Jack’s Story

This is the story of my client, Jack, a successful man in every way.“Having largely been a confident, outgoing and successful person all my life, when panic attacks came to my door it was a very difficult situation to deal with. On the face of it I would have appeared to have had no problems in my life. I came from a loving, stable family background, was well educated and had all the opportunities one could really hope for in life. Despite all of this when I started to have panic attacks my world began to fall apart. It became very difficult to conduct my working life, to have even the simplest of social interactions and in particular it became a nightmare to speak in public, something I had done for a large part of my career and that was massively important to me holding down my job and earning a living.

So when I first came to Fiona I was in the process of dealing with these issues and trying to get back to the ‘old me’. At this time, I was experiencing regular bouts of anxiety and at its worst full-blown panic attacks in circumstances where I was on the spot. Conducting a meeting or giving a presentation would be a fraught experience, the latter in particular being almost impossible and one that I avoided if at all possible. However, through a series of sessions with Fiona I was able to rebuild what I once had. I managed to regain my self-confidence, felt considerably calmer and more in control, which is exactly what you do not feel when having a panic attack. More than anything though I suppose I managed to get back to the old me. I was able to speak again in public including to large groups, and feel that I am back in control of myself and my emotions. It‘s worth saying that this is not a straight-line type of thing. There were bumps on the road and although it’s a cliché, it was a process to regain what I had lost. I had to look at the roots of the fear and the surrounding events that led to me getting so far away from the real me. Indeed, it is an ongoing process and requires continual work and commitment to stay positive and continue to build success into my life.

The thing about anxiety and panic attacks is that you feel you have to edit your life around what it is you feel you can and can’t do. This leads to you curtailing your activities and reducing the scope of your life, sometimes considerably. Now I feel I have regained control and no longer have to edit my life around my anxiety and panic attacks. Rather they have become only a very occasional sideshow and mainly a thing of the past.”