not exactly crazy, just a little nervous

In the seventh grade, I went to see Cyndi Lauper perform during her She's So Unusual tour. My dad took me and a couple of friends to the Mann Music Center in Phildelphia for this, my first, concert. But rather than write about how incredibly, um, gay that is, or how fantastic the show was, I want to write about something else that happened that night -- I had, for the first time in my conscious memory, what I would later learn to call a panic attack.

This is what happened: We arrived at the show and took our seats in the balcony of this theatre, which was relatively small, but cool because it was outdoors. I was astounded at how high up we could be and still have a great view of the stage. When the concert started, the entire balcony stood in their seats and started jumping and dancing. Much to my great shock, the balcony itself began to move under us, not giving way, of course, but bouncing along with us, in much the same way that a diving board does. My father, who had no opinion of Lauper except that she was "weird," brought a walkman with him, kicked back in his seat, popped his favorite Pavarotti cassette in, and conked out. My friends were smiling and bouncing up and down like everyone else.

I, on the other hand, could feel nothing but sheer terror, so much so that I couldn't even speak. As I sat there, confronting my mortality, everyone else was having the time of their life. How come no one else felt such great alarm? What was wrong with me? Why couldn't I enjoy this, too? This added to the terror-effect: No one realizes we are going to die except for me.

I imagined the breaking away and terrible crash of the balcony, what it would feel like to fall, who would be trapped underneath of us. I was convinced that at any moment concert security would interrupt Lauper's show, announce that the balcony was about to collapse, and usher us to safety. About twenty minutes passed, and a thought entered my brain: Since no one is going to help us, since no one else seems to mind, and since I cannot do a thing about this terrible danger that we are all in, the only thing I can do is enjoy it. The anxiety lifted a little. If I am going to die, I thought, I don't want to die in abject terror, I want to be happy like every one else. I started to bounce along with the crowd. The balcony bounced right under me. Every once in a while, the terror returned, and I'd have to stop. My heart would be racing and I would not be able to breathe. It sucked the air right out of my lungs. Then I'd hear my voice in my head ask me the question: "Do you want to die terrified, or do you want to enjoy what little of this life is left?", and I'd ease myself back into the "fun".

This whole ordeal, of course, was in my head. I never said anything to anyone about it. Everyone else was hanging out, dancing, singing along and cheering for Lauper. I, meanwhile, was negotiating matters of life and death. It was a difficult evening, to say the least. Looking back, I wonder if the reason no one else was terrified was because, really, the movement of the balcony was something that I hallucinated.

But I identified this night, years later, as the first time I consciously remember feeling this way. The therapist I was talking to about it noticed that I had, in fact, employed a coping mechanism that night to deal with what was happening, that I was conscious of the panic and worked towards alleviating it the best way a twelve-year old knows how.

In graduate school, my panic attacks were so bad and so frequent that, as anyone who has them knows, I would not be able to leave my couch. I didn't even know what they were. They were a part of this thing that I grew to call my "nervousness." "Nervous" was a word I used for a long time to describe myself or how certain events or things made me feel. When it got to the point that I felt like the attacks were interfering with my life, I finally took steps to figure some things out. Very lucky for me, I learned how to manage the problem, finally, without medication.

But panic attacks can come when you least expect them. Yesterday, H. took off on a long, long bike ride. Almost as soon as he left, I started to spiral. I couldn't do anything. I was a wreck for about three hours, and when it finally lifted, I was totally drained. I slept. When I woke up, I felt better, and into the evening with friends, I kept thinking about what happened, what triggered it (as I learned to say), why now, etc. I thought back to that night in the balcony -- the terrible fear of a plunge into obliteration as the raucous carnival danced and bounced around me.