Originally Posted by greenery
While I have been on hundreds of flights all over the world, I still on occasion experience panic attacks on an airplane. It is not due to fear of flying but the feeling of being closed in a small place without a chance of getting out for a very long time.
One time I was trapped on a small 30 seat prop plane on a tarmac for over three hours in a snow storm. I almost went crazy.
Another time I was sitting in the window seat on a long 16 hour flight to Asia. Every hour or so I would get up and walk around to get my sanity back but the people next to me had grown tired of my getting up every hour and pressured me to sit still. I felt trapped and started to get a panic attack. No aisle seats were available.
Other times I would freak out sitting in the small bathroom on a plane and my thoughts had been trapped in their for life.
Does the trapped closed in feeling ever make you get a panic attack on an airplane?
I'm a so-called recovering fearful flyer, and have endured what you have described, in part from 'control issues' about flying (i.e. being in the back with the door closed, not knowing what's going on, etc.) but also some claustrophobia.
There are a lot of really good techniques to help you resolve your panic attacks, but I don't have a comprehensive list, nor am I really qualified to try and teach them on an FT board
Some are just exercises, but there are also a couple of physical tools you can use to help get yourself under control and slow your heart rate.
That said, I would search out a psychologist who specializes in these issues. I don't know where you're based but there's a fellow
in Chicago who's quite good. I don't remember where I found it on the net, but there's a list out there of folks with his specialty around the U.S., and I'm sure on other continents if you're somewhere else.
There used to be an AA program called AAirborne, which was excellent, but it's gone now. AA might maintain a list of the folks who set up shop when AAirborne went away.