Paranoid

Some out there know what it is that I speak of when I say "panic attack".  This is not the same thing as a temper tantrum when things are not going your way or you don't get the things you want immediately.  Someone eats the last cookie or cupcake and you go ballistic because you wanted it.  So you come back around and say "there will be more cookies or cupcakes in my future".  A real panic attack can hit you out of no where, you believe that you are having a heart attack or a breakdown.  When this happens, you feel your heart beating like a five cylinder engine.  You break out in cold sweats.  It's hard to draw breath normally and it's shallow in your chest.  You can't concentrate, you're shaking, feeling a sense of numbness or tingle all through your body.  Your stomach is burning up and all foods taste like rubber.  Intestinal upsets also follow.  The worst of the worst I ever experienced hit me like a tidal wave, it spiked from 0 to 100 and I could barely walk in a strait line.  I heard voices, I couldn't sleep or sit still for five minutes.  I just came down from one, it left me exhausted so much that I had to take a nap for the last few days mid afternoon after work.  The cause was work rather than personal, although at times it's hard to see where these two things separate these days.

Questionable behavior about coffee in the office.  I asked if there was coffee to be brewed, the response was "It's at the fuckin grocery store!"  I blinked a few times, then I responded "Oh I'm sorry, I have only done my food shopping at grocery stores.  I have yet to patronize the fuckin grocery store."  After others laughed, I got my coffee from the cafeteria from then on and never asked again.  We live in an age of paranoia, naturally I was called onto the carpet for some hillbilly antic as opposed to my more classy response.  For once, they chose class rather than trash which seems to be in most work situations without considerations for mental health.  Spend a few days gasping for breath, shaking, feeling your insides churning, snapping a rubber band against your wrist to halt the signal to your brain that you are in danger until it's red and raw and then tell me that there is no such thing as mental illness.  My electrical system is back to normal, everything is at peace with the world as much as it can be once again.

Our minds are more fragile than you think.  Consider this of those around you, you never know who can snap in half or shatter in a million pieces.