Panic Attacks And Asking For Help

In the last few weeks, much to my surprise I learned I have a parathyroid adenoma and I will need surgery to remove.  It hopefully explains some of the life impairing symptoms that I have been having for months.  I have felt much older than my fifty-six years and it makes sense now. I had been attributing it to another medication I'm taking and that this just must be aging.  I underwent lots of different tests to come to the previous diagnoses of hypercalcemia and hyperparathyroidism. The last test though to find the affected parathyroid, really did me in.  I can now say, with certainty that I had a panic attack in the middle of it.  It was much more identifiable because I couldn't move. 

I have never named my previous panic attacks.  With my past "freak outs" I just didn't put it together.  My ego probably didn't want to let me and once it was over, I didn't want to think about it anymore. Prior to the last test, I had contacted my pharmacist friend about my claustrophobia and the scan.  She texted, will you have a panic attack?  And until that moment, I had not named any of what I had experienced before as a panic attack. 

I do have panic attacks.  

This one enabled me to learn a few things. 

In order to get a better look at my parathyroid glands, I had a nuclear medicine test with dye.  I didn't take
a gander at the scanner until the night before.  It didn't look good. Yet I thought I will get through it, I will take a Xanax, it's going to be okay.  It has to be, because I really need this test.  I want to know for sure what is draining my energy, giving me body aches, headaches, making my brain fuzzy, as well as going to the bathroom numerous times during the night.   I feel like I have aged two decades in the last few months.  It is hard to be tired ALL the time, even thinking and talking is too hard. 

The part of the scanner that gave me trouble was a large flat panel that was focused on my neck and it had to remain flat to my face about six- seven inches away for the first test of two minutes.   I took the Xanax at 10:00 for the 10:30 test.  I thought that would give sufficient time and also it needed to stay in my system for the other longer scans at 1:30pm. 

The nuclear medicine "guide" Brad was very friendly, used a lot of humor as I was jittery and anxious. It took about ten minutes for the shot of the radioactive dye to settle into my system and away we go.  One of my newer techniques to combat my claustrophobia is to have my mind occupied so I was planning to listen to a podcast or music.  As I walked to get my airpods and phone, he said, it's just two minutes. So I didn't get them. 

( Lesson 1) I didn't listen to my intuition.   

 I should have at least been listening to something. I laid down and the panel lowered in front of my face.  

The life began draining from my body slowly and surely. 

I stayed quiet as I could feel terror move down my body very slowly from the neck down. It felt like the radioactive dye was moving down, but it wasn't. It was past trauma.  

That two minutes seemed to last for hours. All I thought was how could I get back in here and do this again for an even longer time period?!!  Both Brad and another guide Alejandro held my hands during part of that two minutes, bless them. How in the heck am I going to manage this again? 

I sat up, felt like I had to throw up and gingerly walked away with Brad telling me, we will get you through this. 

I had another text conversation with my pharmacist friend.  I learned that my Xanax dose wasn't that strong and I could take another but I would need someone to drive me for the second appointment. 

I enter the zone of one of my absolute worst fears.  Who am I going to get to help me?  I have no one to help me.  It brings up abandonment issues that paralyze me, yet I needed to act and fast. I was forced to start reaching out to persons who could get here in 45 minutes and take me across town to Ochsner Hospital.  At this point, I was ugly crying so I at least wanted someone I felt comfortable with.  An Uber would not do the trick.  I reached out to a few people and there were conflicts, but each one said, they would work it out if needed. 

I was so heartened to know they would show up if they could. 

Tears rolling down my face even now.  

(Lesson 2)  I do have friends who are willing to help.  

My fourth person, Shannon, was off work on Friday afternoon, nearby and available!  I told her I was a hot mess, and she replied, "hot mess is my specialty."  

Relief and gratitude flowed through my body. It was the opposite feeling of the test.   I stopped crying and took another Xanax. 

(A note: I don't like taking Xanax, benzodiazepines can be dangerous if taken regularly, I only use them when absolutely necessary)  

Off we went, Shannon came into the scanner room, talked to me and held my hand for some of it.  I'm here, I've got you.  This time, I did grab my phone and airpods and listened to music. My husband George did a fly by as he was in the middle of five surgeries that afternoon.  It was so much easier this go round.   

(Lesson 3) Take the right dose of Xanax. 

I remember having a great conversation catching up with Shannon on the way home. After a good nap, it all seemed a little fuzzy though, so absolutely I should not drive on a full dose of Xanax.   Thanks Kris! The fun(!)  from this day carried over until the next day.  I felt so drained and experience a panic attack hangover.  Every cell in my body had freaked out for that two minutes and then it went on as I tried to prepare to do it all over again.  I had to be kind and rest and take care of myself.  

I will not beat myself up for having a response that is in my body.   It just is.  If anything, welcoming the unwanted feelings and making friends with it is the way to heal what is in the body.  I have to nurture my own self. Yet, people can also be utterly kind, I have found those people in my tribe to connect with and help me and vice versa.  I have more chances to ask for help as I will have surgery in the next couple of weeks.  

Namaste

Defining Love

Saturday night, I came across the post of Anderson Cooper announcing the birth of his second son, Sebastian.  I played the video of him explaining how he and his former partner and now best friend were parenting both sons and the children's surnames would both be Maisani-Cooper.  They are a family. He described how he felt the presence of his deceased mother, father and brother while raising toddler Wyatt Cooper with Ben.  He then read a quote from his father, Wyatt Cooper which made me weep.  

All of it made me weep. 

(Thank you to the man on Twitter who painstakingly captured the words on video in written form.) 

Here are Wyatt Cooper's amazingly loving and accurate words. 

"Life itself is brief. And yet each life encloses all eternity.  We are, all of us separately and together engaged on the same tough journey. Each of us taste its joys and sorrows.  Each of us gets by as best as we can. And we must whenever possible reach out to each other tentatively to touch with our hands, with our eyes, and with our hearts. We must wish for each other love and laughter, good thoughts and happy days.  We must go rejoicing in the blessings of this world. Chief of which is the mystery, the majesty, the magic that is life."

For some reason, ever since Anderson Cooper started writing and documenting his and his mother's life and their relationship journey, I was mesmerized.  First in the book, "The Rainbow Comes and Goes" and then in a documentary, "Nothing Left Unsaid."  Anderson has been through tremendous loss, and examined it and come through it looking for light and love. Gloria Vanderbilt led an astounding life trying to fill in the gaps for missing loved ones.  A dad that died when she was one and a mother who was not able to connect with her.   She and Anderson shared their grief over losing his dad, Wyatt, all too soon and then ten years later, his brother, Carter. They shared how their relationship worked and didn't work.  I love a family who speaks their truth and tries to work things out together.  Relationships are messy and there has to be open, honest and mature communication.  If you don't have that, it's really hard to make it work for both parties. 

I celebrate Anderson and his best friend choosing to raise a family together and it really resonates deeply for me.  Family can be who you make it to be.  It can be those who reach out and touch our hands, eyes and hearts.  I have tried to connect on a deeper level with family and it just hasn't worked.  It's devastating to come to that conclusion yet I have learned that God ( the Divine One, the Trinity, the Christ Consciousness or Universe) will bring people and situations into my life that will fill my longing for attachment and connection in a loving and kind way.  It will not look like what I expected but if I can let go, forgive and move on, my heart will be touched by love when I least expect it. 

Today, on Valentine's Day, a manufactured day with confusing origins, I will still celebrate LOVE. 

The kind of love that listens to my deepest concerns and I listen to theirs.  A love that is kind, responsive, mature and patient.  It's not perfect but it shows up.  That's my version of First Corinthians 13.  A veil is lifted and I only understand in part, but the part, the mystery that I see is so generous and overwhelming, I can't do anything but figure out how to lean into it again and again. 

I am so very thankful for the loves in my life.  The unit that I created: my husband and daughters,  friends who are soul sisters, family, and others who cross my path in all kinds of ways.  And of course,  the four legged sweethearts cannot be left out!