Causes of Panic Attacks

The short and obvious answer: panic attacks are caused by high anxiety. But, what exactly is anxiety? Understanding how anxiety crops up will help you defeat panic attacks.

One of the biggest myths surrounding anxiety is that it is harmful and can lead to a number of various life-threatening conditions.

Definition of Anxiety

Anxiety is defined as a state of apprehension or fear resulting from the anticipation of a real or imagined threat, event, or situation. It is one of the most common human emotions experienced by people at some point in their lives.

However, most people who have never experienced a panic attack, or extreme anxiety, fail to realize the terrifying nature of the experience. Extreme dizziness, blurred vision, tingling and feelings of breathlessness—and that’s just the tip of the iceberg!

When these sensations occur and people do not understand why, they feel they have contracted an illness, or a serious mental condition. The threat of losing complete control seems very real and naturally very terrifying.

Fight/Flight Response: One of the root causes of panic attacks?

I am sure most of you have heard of the fight/flight response as an explanation for one of the root causes of panic attacks. Have you made the connection between this response and the unusual sensations you experience during and after a panic attack episode?

Anxiety is a response to a danger or threat. It is so named because all of its effects are aimed toward either fighting or fleeing from the danger. Thus, the sole purpose of anxiety is to protect the individual from harm. This may seem ironic given that you no doubt feel your anxiety is actually causing you great harm...perhaps the most significant of all the causes of panic attacks.

However, the anxiety that the fight/flight response created was vital in the daily survival of our ancient ancestors—when faced with some danger, an automatic response would take over that propelled them to take immediate action such as attack or run. Even in today's hectic world, this is still a necessary mechanism. It comes in useful when you must respond to a real threat within a split second.

Anxiety is a built-in mechanism to protect us from danger. Interestingly, it is a mechanism that protects but does not harm—an important point that will be elaborated upon later.

The Physical Manifestations of a Panic Attack: Other pieces of the puzzle to understand the causes of panic attacks. Nervousness and Chemical Effects...

When confronted with danger, the brain sends signals to a section of the nervous system. It is this system that is responsible for gearing the body up for action and also calms the body down and restores equilibrium. To carry out these two vital functions, the autonomic nervous system has two subsections, the sympathetic nervous system and the parasympathetic nervous system.

Although I don't want to become too "scientific," having a basic understanding of the sympathetic and parasympathetic nervous system will help you understand the causes of panic attacks.

The sympathetic nervous system is the one we tend to know all too much about because it primes our body for action, readies us for the “fight or flight” response, while the parasympathetic nervous system is the one we love dearly as it serves as our restoring system, which returns the body to its normal state.

When either of these systems is activated, they stimulate the whole body, which has an “all or nothing” effect. This explains why when a panic attack occurs, the individual often feels a number of different sensations throughout the body.

The sympathetic system is responsible for releasing the adrenaline from the adrenal glands on the kidneys. These are small glands located just above the kidneys. Less known, however, is that the adrenal glands also release adrenaline, which functions as the body’s chemical messengers to keep the activity going. When a panic attack begins, it does not switch off as easily as it is turned on. There is always a period of what would seem increased or continued anxiety, as these messengers travel throughout the body. Think of them as one of the physiological causes of panic attacks, if you will.

After a period of time, the parasympathetic nervous system gets called into action. Its role is to return the body to normal functioning once the perceived danger is gone. The parasympathetic system is the system we all know and love, because it returns us to a calm relaxed state.

When we engage in a coping strategy that we have learned, for example, a relaxation technique, we are in fact willing the parasympathetic nervous system into action. A good thing to remember is that this system will be brought into action at some stage whether we will it or not. The body cannot continue in an ever-increasing spiral of anxiety. It reaches a point where it simply must kick in, relaxing the body. This is one of the many built-in protection systems our bodies have for survival.

You can do your best with worrying thoughts, keeping the sympathetic nervous system going, but eventually it stops. In time, it becomes a little smarter than us, and realizes that there really is no danger. Our bodies are incredibly intelligent—modern science is always discovering amazing patterns of intelligence that run throughout the cells of our body. Our body seems to have infinite ways of dealing with the most complicated array of functions we take for granted. Rest assured that your body’s primary goal is to keep you alive and well.

Not so convinced?

Try holding your breath for as long as you can. No matter how strong your mental will is, it can never override the will of the body. This is good news—no matter how hard you try to convince yourself that you are gong to die from a panic attack, you won’t. Your body will override that fear and search for a state of balance. There has never been a reported incident of someone dying from a panic attack.

Remember this next time you have a panic attack; he causes of panic attacks cannot do you any physical harm. Your mind may make the sensations continue longer than the body intended, but eventually everything will return to a state of balance. In fact, balance (homeostasis) is what our body continually strives for.

The interference for your body is nothing more than the sensations of doing rigorous exercise. Our body is not alarmed by these symptoms. Why should it be? It knows its own capability. It’s our thinking minds that panic, which overreact and scream in sheer terror! We tend to fear the worst and exaggerate our own sensations. A quickened heart beat becomes a heart attack. An overactive mind seems like a close shave with schizophrenia. Is it our fault? Not really—we are simply diagnosing from poor information.

Cardiovascular Effects Activity in the sympathetic nervous system increases our heartbeat rate, speeds up the blood flow throughout the body, ensures all areas are well supplied with oxygen and that waste products are removed. This happens in order to prime the body for action.

A fascinating feature of the “fight or flight” mechanism is that blood (which is channelled from areas where it is currently not needed by a tightening of the blood vessels) is brought to areas where it is urgently needed.

For example, should there be a physical attack, blood drains from the skin, fingers, and toes so that less blood is lost, and is moved to “active areas” such as the thighs and biceps to help the body prepare for action.

This is why many feel numbness and tingling during a panic attack-often misinterpreted as some serious health risk-such as the precursor to a heart attack. Interestingly, most people who suffer from anxiety often feel they have heart problems. If you are really worried that such is the case with your situation, visit your doctor and have it checked out. At least then you can put your mind at rest.

Respiratory Effects

One of the scariest effects of a panic attack is the fear of suffocating or smothering. It is very common during a panic attack to feel tightness in the chest and throat. I’m sure everyone can relate to some fear of losing control of your breathing. From personal experience, anxiety grows from the fear that your breathing itself would cease and you would be unable to recover. Can a panic attack stop our breathing? No.

A panic attack is associated with an increase in the speed and depth of breathing. This has obvious importance for the defense of the body since the tissues need to get more oxygen to prepare for action. The feelings produced by this increase in breathing, however, can include breathlessness, hyperventilation, sensations of choking or smothering, and even pains or tightness in the chest. The real problem is that these sensations are alien to us, and they feel unnatural.

Having experienced extreme panic attacks myself, I remember that on many occasions, I would have this feeling that I couldn’t trust my body to do the breathing for me, so I would have to manually take over and tell myself when to breathe in and when to breathe out. Of course, this didn’t suit my body’s requirement of oxygen and so the sensations would intensify—along with the anxiety. It was only when I employed the technique I will describe for you later, did I let the body continue doing what it does best—running the whole show.

Importantly, a side-effect of increased breathing, (especially if no actual activity occurs) is that the blood supply to the head is actually decreased. While such a decrease is only a small amount and is not at all dangerous, it produces a variety of unpleasant but harmless symptoms that include dizziness, blurred vision, confusion, sense of unreality, and hot flushes.

Other Physical Effects of Panic Attacks:

Now that we've discussed some of the primary physiological causes of panic attacks, there are a number of other effects that are produced by the activation of the sympathetic nervous system, none of which are in any way harmful.

For example, the pupils widen to let in more light, which may result in blurred vision, or “seeing” stars, etc. There is a decrease in salivation, resulting in dry mouth. There is decreased activity in the digestive system, which often produces nausea, a heavy feeling in the stomach, and even constipation. Finally, many of the muscle groups tense up in preparation for “fight or flight” and this results in subjective feelings of tension, sometimes extending to actual aches and pains, as well as trembling and shaking.

Overall, the fight/flight response results in a general activation of the whole bodily metabolism. Thus, one often feels hot and flushed and, because this process takes a lot of energy, the person generally feels tired and drained.

Mental Manifestations: Are the causes of panic attacks all in my head? is a question many people wonder to themselves.

The goal of the fight/flight response is making the individual aware of the potential danger that may be present. Therefore, when activated, the mental priority is placed upon searching the surroundings for potential threats. In this state one is highly-strung, so to speak. It is very difficult to concentrate on any one activity, as the mind has been trained to seek all potential threats and not to give up until the threat has been identified. As soon as the panic hits, many people look for the quick and easiest exit from their current surroundings, such as by simply leaving the bank queue and walking outside. Sometimes the anxiety can heighten, if we perceive that leaving will cause some sort of social embarrassment.

If you have a panic attack while at the workplace but feel you must press on with whatever task it is you are doing, it is quite understandable that you would find it very hard to concentrate. It is quite common to become agitated and generally restless in such a situation. Many individuals I have worked with who have suffered from panic attacks over the years indicated that artificial light—such as that which comes from computer monitors and televisions screens—can can be one of the causes of panic attacks by triggering them or worsen a panic attack, particularly if the person is feeling tired or run down.

This is worth bearing in mind if you work for long periods of time on a computer. Regular break reminders should be set up on your computer to remind you to get up from the desk and get some fresh air when possible.

In other situations, when during a panic attack an outside threat cannot normally be found, the mind turns inwards and begins to contemplate the possible illness the body or mind could be suffering from. This ranges from thinking it might have been something you ate at lunch, to the possibility of an oncoming cardiac arrest.

The burning question is: Why is the fight/flight response activated during a panic attack even when there is apparently nothing to be frightened of?

Upon closer examination of the causes of panic attacks, it would appear that what we are afraid of are the sensations themselves—we are afraid of the body losing control. These unexpected physical symptoms create the fear or panic that something is terribly wrong. Why do you experience the physical symptoms of the fight/flight response if you are not frightened to begin with? There are many ways these symptoms can manifest themselves, not just through fear.

For example, it may be that you have become generally stressed for some reason in your life, and this stress results in an increase in the production of adrenaline and other chemicals, which from time to time, would produce symptoms....and which you perceive as the causes of panic attacks.

This increased adrenaline can be maintained chemically in the body, even after the stress has long gone. Another possibility is diet, which directly affects our level of stress. Excess caffeine, alcohol, or sugar is known for causing stress in the body, and is believed to be one of the contributing factors of the causes of panic attacks (Chapter 5 gives a full discussion on diet and its importance).

Unresolved emotions are often pointed to as possible trigger of panic attacks, but it is important to point out that eliminating panic attacks from your life does not necessarily mean analyzing your psyche and digging into your subconscious. The “One Move” technique will teach you to deal with the present moment and defuse the attack along with removing the underlying anxiety that sparks the initial anxiety.

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Joe Barry is an international panic disorder coach. His informative site on all issues related to panic and anxiety attacks can be found here:http://www.panicportal.com


This article is copywritten material

It's Monday morning and the anxiety is building...

It is Monday morning and the anxiety is building as I ride into work. I only managed to get a couple of hours sleep last night as I spent most of the night wide awake worrying about it. How am I going to get out of this? I’ve been racking my brain all night and still haven’t come up with an answer. I can’t ring in sick again; I did that last Monday and I’ve got virtually no sick leave left. The day or two I do have left, I need to save in case of really big one.


As a child, I knew there was something wrong but I was always told by my parents, “It’s normal to get nervous at times.” I was never able to convey just how nervous I got. Speaking in front of class was the worst. Terrified of an upcoming class talk, I once remember asking my older brother for help. The advice he gave me was “you can’t be good at everything.” In a way, he was right and his advice provided a tiny bit of relief at the time. I was a bright student and did well in most subjects. English was an exception and having to give a speech would have me agonising over it for the days leading up to it. I knew I was the worst in the class at giving speeches. I worked harder on my speeches than anything else, because I did not want to look foolish in front of everyone. My heart was pounding, my voice quivering, pools of sweat were collecting and my hands were shaking so bad I was having trouble reading my notes. My mates gave me a serve afterwards but they stopped and laughed when I confidently replied, “Ahh, well, you can’t be good at everything!”

Fast forward ten years.

The older I get the more anxious I become. I’m twenty-five and can’t get a job and can’t get a girlfriend. The fear of being interviewed, and the fear of even just ringing a girl I like, is more than enough to ensure I never attempt either. The anxiety closes in on the other side too though, “what if I’m thirty and still don’t have a job? What if I’m thirty and still don’t have a girlfriend?” I know the anxiety of NOT doing anything at 30 is going to be even more than not doing anything at 25. Knowing that no-one is going to want to go out with an unemployed loser, I decide to do absolutely everything I can to get a job.”


I remember talking to my father on the phone the night before I was to be interviewed. To this day, I remember his exact words at the end of our conversation. “I believe in you son,” set a ripple through my body which I believe profoundly affected the outcome of the interview the following day.

I had prepared extremely thoroughly but was still petrified. At the security desk my hands were shaking violently as I tried to hold the pen steady enough to write my name. It was barely legible. I never calmed down at all and shook throughout the entire interview, though slightly less towards the end. My voice quivered and croaked and although I clearly needed some water I refused it when offered. I was shaking so badly there was no chance of any of that water going anywhere near my lips if I picked up the glass. I don’t know how, or what it was I said that convinced them, but they offered me a position.

Fast forward to Monday morning again. What’s that thing they’ve asked me at work to do that’s causing me so much anxiety? Make a phone call. Nothing complicated, just have to ring someone and make a simple everyday phone call. It’s been six years since my first full-blown panic attack. I say full-blown because looking back I realised that I’d had less severe ones up until then but hadn’t really known what they were. It wasn’t until after this one that I learnt what a panic attack was.

I was already under a lot of pressure, as was our whole team to meet an unrealistic deadline. I’d finished a piece of work early and my boss then asked me to arrange for a computer graphic to be created. Immediately I started to worry. I took a quick sideways glance at the phone and back again. I started to come up with excuses, and that someone else would be better to do it. But everyone else was still flat out and I didn’t have to do the work myself. All I had to do was make a simple phone call and tell someone else what we needed.

In the past, I had put off making phone calls at work for days, sometimes weeks. I would come up with elaborate plans to avoid making the call. Sometimes it was as simple as going to see them in person if they only worked a few floors away. Sometimes I would have to make five or six trips before I could catch them in.

One time I had to ring a guy that I would sometimes see on the bus on the way to work. He was a genuinely nice guy. Could I ring him though? No chance – not with all those people in the open plan office listening. His building was too far away from mine for me to go visit unannounced. So what did I do? It took about a week or more before I saw him on the bus again, but when I did, I arranged what I had to with him as we walked from the bus stop into work.

One time I even rang a colleague from home at 9.05 am. I then raced into work. Since I was home alone, I was able to get through the call with only minor anxiety. Unfortunately he called me back about ten or fifteen minutes later and was more than a little surprised when he was told that I hadn’t come in to work yet!


The purpose of this site.

The purpose of this blog is to reassure sufferers that they are not alone and that this condition can be treated. This blog will be a record of my progress and what has worked for me. This is a topic that I have become quite knowledgeable about over the years and I hope to share this knowledge with those who are now looking for answers.


Fast forward back to Monday again. Are you wondering yet? Did I make that call? I almost did a couple of times during the day, but sadly, no, I chickened out. One time I was getting ready to make the call and then my boss would come back. Can’t ring with him sitting there. Later, I’d be about to ring but then I would suddenly become aware of how quiet the room was. Can’t do it then, everyone in the office would hear. If I don’t ring soon though, I won’t have the information I need and so I wont get my work done. If I don’t get my work done I don’t want to even think about what will happen in our weekly team meeting when I have to talk about what I’ve been doing for the last week!

Actually I’ve got a few calls to make that I’ve been putting off for a couple of weeks now. One I’ve gotten out of, because someone else has done the work. I feel bad about that because it’s something I should have done, but it beats having a panic attack in front of an office of twenty people any day. One down, two to go. I’ll have to do them tomorrow. I don’t think I’m going to sleep very well tonight.