FreeLists / lit-ideas / [lit-ideas] Re: Tune in and turn off - Panic attacks

[JimKandJulieB@xxxxxxx]

Forgetting something both simple and devastating is no mean feat.
 
Should I applaud or suggest cognitive therapy?
 
Julie Krueger

========Original  Message========     Subj: [lit-ideas] Re: Tune in and turn 
off - Panic attacks  Date: 5/2/06 5:14:34 A.M. Central Daylight Time  From: 
_donalmcevoyuk@xxxxxxxxxxxx (mailto:donalmcevoyuk@xxxxxxxxxxx)   To: 
_lit-ideas@xxxxxxxxxxxxxx (mailto:lit-ideas@xxxxxxxxxxxxx)   Sent on:    



> >>Likewise panic attacks  are ways of expressing submerged thoughts and 
> >>feelings and  emotions, as are obsessions, and arguably phobias. <<
> 
>  Perhaps or perhaps they are symptoms of a chemical imbalance in the  brain
> or 
> neuronal lesions or disease.  I suspect those  causes much more strongly
> than 
> suppressed bad  thoughts.

Panic attacks have been researched and a pioneering cognitive  therapy has
been developed that is 90%+ effective. A key pioneer was David  Clark, an
Oxford man. His theory is that panic attacks are not due to  chemical
imbalance or lesions or disease, nor "suppressed bad thoughts", but  arise
from a catastrophic (mis)interpretation of unpleasant but normal  bodily
sensations. 

The success of the cognitive therapy he developed  does not in fact prove the
thesis that panic attacks are cognitive rather  than biological/physiological
disorders. So he also developed an experiment  that shows that the underlying
cause of panic attacks must be cognitive. The  test is both simple and
devastating and I've forgotten what it  is.

Donal



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