Natural treatment for panic disorder and chronic anxiety involves focusing on the actual triggers of a sufferer’s panic. This may include, train travel, driving, shops, even walking down the street. Once the usual triggers are identified, a therapist can use one of two usual methods of eliminating the panic. One is cognitive behavioral therapy or CBT, and the other is a sub-group of CBT called Exposure Therapy.
Exposure therapy uses the principle of habituation. If you live in a house on a busy street, the chances are that you no longer hear the traffic outside. But if a friend came to stay for a few days, he or she might have trouble sleeping because of the noise. You have become habituated to the noise, but they have not.
In the same way a panic attack sufferer can be habituated to the triggers of the panic. This could be a situation, a thought, or an item and the therapist would, through a series of meetings, gradually dispel the fears that are associated with that trigger.
The technique involves gradual, repeated and eventually prolonged exposure to the trigger. Each exposure should be just enough to bring on a little of the underlying anxiety, but not so much that a full-blown panic attack undermines the good of the session. With each session of managing to cope with a little more of the trigger, self-confidence increases and fear reduces. It is important to have regular contact with the trigger and a therapist would plan to see you often but will set assignments between sessions in order to keep up your exposure.
At the end of therapy, prolonged exposure to the full trigger should be possible, with no symptoms of panic.
