Had an interesting experience on Monday. I had my first OCD-related panic attack “in the wild” since I started therapy for it. And although it took about ten minutes, I actually did manage to short circuit it.
It was still exhausting and unexpected, but I was really able to latch on to the idea of “this sucks but it IS going to subside if you just hang on.” And it gradually did. I did the breathing exercises, and focused really hard on doing the whole “impartial observer” thing.
And it worked. And I was able to step outside of myself, and take the anxiety and just kind of sand it down until it was gone. And it’s the first time in, quite seriously, several years that I actually felt like I might eventually get a handle on this thing. What a great feeling.
