How to Feel Normal Again After a Panic Attack

A few years back, my grandmother was very sick and had to undergo numerous MRI exams. Being the genetic matriarch of feet in our family unit, this caused her to have many panic attacks due to MRI claustrophobia. Later, getting my own MRI scan, I once again wondered how to deal with MRI claustrophobia and how to stop a panic attack while within an MRI machine.

Hither are the best ways I've constitute to cope with MRI claustrophobia and stop a panic attack while inside:

• Know Exactly What to Wait
• Sedation for MRI
• Recognize and Acknowledge Your Anxiety
• Talk Through it with the Radiologist
• Asking a Coating
• Listen to Music
• Meditate
• Focus on Your Animate
• Visualize Yourself as Being Somewhere Else
• Become in With a Trouble to Piece of work on

These tried-and-true methods should work wonders to ease your MRI claustrophobia and stop whatever panic attacks within the MRI auto.

If they seem a bit vague, no worries. We'll go into each step in much greater detail below.

Allow'southward swoop right in!

Know Exactly What to Await

Knowing what to wait during your MRI test tin can help calm your nerves immensely.

Oft, "the fear of the unknown" tin can be the scariest phobia of all.

So, do your due diligence. Make sure you know exactly what to look before you climb inside the machine; ideally earlier the day of your appointment. Here are some MRI FAQs you may find useful:

Why Would I Need an MRI Instead of an X-ray or CT Scan?
Ten-rays and CT Scans both rely on ionizing radiation to produce images that will give the doctor a better look inside. An MRI does not employ ionizing radiation, only rather, uses powerful magnets (almost 1000x stronger than the ones on your fridge!) and radio waves to produce images. The benefit of MRIs is that they're much better for imaging soft tissues than X-rays.

How long does an MRI concluding?
An MRI can last anywhere from xv to 90 minutes, depending on the role of your body being scanned and how many images are needed. Moving or fidgeting too much may necessitate additional scans, which could make the MRI examination accept longer every bit a event.

Does an MRI Require an Injection?
For approximately 1 in three MRI scans, Gadolinium Contrast Medium is used to produce better imaging results. This may or may not be recommended at the discretion of the radiologist. If you lot take a serious phobia of needles, the radiologist may accommodate you or skip the MRI contrast agents altogether.

Are MRIs Safe?
MRIs are much safer alternative to many other options, as they don't subject field you to radiations. For a minor subsect of the population information technology may be dangerous: for example, for those with an implanted pacemaker. Any condom concerns should be discussed with your radiologist, merely nigh people have nothing to fear.

Is There an MRI Panic Button?
With up to ten% of the population suffering from claustrophobia, radiologists sympathize that people may get anxious during an MRI. Most locations volition give you a "panic button" to hold onto while inside. This MRI panic push will assistance to give you some peace of mind, every bit yous can button it to be removed from the machine at any time.

Sedation for MRI

In that location are many options for sedation during an MRI if you lot feel information technology's necessary.

The best drug for MRI claustrophobia can be recommended to you past your doc. Oral sedation is oftentimes recommended for those with severe anxiety and panic attacks, in the form of benzodiazepines like Xanax, Valium, or Ativan. In extreme cases, I.V. sedation may also be offered.

I am generally not a fan of recommending hard anti-anxiety drugs for coping with anxiety. Yet, if your feet is severe and specific to receiving an MRI (MRIs occur pretty rarely), it can be justified if prescribed by your doc.

For milder, over-the-counter, or natural sedation options,cheque out this post about anxiety supplements.

Recognize and Acknowledge Your Feet

Perhaps the most important step to stopping a panic attack in any situation is to recognize and acknowledge your anxiety.

This ways recognizing your anxiety and panic attacks for what they are: Anxiety.

This may seem obvious, but information technology'southward something most people conveniently forget in the estrus of the moment.

When yous have a panic attack during an MRI, you need to remember this:

You are non dying.
You are not having a heart attack.
You are non suffocating.
You lot practice not need to run out of the room.
You are having a panic attack.

Your feet has got you lot worked upwardly, and the surge of adrenaline is causing your fears to spiral. But this fear will misemploy equally apace as it came on; information technology'll be over in a thing of minutes, at most.

Just be enlightened of this every bit you're inside the car, and retrieve that nothing is wrong.

If you have whatever concerns, your radiologist should exist nearby and available to talk through them with yous.

Talk Through information technology with the Radiologist

Fifty-fifty if you show up to the exam completely by yourself, you're never really alone.

I had an MRI washed on my shoulder final yr, and the radiologist was in the room with me the whole time, literally less than ten anxiety abroad.

He wasn't much of a talker, but I had just torn my rotator cuff then I wasn't feeling especially chatty myself.

But my bespeak is, he was right there the whole time. You volition non be "lone" for your exam.

If y'all have any questions or concerns, talk to your radiologist nearly them. That'due south what they're paid the big bucks for.

If you're feeling nervous within the car, feel free to express that to them. With 1 out of x people in the world suffering from claustrophobia, I promise yous they're used to it past now.

Spark upwardly a conversation with them about annihilation, and hopefully it volition help the fourth dimension pass.

Request a Blanket

Materials like clothes are fine to wear inside the MRI car, and so a blanket may be fine equally well.

With "weighted blankets" being a superlative holiday gift these days, information technology's obvious that people experience more than condom and secure when comforted by a coating.

If yous feel you might benefit from bringing a blanket in the machine with you, ask the radiologist if this is an selection. They may have one bachelor already, or may permit you to bring your own. Non to mention, MRI rooms are notoriously cold, so having a blanket tin serve multiple purposes.

Bonus points if you can convince the radiologist to tuck you in.

Listen to Music

Another detail I remember from getting my own MRI scan was the big, ugly, MRI-approved headphones they provided me with. They were seriously the tube television equivalent of headphones.

I didn't have to enquire for them or annihilation, they were simply provided. The music was already called for me as well. (Spoiler alert: It was half an hour of the "Guardians of the Galaxy" soundtrack).

Evidently, if y'all bring your own music (or guided meditation, audiobook, etc.) they tin normally play information technology over the headphones for you lot. Y'all cannot bring your own electronic devices or personal headphones into the MRI machine with you, however.

I've ever found music helpful to pull myself out of my own caput. While suffering from MRI claustrophobia, you can stop a panic attack by really listening to the music. I mean actively listen to it, not just passively let it play in the background while you focus on your panic attack.

Focusing on external stimuli rather than internal sensations tin assist pull you out of a panic assail.

Unfortunately, touch on, odour, sight, and gustatory modality are extremely limited during an MRI.

This leaves us with sound, so really strop in and enjoy the music.

Meditate

An alternative way to stop a panic attack during an MRI is to meditate. I tin't recommend meditation more highly plenty for anyone who suffers from anxiety.

No, I'm non referring to trancelike states or spiritual awakenings; recollect of it more similar mental exercise.

Laying at that place in the MRI machine is the perfect opportunity to practice some meditation. In that location are tons of means to go about this, just one elementary method is to simply shut your eyes and reel your thoughts in.

Have note of every passing thought or physical awareness; and then, let it laissez passer and focus on the nothingness once again. Distracted by the buzzing of the machine or the crawling on your arm? Simply take a mental annotation of it and and so allow the idea pass.

This can be hard for beginners, so feel free to read this post about meditating for anxiety.

If "nothingness" is a difficult focus point for you, you may focus on your breathing.

Focus on Your Breathing

During a panic attack, your breathing may starting time to experience ragged, difficult, or "off."

This is very common, and taking deliberate steps to command your animate volition help y'all to end your panic attack that much faster.

You lot can combine this method with meditation by actually focusing on the sensation of the air as it goes "in" through your nostrils, fill ups your lungs, and goes "out" through your mouth.

There are a ton of conflicting strategies online for how long to breathe in, how long to hold your breath, and how long to exhale out.

Let's keep it elementary and say five seconds in, 5 second hold, five seconds out.

This isn't something that needs to be overthought. The key cistron is that you are establishing some sort of regular breathing pattern while your brain allows itself to at-home down.

Combine this breathing method with another one of the distracting techniques on this list and you should render to feeling normal in a matter of moments.

If it doesn't feel similar it's working right away, don't panic. Remember, information technology is working, it's simply going to take a few minutes for the adrenaline to clothing off.

Visualize Yourself every bit Existence Somewhere Else

Some other useful strategy to cope with MRI claustrophobia and anxiety is to visualize yourself as being somewhere else.

This i is more or less as unproblematic equally it sounds.

Visualization is a tried and true method, so give information technology a shot. If you're imagining yourself every bit being stuck within a tight metal tube, you're definitely going to freak out.

Instead, consider the reality of the situation.

You lot are finer merely laying down with your eyes closed. In fact, this is the closest you lot can come to nap-time equally an developed; why not savor it?

Keep your eyes shut and imagine that you are anywhere else: your bed, the beach, a park bench, etc.

Hey, you can even count sheep if it helps, I don't care. Observe what works for y'all.

Go in With a Problem to Piece of work on

As you've no doubt noticed by now, the proper name of the game with panic attacks is lark.

You've got a high-powered, high-velocity thought car in your head and information technology wants to work. Unfortunately, some of its ideas are not so practiced for usa; like MRI claustrophobia and panic attacks.

Your encephalon is just following the blueprint it associates with this state of affairs. You have an irrational fear of MRI machines, and this is going to try and manifest as a panic assail during an MRI.

Your thoughts are going to try as hard every bit they tin can to go downward that route, focusing in on one idea: Fear.

Instead of giving our encephalon that opportunity, let's put it to piece of work.

By going into your MRI with a problem to work on, your stress-ridden, restless MRI claustrophobia panic attack becomes a productive brainstorming session.

This problem can be anything, but ideally, it'll exist something that doesn't trigger anxiety in you lot.

Working on the next affiliate of your volume? Need to come up with a tricky slogan for the next marketing presentation at work? Thinking about how to plan your 4-year-quondam girl's altogether political party?

This is the fourth dimension to work through information technology.

How to Feel Normal Again After a Panic Attack

Source: https://dontpanicdothis.com/mri-claustrophobia-panic-attack/

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