Updated: Jun 19, 2021
Have you found yourself thinking? He does.
Have you found yourself constantly thinking? He does.
Have you found yourself constantly overthinking? He did.
Have you found yourself constantly overthinking at night resulting in sleeplessness? He did.
After working from home all day long, he returned back to his bed. He lay down, closed his eyes, and began thinking. He began thinking about his day. Even though everything did not go as planned, he thought that it was a beautiful day for him and was so proud of all that he achieved during the day. He felt extremely grateful for his life and for those around him.
14 months back, it was all different.
After working at the office all day long, he returned back home and to his bed. He lay down, closed his eyes, and began thinking. He began thinking about his day. He thought about how bad his day was and how nothing went as planned. He was extremely frustrated and couldn’t help but think about how he had achieved nothing throughout the day. Everything went wrong. It was one of his worst days at work.
He had some sleep concerns in the past as well. However, that night was the first time he couldn’t fall asleep. He stayed awake throughout the night, tossing and turning in bed. He tried sleeping in different positions, on a different side of the bed, with and without his blanket, by counting backward, by chanting repeatedly, by listening to guided meditation; however, nothing seemed to work. He finally gave up and sat-up on the bed. He removed his laptop and wrote to his boss at 4 AM, “I am sorry but I will not be able to come for work tomorrow. I have encountered an unavoidable emergency.” He shut the laptop, got out of bed, went to the balcony. He stood there on the balcony staring at the bright lights of the city that ‘never sleeps’. He looked down from the balcony and thought, “Should I?”.
He got scared. He was so scared that such a thought even occurred to him. He ran back to his room, shut the door, locked it, got on the bed, and covered himself with his blanket. He was shivering, sweating, and could feel his heart racing. He sat up and found himself nearly passing out and unable to breathe. As he quivered, he reached out for a glass of water, but it fell to the floor. He closed his eyes and found himself sinking in the darkness.
Exactly 2 minutes and 33 seconds later, it all stopped. Everything felt okay. He lay back down and started thinking, “What was that? Am I going to die?”. He removed his phone and went on Google. He typed, “shivering, sweating, heart palpitations, shortness of breath, a sensation of passing out, felt like I was going to die”. The only answer he got was a diagnosis. A diagnosis for a mental health condition. It was, indeed, a panic attack.
He locked his phone, moved over to the other side of the bed, and thought, “I am going crazy. I have a mental health disorder. I can’t tell anyone about this. What will they think? What will they say?”. He closed his eyes tightly, pinched himself, and tried to make himself believe that it was all a dream. Gradually, he fell asleep.
The next day, he woke up at 2 PM. He was extremely groggy. Just as he opened his eyes, all the memories from the previous night flashed back again and he couldn’t breathe. He tried to hold onto his blanket. Exactly 1 minute and 2 s