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Benzos and other GABa active drugs (highly effective, highly addictive, can reduce cognitive performance while on them)
Betablockers (propranolol) (not effective for all kind of anxiety/panic issues, non addictive, might make you feel weak/weird)
Long term:
Meditation, CBT
Stress/anxiety comes from rushing due to taking on responsibility for an impossible deadline. Do not rush, but instead work with urgency and learn to deflect the pressure to switch from urgency mode to panic rush mode.
You are not personally responsible for a timeline.
People will yell and scream if you miss whatever boat you are trying to catch. But this is not your problem, your problem is to build what your building with urgency.
The only way to make this mindset shift is to find activities outside work that bring you happiness/grounding/etc so that you can realize that the things you currently think are important are not important and it is only a job.
I've personally struggled with this for years, call/txt me anytime if you want to talk 4153413957
Talk to your doctor. Panic attacks aren’t something you have to just live with. They can often help with a “patch” in the form of anti-anxiety meds.
This will help give you headspace to figure out your next steps.
Moving forward, you need to go for the root cause. The long term “fix” here might be something you have suggested - or it might be something else. For myself, I found that a new company helped a bit (until it didn’t), but the long term fix has been working for myself.
The lifestyle + diet advice can also be helpful. No single person here will have all the answers for you - pick some bits from each and give them a try.
Talk to your friends and family. They can bring some outside perspective to the situation at work which might be helpful.
Tldr: Meds are a good patch that gives you the opportunity to go after the root cause on your own terms.
Breathing into a paper bag is a stereotypical "calm yourself down when panicking" technique, but I've done it mid-panic and it has had an effect on me. With that being said, it's debatable as to how well it works.
Might also be the focus on one's breathing that helps one detatch from the stressor.
Your role as a lead is NOT to get the project delivered on time. Instead, your job is to bubble up updates and timelines and let your superiors handle the stress of the impending deadline. It is better for them to hear about delays earlier than be surprised about missed deadlines. Stress/anxiety comes from rushing due to taking on responsibility for an impossible deadline. Do not rush, but instead work with urgency a…
Your panic attack is happening because you are getting worked up and your body is producing adrenaline to help you accomplish your goals but there is no release of the tension, no pathway within an adrenaline-pumped maintainable time frame to achieve the end goal.
The solution is what dafzal is saying, you need to re-frame your mindset in regards to this project. You need to set better, achievable, (smaller) goals such as, "Today I will get this extension functioning.", "The next task I will do is get info on the progress of X for my report.", etc.
You need to gratify your desire for completion by breaking this gigantic project up into smaller, completable steps and know that as long as you churn out completed tasks at a decent rate then you are doing your part to make the project a success. That is all that is being asked of you. You are doing what you are paid for and that is good enough.
What helped me the most was:
- recognizing that I'm fine/healthy, like go do a check-up if that's bothering you;
- getting used to physiological discomfort, for example exercise (or yoga I think helps as well). Like the concept that having high heart BPM, and high blood pressure, and shortness of breath, becomes familiar to you to the point you don't even be bothered by it... your body will perceive that as you're fine, and that body condition fades away and you become calm and relaxed after it.
For example: chest and back pain are usually from shallow breathing, which is recruiting auxiliary muscles. On the other hand your neck/back muscles are probably tense.
Basically you need to feel that you're safe in your own body, which is an odd concept the first time you come around it, but in a sense you might be fearful of the reaction of your body to some stressors.
The worst part is that it can't just be rationalized, it's probably very hard to try to just solve this through logic, because your body does his own thing when it comes to reacting to emotions, it releases hormones so there's no thinking through that.
Even if you have a stressful job (which you should consider if it's the best for you, or at least try to change what's stressing about it), and it can be the source of your anxiety, but panic attack doesn't have to be the outcome, even within that scenario.
Above all, if it's has an impact on your day to day, you need to get it checked.
Telling myself I can quit, get fired, ect didnt help.
What did help was bringing more honesty into my job and letting go of ego. I felt like I was making the project success personal, suppressing and internalizing the stress, and holding myself to an impossible expectation.
My recommendation would be to just bite the bullet and give an honest update to your manager, tell them where you are, and ask if they have any additional ideas. Healthy organizations actually want this. If your manager blames you, you have a different problem to deal with, but at least you are one step towards getting out of your personal hell.
You might need therapy mate... maybe your fear of having a panic attack fuels the panic attack - as if your first panic attack was enough of a traumatic experience, or at at least extremely unpleasant, and you might have anxiety as a trigger for panic attacks. What helped me the most was: - recognizing that I'm fine/healthy, like go do a check-up if that's bothering you; - getting used to physiological discomfort, fo…
>- getting used to physiological discomfort, for example exercise (or yoga I think helps as well).
I had to do these two things to get past regular panic attacks. All I did was run every other day for at least 40 minutes and my panic attacks disappeared for over a year... until a few months after I stopped running.
The quality of life difference was substantial. It improved the quality of my work, too.