I had a defining traumatic experience and ever since then I get 'panic attacks' out of nowhere. In my teens I never was anxious about anything (even things I should have been healthily worried about...) but since that experience running through the first year of Covid I've been feeling like I'm going insane.

I could be sitting at my laptop doing work, and suddenly find it hard to breath, my heart feels empty and I fall into a rapid state of panic. Panic that something wrong is going to happen. Panic that I am painfully alone. Panic over things I don't understand. It's sort of like being in one of those haunted houses where actors come out and scare you. You know they can't hurt you, but it's still terrifying and you want to just get away from it even when it's daylight. I tried get away from what I was doing to try calm down, I even go to my boyfriend but just start violently sobbing. This is coming from a person who's mother used to laugh about how confident and self-assured her daughter is. 

My situation isn't bad. I have an ok paying job, but no friends around me but a house full of loving and supportive people. Yet I still have these moments of pure insanity. Therapy isn't an option and I've abandoned self-help books, I feel completely lost.