Neuroplasticity: How to deal with Anxiety Disorders Like Panic Attacks

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Today I had a hard time deciding how I would go into Neuroplasticity’s role in dealing with the various types of anxiety disorders. I went from Cognitive Behavioral Therapy which is a form of psychotherapy that treats problems by focusing on solutions, encouraging clients to challenge their distorted cognitions and changing the client’s destructive patterns of behavior, to Meditation where you are training the mind to be free of scattered thoughts & Mindfulness which is the ability to be fully present while being aware of where you are and what you are doing while not over reacting to what is going on around you. There is music therapy, neuroplasticity exercises, and self-directed neuroplasticity techniques. Others look to yoga, positive affirmations, focused breathing, etc.

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“Because of the power of neuroplasticity, you can,
in fact, reframe your world and rewire your brain
so that you are more objective.
You have the power to see things as they are
so that you can respond thoughtfully, deliberately,
and effectively to everything you experience.
-Elizabeth Thornton

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It was a bit overwhelming, because I generally like to do an overall introduction, before going into each technique. So here I was, trying to figure out a way to start, and after hours of researching, I was literally nowhere. I started to think, “Oh no, I’m getting overwhelmed and I feel stressed!” I thought, “Wait a minute. This is the very thing I shouldn’t be doing. I’m not practicing what I am trying to teach!" So I decided to take a step back and took a deep breath to center myself. I calmly did some more research and came upon an article that I really liked.

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So in deference to my dilemma, I decided to feature this article, because it actually did a really good job of simply talking about anxiety and the Amygdala, which is an ancient organ (referred to as the Dinosaur), whose job it is to affect how the individual feels emotions, especially fear and pleasure. The key word here is FEAR! It is a ganglion of the limbic system adjoining the temporal lobe of the brain.

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I found this article called, ”How can you deal with panic attacks and social anxiety?” by Dr. Harry Barry (https://www.irishtimes.com/sponsored/healthy-town/how-can-you-deal-with-panic-attacks-and-social-anxiety) where he stated that hundreds of thousands of people in Ireland suffer from panic attacks and countless others suffer from social anxiety. He also stated that there were those with phobias, general anxiety, post-traumatic stress disorder sufferers, and hundreds of thousands having to live in a world of anxiety and panic. He was most concerned about the increasing rise of all types and forms of anxiety in the adolescent population where there seems to be a correlation to the self-harm epidemic in the school population he sees today.

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Dr. Harry Barry wrote a book called ”Flagging Anxiety and Panic” where he wrote about some new insights into these anxiety related disorders. The first insight he wrote about, “is that anxiety pathways in our brain can be reshaped by our mind – a process called neuroplasticity. This is best done with the harnessed use of our mind. Targeted CBT exercises can reshape our anxious mind and, in turn, the very anxiety pathways creating the problem.”

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“Ironically, some of our most stubborn habits
and disorders are products of our plasticity.”
-Norman Doidge

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His second insight “is that anxiety is not only a cognitive condition, where we worry and catastrophize all the time, but also a strongly physical condition triggered by our emotional brain activating our internal stress system.” This is the amygdala which is the ancient organ I mentioned above. He refers to the amygdala as the “gunslinger” which he feels is not smart, has a long memory, and does not respond to talk therapies. So this insight is powerful because Dr. Harry Barry feels that we have to disempower the amygdala.

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Dr. Barry’s third insight, “is that the worrying side of anxiety comes from the left prefrontal cortex part of our brain and the catastrophizing comes from the right prefrontal cortex.” Here he focuses on two main anxieties: panic attacks and social anxiety. For this article I will only go into panic attacks.

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Panic Attacks, which we went over in a previous article, hits out of nowhere where the individual becomes short of breath, has a rapid heart rate, shaking, sweating, and a feeling that they are going to die, plus a whole lot of other horrific symptoms. These people literally live in a state of fear that another might strike at any time. Dr. Barry explains, “To understand a panic attack, we need to realize that the physical symptoms experienced by the person are created by an adrenaline rush. This occurs when our stress system is activated by the amygdala, or gunslinger, firing inadvertently and seemingly without warning.” Dr. Barry said, “once the person understands what is going on and how the amygdala works – and learns to accept the discomfort that challenging the gunslinger will induce – panic attacks rapidly become a thing of the past.

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In another article about Dr. Barry, “Dr. Harry Barry: How to get a grip on crippling panic attacks” regarding panic attack approaches, he said that some people try breathing exercises in the middle of a panic attack but this will only make the individual more panicky. What he teaches clients is a technique called ”flooding” which he describes as a technique where the person having the attack learns to accept the symptoms. He said, “Imagine that you were stuck to the ground, allowing the waves of physical sensations to just wash over you and move on. If you do this, the panic symptoms will be gone in 10 minutes or less. If you try to stop them, they may last for hours.”

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“"Some panic attacks can go on for hours, but if you let the adrenaline rush happen, it will pass more quickly. At first, this is unpleasant, but finally, the memory in the amygdala changes. You weaken it, so patients start to lose their fear of panic attacks and then they stop happening completely. It's about retraining the brain. I get them to do a panic exercise where I try to get them to bring on a panic attack and when they can't, they realize that I'm putting them back in charge of their bodies. It's very rewarding.”

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“...an effective psychotherapist or psychoanalyst
is a "microsurgeon of the mind" who helps patients
make needed alterations in neuronal networks.”
-Norman Doidge

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The reason I thought this was a very good article is because Dr. Barry uses the concept of neuroplasticity where he feels that we can reshape our brain using our own mind. If, during a panic attack, we allow the adrenaline rush to just happen, instead of trying to tap it down or do deep breathing, the attack will last only 10 minutes or less. Trying to fight it might lead to a longer attack and more repeat attacks. And as he stated, if you allow the rush, the memory in the amygdala will change which is key to decreasing panic attacks.

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In conclusion, I was glad that I changed the initial focus of my article because if I didn’t, I would not have come across this wonderful post about Dr. Harry Barry who’s concept of ”flooding technique” is something that I actually think would have helped me in my early days of panic attack. I remember the fear and agony of trying to stay calm during a panic attack but couldn’t stop it. I didn’t realize that my panic was making my amygdala to form stronger neural connections that would trigger more future attacks. It would have saved me countless years of fear and misery.

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“Ironically, some of our most stubborn habits
and disorders are products of our plasticity.”
-Norman Doidge

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I hope this discovery will help others who may one day have a similar situations. These advances in neuroplasticity discoveries are giving a lot of hope to those who are now suffering with all sorts of anxieties. Life is meant to be able to live fully and happily. That is my goal in researching all these areas of mental and physical disorders.

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I hope you will continue this journey with me. Thank-you for reading my article on Neuroplasticity: How to deal with Anxiety Disorders Like Panic Attacks. If you would like to follow me, please check HERE.

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This is my previous article on Neuroplasticity & Anxiety if you are interested in reading it:

Neuroplasticity: Hope For People With Anxiety?
https://steemit.com/steemiteducation/@cabbagepatch/neuroplasticity-hope-for-people-with-anxiety

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