Well first of all I have anxiety, depression, and ADHD. I have been taking two medications to help me with those for at least 3 years, and I’m 16. I have a special needs brother(brother B) and recently he has been having a lot more melt downs because he is about to graduate high school and he is scared but he also has other changes going on and he isn’t dealing with it well.

I am very used to being called nasty names when he has freak outs, I never thought it bothered me because I know he doesn’t mean it but it’s been going on so often now and I guess it has been slowly eating away at me.

So a few days ago he cracked his phone screen and he flipped, I called my mom(she works in a doctors office) and we have gotten to a point where she can’t calm him down over the phone so she was trying to talk him down but it didn’t work. Then I went to get my eldest brother(brother A) who is like 23 I think and he came downstairs to the kitchen and took one look at him and turned around and said, “Yeah I’m not talking to him.” And just left me there by myself.

I also have a younger brother(brother C) and I didn’t want him to get into the middle of this so I told him to go into my parents room and watch tv with the door locked. I some how got my other brother into his room but he kept on coming back out and trying to break stuff. At that point I was so drained that I couldn’t even function, he wasn’t listening to me there was no point. So I told C to stay in there and let B break whatever he wants and wait for my mom to get home.

I went to my room, locked my door and just started crying so hard I couldn’t breathe. I cried for at least an hour and while crying B was throwing stuff at my door and yelling and cussing at me. I finally broke and opened my door and started yelling at him, and my mom finally got home and took over. I went back to my room and later down.

While laying down I decided that I wanted to go to therapy. I know that I cannot deal with this almost every day and never talk about it. It hurts even though I try to not let it get to me. He doesn’t think about how others feel when he says hurtful things, he just knows that he feels upset.

Around 2 hours later I come out of my room and eat dinner. After I ate I sat with my mom and told her that I wanted to start going to therapy. She said okay and asked if it was because of anything specific and I just said that I can’t keep on doing this and motioned to B. And I started tearing up and she opened her arms and told me to come here. I started balling. She hugged me for a good 20 minutes and told me that she was so sorry that I had to deal with this by myself. While crying I told her everything that has happened.

While this was going on B stood in the room across us and could see everything that was going on. After I mostly stopped crying my mom looked at him and said that what he does affects everyone not just him, it hurts the people that love him the most. He seemed genuinely distressed, he had never really seen me fall apart after one of his melt downs. He said he was sorry and that he didn’t know that it hurt us that much.

I told my mom that I think B needs to go see someone too to deal with his anger and how to express his emotions. Then I said that it wouldn’t be a bad thing if C also saw a therapist because he doesn’t ever really talk about that stuff with us and I know that he listens to more of what’s going on than he says.

So my mom said that she is already trying to get B into somewhere and that she would look for someone for us too. Then I calmed down and just sat and watched tv.

Next Day

I woke up to get ready for school and I felt off but I had spent the night before crying so that’s normal. I got ready and hurried to school. I was super tired but everything was good until around 4th period. My heart had started hurting and racing, I couldn’t catch my breath and I felt dizzy but I just continued doing my work and finished up.

Next period is my lunch and I have lunch with my 2 best friends buuut today they BOTH weren’t there so I had no one to help me so I texted my mom and told her that it got worse and when I looked down the ground would be moving in waves. My stomach was f-ed up I felt like crap, I couldn’t think straight but I also wasn’t letting it show to everyone around me. I asked if she could come pick me up because she had the day off and she asked if I could talk to A and see if he could pick me up because she wasn’t home yet. But my school has a strict no phone rule and I was barely getting away with texting her then, I told her that and she said she was on her way.

I had to go to my next period and the heart rate, breathing, headache, dizziness, and nausea was still going on. My next period was Floral Design. I had to put together an arrangement but I managed. It was getting worse and I told my mom, she was around 10 minutes away and she told me to get someone to take me to the office.

I talked to the teacher and he said that he couldn’t let me leave until the office called for me or else he would get in trouble. I totally understood but I still felt like crying. I sat in my seat and felt tears coming, I didn’t want to make a fool of myself so I went to the bathroom to chill. I calmed down and went back out.

My mom got there like a minute later and we left. She talked to me and decided to take me to her work to see someone. I got there and my heart rate calmed down and my breathing was a little better. But I was still super dizzy, had a headache, chest pain, and was nauseous. They did an EKG(they stick stickers to you chest and connect cables to the stickers and the cables connect to a machine that checks my heart.) just to make sure everything was okay, and it was.

The doctor comes back and says that he thinks it was a panic attack and that maybe my meds are reacting poorly to each other and not doing what they should. (I also had to get bloodwork but that doesn’t matter)

We leave and go to get food. I get home and calm down. Everything else that day goes by fine. I head to bed and go to sleep.

Next Day

I wake up and feel fine and I’m glad. I get ready and don’t really put a lot of effort into my appearance. And head to school. Everything was alright and then I was heading to 4th period again and while in class my heart started really hurting, it felt like when you are genuinely hurt and you start crying so hard that you can’t breathe, it felt like I was completely falling apart from the inside out. I felt like I was balling on the inside but felt nothing on the outside. I couldn’t catch my breath again but I knew what was going on this time and didn’t know how to stop it. People have asked if I get really stressed out in that class but it is super easy to me and we were doing relatively easy work.

The panic attack lasted the whole class period and I started to calm down as I headed to lunch. That day my friends were there and they helped me relax, but at that point it felt like my adhd meds completely wore off, I couldn’t stop moving, I was shaking and stuttering over my words. It was very frustrating. I hate feeling like this. I’m tired of not having control over my body. I’m hoping to get into a therapist soon and start the long long journey that’s ahead. Who knows what will happen it’s the next day after my 2nd panic attack and my chest is getting that feeling again, the panic attacks are so draining I don’t want to do this again but there isn’t much I can do to stop it at the moment. Anyone with experience with panic attacks please leave advice or anything really. Thanks for listening to me, sorry for making it so long. Love, Faith <3