Agoraphobia - Recovering From a Mental Disorder

What is Agoraphobia?
If you look up the diagnostic code DSM-5 anxiety disorders, Agoraphobia, there is an extensive explanation and criteria list. [1] However, as someone recovering from panic disorder with Agoraphobia, I sum it up as avoidance of anxiety or panic attacks.

How does panic disorder with Agoraphobia work?
For me, any place that I suffered a panic attack would usually cause me high anxiety or panic if I revisited the same place. My mind was linking the place with the fear, even though I knew this was irrational it did stop the feelings of terror that I felt. Therefore, I started to avoid places where I had a panic attack. My world grew very small quickly.

My Story:
I've had panic attacks since my early 20s, but didn't develop acute Agoraphobia until 20 years later. What changed? At the time I was working long hours as a network administrator creating, maintaining, updating virtual machines and thin clients. I wasn't taking good care of myself and didn't know it, but I was suffering from hypothyroidism, anemia and several nutritional deficiencies. I stated to have severe panic attacks, some to the point where I would black out. The chickens had come home to roost. I finally went to the doctor and was diagnosed with my health issues and started thyroid medication and supplements for the nutritional deficiencies to physically get well again. However, my mind wasn't so easy to mend. It remembered and linked all the places I had panic attacks, which by this time was almost everywhere I went daily including work. It started to become unbearable to go to work every day and function. I talked to my management team and they were understanding and let me work from home for a year. After that I left my job a year earlier than I had planned. The best-laid plans of mice and men often go awry. My world was getting much smaller now. At my lowest point I was struggle to get to my mailbox without having extreme anxiety. If I had to go somewhere I would wait for my husband to take me, so I would feel safer and less anxious. I started an organic blueberry orchard, so I could make money doing something at home and it was my dream to live a more simple life. Well, farming maybe simpler than IT, but it's not easy by a long shot. Also, my elderly mother-in-law came to live with us, since she was having trouble taking care of herself alone. My husband started to volunteer most of his off time at the animal shelter and started to bring home dogs that were hard luck cases that no one wanted and some of them needed quite a bit of care. At one time we had seven dogs. The problem with this was it fell mostly to me to take care of the dogs, orchard, housework, Mom and I also had two horses of my own to take care of. I would tell my husband I needed more help, but he felt he was doing more than his part by taking Mom and I to all our appointments and the grocery shopping. This often lead to arguments that left me feeling overwhelmed, isolated, lonely and terrified. I would often think what happened to my life, I was so independent, so full of life, quick to laugh. I felt like an empty shell of the person I once was and I was no longer living life, I was just existing. I had to depend on others to take me places, since I had gotten too scared to go alone. This dependency started to weight heavy on me. I had always thought how could anyone ever contemplate committing suicide, life is so beautiful, so precious. However, I found myself sitting on the edge of my bed staring at my gun on the nightstand, crying and thinking I can put this suffering to an end in an instant. It would all be over for me and I would no longer be a burden to my husband and family. I remembered a quote I had read that "suicide was a permanent solution to a temporary problem." I looked down through my watery eyes at my dog who was staring up at me with his ears down and eyes wide looking at me helpless and scared and I thought I maybe struggling, but I'm not worthless. If I can think of death as an option then why is facing my fear the lesser option? I put my gun away and more than ever I was determined to recover from my mental disorder.

A promise I wrote to myself:

Recovery Process:
I kept the promise to myself and try almost every therapy out there. All had some part in my recovery. I was in talk therapy which helped me put to rest my childhood traumas. These were things I had never told anyone, even though I knew it was not my fault, the shame was deep. I listen to all of Claire Weekes audio books and learned acceptance of the panic sensations.[2] I had found another story of a sufferer of Agoraphobia named Marius Smook that had recovered using Clare Weekes program and had an exercise called "right ready action" that could be practiced at home to prepare for real world exposures. Unfortunately, his website with his free e-book is gone. I seen a hypnotherapist which helped quiet my constant mind chatter and racing thoughts. She also taught me mindfulness which helped get me out of constantly living in my mind and living in the real world around me. I found two fantastic books on the subject, Mindfulness: An Eight-Week Plan for Finding Peace in a Frantic World[3] and the Power of Now by Eckhart Tolle.[4] That lead to me listening daily to guided hypnosis sessions on youtube by Micheal Sealey.[5] I found a therapist that taught CBT (Cognitive-behavioral therapy)[6] and ERP (exposure and response prevention)[7]. This is where I started to see some real progress. The CBT was helping me change my maladapted thoughts patterns with more productive ones and the exposure was helping face my fears head-on. However, I would have setbacks and would be too scared to go to places on my own again and a back and forth, back and forth progress went on. I bought a book called DARE.[8] I signed up for the DARE bootcamp and for the first time I "ran towards" my panic I became the observer of the fear and not swept away by it. Therefore, I signed up for the advanced group to help motivate progress, but I was still having trouble really pushing my exposures by myself. One day I was getting so frustrated I just cried on my Mother-in-laws shoulder and I will never forget what she said to me, "There are things in life we are given that we just have to accept, we have to climb a steep set of stairs, but at the top there will be a golden room." Sadly, two weeks later she passed away, but I'm forever grateful for her words of wisdom. Lastly, I upped my exposure therapy to an intensive program for six weeks with Rogers Memorial Behavioral Health in Tampa. They taught me interoceptive exposure[9] to be able to cope better with the physical sensations of a panic attack. Their exposure therapy was different by making me do the same exposure repeatedly on the same day until it caused little to no anxiety which they call habituation.[10] All exposure had to be done with no cell phone to stop see that as a "safety" item. After about three weeks I started to have significant progress. By the end of the six weeks I was driving home by myself 80 miles. That was something I couldn't even image trying to attempt when I had started the program just six short weeks earlier.

What Did I learn Along the Way?
I don't take anything in my life for granted.
I'm stronger than I thought and can handle more than I could ever image.
I empathize with people more than ever before.
For these things I'm grateful to the mental disorder I suffered, because without it I would have never learned these lessons so deeply.

How am I Doing Today?
It's been three months since I completed my six weeks at Rogers and I now do all my shopping, doctor, dentist, hair appointments on my own and I keep challenging myself, I took a boat trip by myself and went on a train, next is our local public transportation, then onto a plane ride and keep expanding longer drives from home. I've started taking better care of myself by exercising more and eating better. I do Zumba classes in the morning, yoga on Sunday and belly dancing on Monday. I'm getting back into photography, bike riding and bowling. I have plans to do a permaculture system in my yard which I will do in small manageable phases. Many different techniques went into my journey of recovery I hope this reaches anyone out there suffering. I just want you to know you are not alone in this suffering, but there is a golden room at the end. <3