# Panic attacks before class?



## Xtine24 (Feb 21, 2007)

Does anyone here experience panic attacks before class starts? I just started college again after 6 years... and im only taking one class right now... so i have class tonight at 8pm-10pm.. its 4:50p right now, and i am nervous & scared as hell, even though I have been taking the class for 2 mths now..

I think people there have already noticed my anxiety because I feel all attention are on me everytime i walk in ... everytime class ends, im always the one who cant wait to leave and would just start walking too fast, i mean, i always look so obvious, its embarrassing... 

I feel people sitting by me feels embarrassed to even be next to me coz they would always give me strange looks & stuff... i just cant hide it well... Im a good student, I get high grades, love learning & education & stuff... but this extreme fear & anxiety of being in a classroom is just really the problem....

I'd rather do online classes, but unfortunately, with math, we have to be there ...:roll


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## ninjew (Feb 9, 2010)

I actually had the same thing happen this term, for the first time ever (yeah me!) I'd gotten depressed around the end of Fall term, and ended up being pretty much a total shut-in for good month and a half. When Winter Term started, I was still depressed, and I really wasn't comfortable beingaround more than a couple people at once for any amount of time; the absolute flood of people that is OSU between classes totally overwhelmed me. 

When I got to class I'd very clearly be anxiety-ridden. I would obsess over my eyes, which looked teary and blood-shot, and tried to calm down and control how I looked; in the end, this probably made it worse. There was one class in particular that was really bad; a three-hour lab class with about 15 students. I'd come in looking (and feeling) depressed, confused and half-crazy; I'd spend the entire class worrying about how I looked, and I'd come out feeling exhausted and miserable, and consumed with self-loathing. And, of course, the entire time I looked completely psychotic, and was stuck in my own little world; if people talked to me, it take a few seconds to figure out what they had said, and even then the best I could do was squeamishly force out a high-pitched, incoherent mumble. Making eye contact, even for a second, would cause me physical pain. The worst part was that this class was in my major, which only has about 75 students in my year; so in all likelihood, I'm going to be running into these people many, many times over the next couple of years, and quite possibly for my entire career (assuming I actually manage to get a career off the ground). 

So yeah. My depression has cleared up after that, thanks to time, drugs, and better weather, and my anxiety has gotten MUUUUCH better since then, but it's still pretty bad. I ended up dropping that class; it was a insanely hard, and after I bombed the midterm, there was no way I could pass it.

Here's my little piece of advice; don't worry about how you look, don't worry about how you feel. If you feel anxious, just remind yourself that looking a little (or a lot) awkward and aloof isn't really that big of a deal. If possible, try to find a little humor in the situation. Breathe slowly, and try to ignore your anxiety and focus on the task/information at hand as best as you can. Most of all, you should try to look at the anxiety as a challenge, rather than a curse. Do this, and you'll start to ebb away at the fear.


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