Real Talk Co.

Today we’re gonna explain why you may hit yourself during a panic attack.

Obviously, this is another chapter to the anxiety series relating to mental health that we’re focusing on.

But without further ado, let’s get into it.

Why do I hit myself when I have a panic attack?

Simply put, it’s best to say it’s self harm. With this form of anxiety being fairly new, there’s some people that find it too hard to explain as to why they do it, but claims it helps them. There’s also others that claim it’s a trigger from their past. But ultimately, we can credit this behavior to your hormones.

What is it?

Self harm is when depression meets anxiety.

Self harm shows itself in many different ways.

There’s cutting yourself, destroying your relationships with people who care for you, and the abuse of many different drugs.

Some of the biggest ones is thinking, saying and believing bad things about yourself (that most of the time aren’t even true).

Hard to explain, sometimes

Sometimes, there’s people that harm themselves out of anger without having any explanation as to why they did it.

It’s actually very close to the term where in stories that people “black out” with anger and lose control of their actions.

Obviously, the only difference is that they do this to themself.

It “helps” cope

You might get people who still do this to themself and claims that it helps them cope with the panic attack they’re experiencing.

It’s a very bad excuse, but they (the people who hurt themself on purpose) think that it’s a healthy form of release.

There’s not much to say about this, but if you run into someone that you know is doing this to themself seek professional help.

Triggers from the past

As sad as it is to share, some people harm themself because of something that happened to them in the past.

This word is starting to get very popular in the mental health community, but it’s triggering.

When something triggers you, it causes you to respond to whatever it is that you’re dealing with in the moment.

Think of it as the cause and effect effect.

Raging Hormones

The main hormone that gets released during these episodes of panic attacks is called adrenaline.

What adrenaline does is give you a rush feeling that’s usually compared to one that’s good.

These feelings are usually good and there’s many activities out there that you can indulge in that would do you good.

But, if you hurt yourself enough you’ll never be able to enjoy it on the long term.

Final thoughts

So to end things here, it’s useful to know what self harm actually is first.

There’s many different ways that you can do this to yourself, and it’s helpful to know what it is to avoid doing it.

There’s people that have trouble understanding why they do it to themselves but out of instinct they will do it.

There are people who still do this and think it helps, but it’s just an unhealthy way to cope at the end of the day.

Past trauma is the reason it triggers the person into this habit.

Also, a big factor as to why it happens is a hormone called adrenaline.

But what do you think about this topic?

Leave a comment below and share your thoughts.

As a thank you for making it this far, here’s a video that explains the topic pretty well.