Causes Of Panic Attacks
A panic attack is the sudden onset of intense anxiety, characterized by feelings of intense fear and apprehension and accompanied by heart palpitations, shortness of breath, sweating, trembling plus several other symptoms. It is not understood what the cause of panic attacks is but several things could play a role including a combination of factors like biological and environmental.
Professionals have pointed out genetics which could be a reason that people have panic attacks. The exact way someone has the same hair or eye colour can be directly related to how families can experience panic attacks in their genes.
There is a possibility that some people are more likely to suffer from these attacks. There has been a link to family histories of panic disorders, depression, or any emotional disorders for some panic attack sufferers.
Another possible biological cause for panic attacks could be abnormalities in the brain. A panic disorder can be the result of certain changes in the way that parts of the brain function. Recent studies have suggested that panic attacks often co-occur with psychotic disorders like schizophrenia or post traumatic stress disorder.
Psychotic symptoms can also be a cause of panic attacks. Episodes of psychosis may happen prior to or predict the onset of certain anxiety disorders, like post traumatic stress disorder.
In addition information suggests that your system’s instinctual fight vs. flight reaction to negative stimulus is involved in panic attacks. Your body’s natural panic response is a set of both physical and mental processes that allow you to respond to a danger, such as a quicker heart beat and faster breath pattern. Throughout a panic attack, these reactions occur needlessly when there is no danger. It is a mystery why a panic attack happens when there is no obvious stimulus present.
Major life stress in some cases may be a cause of panic attacks as well. Stress may come in the form of a stressful event or a major life transition like the death or separation of a loved one. Some researchers have found that in these cases, when stresses lower your resistance, the underlying physical predisposition kicks in and may trigger an attack.
An environmental trigger of panic attacks could be seen through an addiction. The experience of being drunk or withdrawal of substances or alcohol due to abuse could also contribute to a panic disorder in a patient as well. Physical and environmental factors of a panic disorder could also cooperate at times.
Normally, attacks occur at random. Although, eventually the person afflicted may trigger them by responding to the physical signs associated with an episode. Such as, if an individual afflicted with a panic disorder experiences a very fast heart rate caused by an outside stimulus like ingesting a specific medication, they could see this as a sign of an attack. The individual could bring on the episode due to their anxiety since a large portion of the feat that comes with an episode is the fear of experiencing another panic attack.
Since the exact cause of panic disorders are not fully understood, it is important to seek treatment through several different forms of therapy.
