Panic Attack Treatment

Are panic attacks filling you with fear? In therapy, you can learn to manage panic symptoms and regain control.

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Panic Attack Treatment
in Houston, TX and Online

Are Panic Attacks Taking Over Your Life?

  • Have you found yourself suddenly overcome by fear, been short of breath and experienced physical symptoms like heart palpitations and sweating, and accompanying fearful thoughts?
  • Have you gone to the hospital believing you were having a heart attack, only to have your doctor tell you your symptoms were caused by anxiety?
  • Are you preoccupied by worry about having a panic attack, so much that you cannot enjoy life?
  • Do you rearrange your life to avoid panic attack triggers?
  • Do you desperately want to control your anxiety, but fear that your life will always be limited by your panic attacks?

Experiencing panic attacks is scary and can impact your quality of life. The good news is that it is treatable.

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Take Back Control of Your Life With
Panic Attack Help

Give us a call at 832-559-2622 to find out more about Panic Attack Treatment in Houston. Or click "Get Started Now" to schedule an appointment online with our Panic Attack Help counselors today. We have therapists near the Montrose, Heights & Sugar Land neighborhoods and offer online therapy in multiple states.

Understanding Panic Attacks

What are anxiety attacks?

In a panic attack, terror takes over your body and makes it feel like an unsafe place. Your throat tightens, you may feel like you are choking, and you may have chest pain. You feel like you’re losing control. It is difficult to think clearly. Your heart rate speeds up, and your breathing gets shallow. You may be afraid that you are dying or having a heart attack. Maybe you’ve even gone to the emergency room out of fear that you have a medical condition, only to find that you are all right physically.

Although a panic attack lasts between 11 and 13 minutes, it can feel like a lifetime. Panic attacks are a normal bodily response that is happening in the wrong context. There are appropriate times to panic, and the body has a specific response to these stressful situations. However, with panic disorder, the alarm is going off at the wrong time.

Your body’s alarm bells can then start to go off anytime you experience an internal sensation (ie., increased heart rate) similar to those you’ve had while panicking.

This can cause panic attacks and become a vicious cycle.

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Other Symptoms of Panic

This response is time-limited—a surge of adrenaline in the body. The adrenaline is reabsorbed in three to five minutes. When having a panic attack, it can be helpful to remember that you’ll feel better soon if you don’t fight it. However, the intensity and feelings of fear during a panic attack make it hard to keep this in mind in the moment. In therapy, you can learn to recognize and take charge of your panic attack symptoms.

In addition to the panic attacks themselves, you may experience a secondary level of pain—worrying about having another attack.

If you are struggling with panic attacks, your life may revolve around avoidance. Perhaps you are doing everything you can to avoid having another panic attack. You may change your life to avoid panic attack triggers. And since panic attacks often seem to come out of nowhere, you may avoid more and more of your life. Avoidance may work to prevent panic attacks, but it limits your life.

Over time, this can lead to the development of panic disorder.

Although you may feel hopeless, with effective treatment for panic your life can expand again. Cognitive behavioral therapy can help you with both the mental and physical symptoms of panic disorder. In therapy, you can learn to recognize the early physical signs and symptoms of a panic attack and build skills to calm down the symptoms, incorporating breathing exercises, progressive muscle relaxation and grounding techniques.

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Through Panic Attack Treatment You Can Learn to Control Panic Attacks And Enjoy Life Again

The therapists at Eddins Counseling Group can help you better understand your anxiety attacks. In a safe and therapeutic environment, we will walk through what happens to you during a panic attack. What symptoms and physical sensations come first? What are the warning signs? Maybe it’s heart palpitations or shallow breathing. When you learn the signs, you begin to gain control over the panic attack and be prepared when attacks occur.

Next you learn skills to respond differently to emotional and physical triggers of panic, which you can practice safely with your therapist. You’ll develop an understanding of fearful thoughts and learn to use supportive thoughts instead.

In this process, we will examine the thoughts that arise after each physical symptom, and replace those thoughts with healing ones. For example, if you feel your heart race and then think, “I’m having a heart attack,” you will likely become more anxious. However, if you think instead, “I’m safe and in charge. I can use my breathing to calm my body,” you are likely to feel calmer, which reduces panic symptoms.

Although panic attacks feel scary, they are not dangerous. You may feel like you’re dying, but you are not. You won’t stop breathing, faint or go crazy. You won’t have a heart attack. In therapy, you can learn strategies to help you remember that you are safe when you feel a panic attack coming on. We can teach you skills to calm your body and breath and counteract anxiety.

Practicing Skills With An Experienced Therapist Will Help You Stay Calm…

After we have gone over these strategies, you can practice using them in the safe environment of the therapy office. Practicing techniques before an attack comes on will help you to stay calm when you experience panic attack symptoms outside of the therapy session. These coping strategies can help you stop panic attacks in their tracks. And, throughout sessions, you may begin to realize that panic attacks are not the end of the world. You don’t need to spend your life in fear of panic attacks. You can do the things you have been avoiding, and live the life you want.

Through counseling, you will begin to understand how everything is connected. For many people, negative beliefs about themselves lead to depression, anxiety and panic. We will look at patterns of negative thoughts and beliefs, and work to replace them with more beneficial, productive patterns of thinking. Instead of fearing your body, you can learn to have compassion for it. You can accept yourself physically, emotionally, and cognitively. Now is not forever—you can accept the moment as it is, and you can get through it.

With the help of an experienced therapist, effective strategies and a willingness to engage in the therapy process, you can experience relief. We can teach you how to face your physical symptoms and catastrophic thoughts, rather than avoid them. You may believe that you can’t handle a symptom or emotion, but you can. You can learn relaxation techniques that turn off the anxiety response, turning the temperature down on panic, and empowering you to move forward in your life.

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Panic Attack Help FAQ's

Some people may be predisposed to having panic attacks by their family and genetic history. For people with panic disorder, the brain’s survival instincts are overactive.

Any internal bodily experiences similar to those experienced during panic, can trigger panic. Increased heart rate during exercise for example, feels similar to the increased heart rate during a panic attack so it then triggers anxiety about having an attack, which then leads to one. Over time, this can happen suddenly without recognizing the trigger.

Panic attacks are scary and uncomfortable, and you’ve probably been doing everything you can to avoid having them. It’s completely understandable to want to make sure that therapy won’t trigger a panic attack. But, therapy provides a safe place to learn how to control your panic attacks.

Skills practiced in session such as deep breathing and progressive muscle relaxation techniques can stop symptoms of panic and anxiety from escalating. Practicing these skills ahead of time increases your ability to use them when fear overwhelms you. With panic attack help, you can move toward a life that isn’t controlled by the fear of panic attacks.

Some people with panic try to white-knuckle it, attempting to push through the fear and pain on their own. Often, this leads to suppressing painful emotions and causes trouble down the road. At best, it’s unnecessarily difficult.

Why go it alone when you can benefit from the expertise of a mental health professionals? It may take time, but we will work through a concrete series of steps to get you feeling better. Entering treatment for your panic attacks sets you on a path to recovery, using methods that have been shown to work reliably.

Panic attacks can significantly impact your daily life, leading to difficulties at work, at home, and with your overall well-being. These intangible costs associated with panic include your health, relationships and career.

Treatment of panic is an investment in your future, and can resolve the troubles in your life that panic attacks have caused. If anxiety attacks are limiting your life, treatment can help you expand your boundaries and reach your potential. The benefits of panic disorder treatment can be transformative.

With Panic Attack Treatment

You can learn skills to cope with panic attacks and panic disorder.

We recommend having an evaluation with your primary care physician to rule out other health conditions. Therapy or a combination of therapy and medication can be helpful for people with panic and anxiety attacks. You can talk to your doctor or a psychiatrist about medication options to treat panic attacks, or discuss this with your therapist. Antidepressants known as selective serotonin reuptake inhibitors (SSRIs) can be effective for anxiety and panic.

Reach out today and develop the skills needed to take charge, feel empowered and change your life.

Read more about related anxiety conditions: generalized anxiety disorder and social anxiety.

Get Help From a Specialist in Panic Attack Treatment

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Alexandra Marshall

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Diana Cabrera-Stewart

Diana’s specialty areas include working with mothers at any stage in their journey, as well as working with clients for whom race, culture, ethn…

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Holly Lark

Holly specializes in working with adolescents, young adults, and women. She is passionate about helping clients work through life transitions, b…

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Joan Mullinax

Joan specializes in therapy services and career counseling and helps clients with challenges incl. anxiety, depression, self-esteem, relationshi…

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Katie Chapman

Katie enjoys helping clients better understand themselves and reach their goals at their own pace.

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Maggie Burkett

Maggie enjoys working with children, teens, and adults experiencing trauma, anxiety, depression, abuse, PTSD, self-harm, etc. Maggie is also a c…

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Sarah Soto

Sarah’s specialties and professional interests include helping people through life changes, trauma, PTSD, abuse, anxiety, stress, depression, AD…

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Steven Serrano

Steven is a bilingual (English & Spanish) psychotherapist. Steven’s experience includes counseling individuals, couples, families and teens in t…

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Suzanne Kamfar

Suzanne (Susan) is bilingual (English & Farsi). Her focus is on helping you navigate through life with balance, harmony, and authenticity. She w…

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Tiara Runyon

Tiara offers a collaborative approach, fit to suit your individual needs. Her experience includes working with those facing life transitions and…

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Vanessa Guidry

Vanessa works with teens, young adults and families. She helps with behavioral concerns, emotional stress such as anxiety, anger and depression,…

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What Clients Are Saying

My Anxiety Is Not This Horrible Monster

Working with my therapist I learned things about myself and I saw things from a different angle. I feel capable and strong and my anxiety is not this horrible monster I fear like the plague. I can face it now.

G.G.

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