life; and at some point I remember us driving to a store and maybe it was day now but I can not remember, and we went inside the store  and near the cash registers there was a man who somewhat reminded me of the actor Roger R. Cross giving a demonstration for a job training program involving bonding / gluing things like jewelry and bonding/gluing things on automobiles et cetera.

I remember talking to Sherlock about very personal things including jobs and my problems/struggles with social/generalized anxiety disorder and depression, Sherlock had not know about this, and we talked about a grid that he once wrote on piece paper for me after he had glanced at a book on mental health; and this grid was used to help people with their mental health issues by them putting certain information on the grid each day, and he explained the grid to me.

I told him that I remembered the grid that he had written on a piece of paper for me, not knowing that I had mental health problems at that time, and I told him that I never did use it; and then I mentioned an idea where maybe he could help me by reading some books/et cetera and try to help me overcome those mental health problems, since he is so smart and quick to learn things, but we got interrupted by my mom.

My mom wanted me to go look at the job training demonstration and decide if I should sign up for one of the classes, you probably had to pay and you would take a class and probably get certified and then you would probably work for the company handling the job training, and so I stopped to watch the demonstration; and the man who somewhat reminded me of Mr. Cross lined up several small clear plastic pieces of tubing in a V-shape with little cut pieces of plastic tubing at the top to connect each end, you had to line the up a certain way it seemed, and then he started gluing them.

I asked him some questions as he was doing this, I also looked at his signs/papers/pamphlets reading about the different classes/jobs trying to decide if I wanted to try any of them, but I got awakened in the real world by someone who handed me a telephone because I had a phone call.

The end,

-John Jr

Almost Getting To Be A Football / Soccer Goalkeeper / Goalie

Source: Wikimedia Commons

I went to bed very late last night and I slept pretty well/deeply without waking up much, so I forgot all of my dreams except for barely part of the end of my last dream, and like my dream from the night before last this dream had a sport(s) theme to it combined my problems with anxiety / depression / et cetera.

All that I can remember of the dream is that I think that it started during the day in a fictional location and I walked into maybe a one-story building that had one or more football / soccer fields, there was a small crowd of people watching people playing football / soccer, and the soccer matches started from youngest to oldest; and so the kids played their soccer matches first.