Sordidsass-blog - Sordid Sass

This morning’s Bridges Not Walls in London, UK

Why does this still has to be a part of our life?

my utopia

“Hold the fuck up.” I say. I am the fuck up. Please hold me.

After not being able to sleep for more than a few hours at a time, I just slept 24 hours. Now I just want puppies, bacon, and chocolate. Puppies for cuddles, not for eats.

Circus Tree: Six individual sycamore trees were shaped, bent, and braided to form this.

Never understood this until recently.

How to Cope with Panic Attacks

1. Recognise that panic attacks are a mind state and not a physical risk. A panic attack can be a very frightening and uncomfortable experience. However, it doesn’t indicate a real physical risk – even although it feels that way.

2. Try to grasp that you are not alone. Panic attacks are relatively common. They’re an anxiety disorder that many other people share.

3. Understand what panic is. Panic is excess adrenaline running through your body when it is confronted with a possible life-threatening situation. It can also be triggered by something that reminds you of a threatening event in your past. Feelings of panic can be very scary, but the feelings are related to your past – not to a threat in the present. Even although you feel terrified, you are not in any real danger.

4. Go and see a doctor or counsellor. Sometimes people find anti-anxiety medication helps them cope with panic attacks. However, identifying the psychological root – and then getting help in dealing with that – is the most effective treatment approach.

5. Let others close to you know that you suffer from panic attacks. People who have never experienced a panic attack may find it hard to understand what you are going through. However, you can help them with this by sharing your difficult experiences with them. In fact, many people want to help those they love – but they don’t know what to say or do. Thus, if you can be more open with them, then they can reach out and offer you support.

6. Don’t avoid those situations which have led to a panic attack in the past. Avoidance will only ‘reinforce’ the disorder … So the more you avoid the dreaded situation the more panic the avoided situation generates. Should a panic attack occur, don’t attempt to fight the feelings. Instead, allow the feelings to wash over you … and then drain away. Focus on staying in the present moment.

7. Focus on slowing your breathing down. This help to ensure that your brain is receiving the appropriate amount of oxygen. That will help reduce your anxiety levels, and the panic attack will dissipate and end.

as a child, i had this really interesting way of dealing with executive dysfunction:

when i needed to do something but did not get the impulse to actually start, i counted to 20.

and at 20, i did the thing.

i started this in order to get me out of bed in the morning, and after a few weeks it was a reliable source of starting impulses. every time i hit 20, i got started. 

somewhere along the way i stopped doing it, because it was weird and nobody else needed to count in order to do stuff.

it makes me wonder, how many brilliant coping skills do we loose or never develop because we live in a neurotypical world and nobody teaches us these things? because we think they’re weird, because we don’t have words for what we’re doing, because they seem to have no place in this world?