Gasping for Airtime - Jay Mohr [54]
The doctor also told me that if I did cocaine or smoked pot I should stop, because both drugs induced panic. I had never even seen cocaine before in my life, let alone snorted it; however, I had been smoking pot every day for three years. I thought that marijuana was helping me with my panic attacks by mellowing me out, but I had actually been encouraging panic with each toke. Once I weighed the consequences, the decision to quit smoking pot was quick and easy. I knew then and there that I would rather have pneumonia once a month for the rest of my life than have one more panic attack.
She also explained to me the irrational nature of panic disorder. People say that when they have a panic attack their heart races and they feel like they are going to pass out, but she explained that you pass out when your heart slows down, not when it speeds up. She stood up from her desk, opened her office door for me, and said good-bye.
I asked her what time my appointment was next Monday. In a very matter-of-fact tone, she told me that she didn’t need to see me again until the prescription ran out. I was stunned. I thought I’d see her every week and give her progress reports.
“You have a sickness, and we have found the right medicine for it,” she explained. “You are no different from someone who walked in here with asthma and got an inhaler. You were sick, and now you’re better.” Then she said something I thought was really cool. “I don’t see a need for you to come in here every week and tell me about your childhood.”
The door was open, but I was reluctant to leave. I felt safe being near her. “What about when I fly? What if I get a panic attack in the air?” I asked.
The doctor furrowed her brow. “If your issue is structure, which we have decided and agreed it is, why would you panic on an airplane? Compared to the rest of your life, flying is the most structured thing you do. You know weeks in advance when you should wake up for your flight. The airline hands you a ticket with a seat assignment on it. If you read the monitors in the airport, they tell you what time your flight is scheduled to leave, what gate it will be leaving from, and how long it takes to get there.” She was right. “If you’re on a flight and you feel some symptom of panic creeping in just reach into your pocket and take an extra pill of Klonopin,” she continued. “You’re taking only a milligram a day. I have patients who take twenty. If you took an extra half-milligram, you’re still taking a very small dosage.”
That was it. I was on my own. She didn’t want to peruse my childhood. I had felt for so long that I was absolutely going crazy, and it turned out I was sick. Not dying, just sick. And now I was treated and feeling fantastic. On the elevator down to the emergency room, I reached into my backpack and took out my bottle of Klonopin. I picked out two pills and put them in the small square pocket of my jeans above my right leg. My Klonopin pocket. Just in case.
Shortly after seeing the doctor, I started liking pretty much everyone. Ellen was still asshole Ellen and Schneider was still hit-or-miss, but my feelings toward everyone else became muted. Whatever mess I was in, I started to realize that I wasn’t the only one. I was no longer terrified by the thought of having a panic attack, so I began speaking more.
The more I spoke to my coworkers, the more the subject of panic worked its way into the conversations. Melanie Hutsell told me she once had a panic attack that was so severe she had to be taken to the hospital, and as a result, her face froze for a few days. Spade also told me he had gone to the hospital once, and then I noticed that Spade had to have pizza and an Amstel Light