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Lorraine Mason has been involved with panic attacks for over
35 years…
Initially, in 1966, at the age of 21, she developed panic
attacks and suffered severely with them for almost four years.
Once fully recovered she then began to help others who where
suffering as she had. After a few years of both helping sufferers
and studying the deeper elements of panic attacks her unique
approach to recovery began to take form. More years passed
and, as she continued to assess and adapt her techniques of
help, she saw that by using her own personally devised ‘five
step’ approach, all sufferers were gaining great benefit
with most making a complete recovery. For the past 10 years,
Lorraine has used her universal ‘five step’ programme
to help hundreds of panic attack sufferers gain total and
permanent freedom. And now, due to the impossible task of
working with every sufferer who seeks her help, she has transferred
her ‘five step’ programme to book form; from which
her vast knowledge, empathic manner and unique ability is
apparent for all to see.
Hello! Many years ago, after a combination
of getting married, moving house twice, becoming pregnant,
realising that my husband was having an affair and having
my first baby, all within thirteen months, I had my first
experience with panic attacks. I was shopping at the time
in my local market, when suddenly, for seemingly no reason,
I felt very dizzy, my heart started to race, a tremendous
wave of fear swept through me, the building itself seemed
to close in on me and a need to escape from all the people,
noise, hustle and bustle overwhelmed me to where I quickly
made my way out of the building.
Once outside, the 'funny turn' began to ease but as the whole
experience had happened unexpectedly and seemingly without
cause, it left me feeling so unnerved that I immediately caught
the bus back home. When home, although relieved to be there,
I still felt extremely unnerved at not knowing what on earth
had happened. Nevertheless, as the hours and days passed without
further recurrence, I began to suspect the whole thing had
been a lot of fuss about nothing.
About 10 days after the 'funny turn,' whilst sitting in church
and again seemingly for no reason, my heart suddenly began
to race, my body trembled, I felt faint, claustrophobic, frightened
and in need of escape. The very thought of fainting in front
of all the congregation added to my concerns, so again I quickly
made my escape outside. However this time, as a 'funny turn'
had then happened twice, I began to suspect that something
real must be wrong with me.
Over the following few weeks, the 'turns' gradually intensified
in both frequency and severity to where they were no longer
merely waves of fear but waves of actual terror. I only had
to be in a crowd of people, on a bus, in a lift or queuing
in a shop when suddenly, and seemingly for no reason, my heart
would race and pound so much I honestly feared it would burst,
my body would shake violently and sweat profusely, my legs
would buckle, my stomach gripe, my head swirl, my mind frenzied
and as the certainty of imminent death overpowered me, every
fibre and sinew in my body and mind literally forced me to
run. And even though I developed the habit of always sitting
or standing near to a doorway or exit for a quick escape,
the waves of terror increased daily to where eventually they
were hitting me anywhere and everywhere.
As I continued to deteriorate my rocky marriage broke down
and my parents took both my son and myself back home to live
with them . Whilst I obviously felt very relieved at having
help with my son and for being free from my marital situation,
my worrying over what was happening to me was taking over,
as every time a panic attack struck all I felt able to do
was frenziedly scream out to my Mum, “Oh God, it's here
again, I’m going mad, I know I’m going mad. I
can’t stand this any more. Please help me!” Which
of course only convinced me further that either something
dire was physically happening to me or insanity was imminent.
As the weeks passed, driven by their concern for me, my parents
would encourage me to go out with them in the family car.
But time and time again, as I prepared to go out and indeed
whilst out, the same fears flooded my mind, “What if
a wave of terror should suddenly strike whilst I was outside?
Where could I run? Who could I run to? Who would come to my
aid? What if I had a heart attack? Where would the nearest
hospital be?” Consequently, by the time we had travelled
200 yards away from home, the fear would have risen-up inside
me to such an overwhelming level that, in absolute desperation,
I would literally beg to be taken back home.
Up to that point, rightly or wrongly, every
single day I had gritted my teeth, collected my courage and
literally forced myself out the door to walk the 30 yards
to the local corner shop, genuinely believing that by forcing
myself through this tortuous ritual I was somehow hanging
on to my sanity. And although, on a few occasions, I managed
to reach the shop and fumble out a few words, ever more frequently
fear would rise within me to such an overwhelming level that
I was forced to run back home empty-handed and in a state
of absolute frenzy. So as the weeks passed, as the journey
to the corner shop became ever more torturous and as it all
became too much for me, in the desperate attempt to save myself
further unnecessary suffering, I decided to stop forcing myself
outdoors but rather, to stay indoors, within the confines
of home, where I felt some degree of sanctuary.
Months then passed, and due to my not having an understanding
doctor mixed with my own lack of understanding of what was
happening to me, fear, exhaustion, pain and terror were becoming
entrenched into every aspect of my life, having a dramatic
effect on both my physical and mental health…
Physically, I was totally exhausted:- whilst my whole body
was throbbing with a grinding-like pulsation, sharp pains
would shoot through my body from one limb to another - my
throat felt so tight I genuinely thought I was slowly choking
to death - my heart was continuously banging, palpitating,
jumping and missing beats - stabbing pains were shooting across
my chest into the area around my heart - the constant aching
pain in the middle of my chest was so strong I genuinely believed
that I had developed a serious heart condition - and in the
hope of finding a degree of reassurance, I sat constantly
with a finger over my pulse but needless to say reassurance
never came.
Mentally, my mind also was driven to exhaustion:- I was then
living in the thick, black, foggy places of the mind that
brought terror to my very core – whilst I could physically
see and hear my family and the world around me, I was seemingly
lost, out of reach, trapped inside myself looking out at them
through a glass or Perspex shield and, in a way, living in
another dimension to them – weird and frightening thoughts
were also engulfing me, with subject matter laughable to other
people but which, to me, seemed very real, plausible, frighteningly
imminent and of such intensity that I simply couldn’t
understand how everyone was going about the normal daily life
when, as far as I believed, horrors of all kinds were about
to happen.
Eventually, as horrific thoughts of doom, gloom, madness and
death consumed my mind, all rational thought was lost to me:–
I couldn’t watch television, listen to the radio, read
a newspaper or talk to friends for fear I might see, hear
or read bad news or perhaps come upon descriptions of horrific
illnesses that matched my own symptoms – whenever I
did inadvertently come upon negativity of any kind, my mind
would tightly grip onto it, turn it upside-down, inside out,
twist and distort it until another terror was found; which
served to drag me down even further into my own 'seeming'
madness – I couldn’t go outdoors or even look
out of a window without feeling totally overwhelmed by all
the space – I couldn’t bathe or go to the toilet
alone for fear of having a heart attack, brain haemorrhage
or indeed any attack whilst not being in the position to run
– I couldn’t go to bed alone, as sleep didn’t
come easily and in the depths of night seeing my Mum next
to me brought me immeasurable comfort – I couldn’t
sleep alone, for when I did sleep my dreams were filled with
the most vivid and frightening nightmares – and even
when my sleep was not filled with horror, I would still wake
most nights completely engulfed in a full-blown wave of terror,
only to frenziedly jump out of bed, run around the bedroom,
crying hysterically, “Someone please help me.”
I remember one morning as if it were yesterday, standing in
my Mum's kitchen, being so very frightened of what might lie
ahead, yet feeling totally helpless to do anything about it
and thinking, “So this is what it feels like to be insane!
This must be insanity because nothing else could ever be so
weird and frightening. I wonder if they’ll take me away?
Oh God! What’s going to become of me? What’s going
to become of my little boy?”
One year turned into two of my suffering ‘fear attacks’
(not knowing they were something called panic attacks) and
whilst believing there was nothing else I could do, nowhere
else I could go, no one else I could turn to for help, and
with all my hopes, dreams and health fading fast, I reached
the point of thinking, “I just can’t do this anymore!
It would be so easy to simply take an overdose and put an
end to all this suffering.” – “But how can
I abandon my beautiful son, what would happen to him if I
were not around to protect him?” – “Yet
what use am I to him like this? After all, if I were dead
a relative would surely adopt him and give him a wonderful
life.” – “But I’m his mum; he needs
me!” – “Maybe, but I just can’t go
through anymore.”
'The darkest hour is just before dawn' so
the proverb says, and one evening, due to my Dad being late
home from work, I happened to see the local evening newspaper
still on the desk, and despite my fear of hearing or seeing
bad news, by sheer absentmindedness (or as I believe by the
guiding hand of my guardian angel), without realising what
I was doing, I glanced through it. And there it was, an article
on the book 'Self Help For Your Nerves' by Dr. Clair Weeks.
I couldn’t believe it! And as my eyes flashed over the
article, I absolutely knew that I had to get the book and,
with the help of my Mum, somehow read it.
Now, some people experience love at first sight and some have
'a road to Damascus' experience, but when I read 'Self Help
For Your Nerves,' it was as though someone had lit the brightest
of lights on that, my darkest of nights. And even though I
personally found it impossible to put Dr. Weeks suggestion
of ‘floating’ into practice (which made me fear
I was much worse than everyone else), even though I was left
with many questions unanswered and even though I still needed
to work on my recovery for many months afterwards, I nevertheless
found Dr. Weeks book to be of the greatest value. Indeed I
know, in the deepest part of my being, beyond any shadow of
doubt whatsoever, that the book, 'Self Help For Your Nerves'
by Dr. Clair Weeks actually saved my life! It did so by acting
as the bridge that allowed me to crossover from feeling lost
and alone to being found by a friend. It took me from feeling
overwhelmed by despair to seeing a ray of hope. It took me
from fearing I was insane to realising I was not. And it helped
me to see that peace was not beyond my reach but was actually
there and, sooner or later, I would find it.
At this point, I will take the opportunity to convey my deepest
gratitude to Dr Weeks and openly offer her my most heartfelt
“Thank You.”
I suffered panic attacks, including their
related symptoms, from October 1966 to late 1970. However,
a few years after I had fully recovered, I began to feel a
niggling sense of needing to try to help others who were suffering
as I had. So not really knowing how else to go about it, I
simply told my local doctor, family members, friends and anyone
who would listen that, if they knew anyone who was suffering
as I had, I would gladly help them in whatever way I could.
And sure enough, albeit very slowly, sufferers began to contact
me and when they did, we would talk, share and compare symptoms
and experiences. I would offer relevant information from the
other sufferers that I was then meeting and in all cases I
would recommend they obtain Self Help For Your Nerves.
As time passed, as I gained more insight, acquired more understanding
and applied my ever-increasing knowledge to the ever-growing
number of panic attack sufferers who were by then seeking
my help, my confidence grew, my ability to help became ever
more apparent and by my tenth year of helping people I had
devised a ‘five step programme' out of panic attacks.
From which, despite the severity of each sufferers panic attacks
and their related symptoms of stress, despite the individuality
of every sufferer and the length of time they had suffered
and despite whatever treatment or therapy they had received
or endured, every panic attack sufferer who followed my programme
gained benefit, with the majority making a full recovery.
And so, after all my experience with panic attacks:- suffering
them for about four years to where they nearly destroyed me
- recovering from them without hospitalisation, anti-psychotic
drugs, psychiatry or electric shock treatment – spending
many years helping and supporting those who suffer them –
studying volumes of technical medical information then translating
it into layman’s language – devising a 'five step’
programme then using it for over ten years to help so very
many panic attack sufferers – seeing all those who diligently
follow my programme gain great benefit, with most gaining
a complete recovery – and converting my ‘five
step programme' into book form, I now offer my 'five step
programme' to you, with the genuine belief that, to whatever
degree you are now suffering panic attacks, my programme will
guide you to recovery.
My many years experience with panic attacks
has taught me a great deal, which I consider it both an honour
and privilege to now pass onto you.
Love Lorraine.
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