I cannot confirm if what has affected me since I was a child is a panic attack.
According to a Wikipedia article:
A panic attack is a period of intense fear or discomfort, typically with an abrupt onset and usually lasting no more than 30 minutes. Symptoms include trembling, shortness of breath and sensations of choking or smothering. The disorder is strikingly different from other types of anxiety in that panic attacks are very sudden, appear to be unprovoked, and are often disabling. [Wikipedia]
I am unsure because I did not ask my doctor about it.
I can still remember an episode when I was still in elementary school. It was a school night, and I was ready to bed. Then suddenly, I just remembered that I was knocking at my parents’ bedroom door, saying something that didn’t make sense. I was very pale. My heart beats very fast. I feel like I am panicking, although I don’t remember why. I was then accompanied to my bedroom by my mom. She tried to calm me down. Then I fell asleep. We then talked about it the following day, but all I told her was all I did, said, and felt did not make sense. More episodes like this happened, sometimes spaced by a few days, then turned to a few weeks, then to months. It has been a year that I have not experienced it.
Since high school, I can now sense I was having a panic attack. Although I can clear my thoughts during the attack, my heart beats fast, and I still feel like panicking (like moving or walking very fast to the point of running). I sit in a corner and distract myself by concentrating on something and drinking something hot (all my feelings and thoughts focus on the hot drink rather than the attack).
I just wished that if I ever had this attack again, it would not disable me in any way.
Original address: http://www.frederickcalica.com/thoughtpatterns/2004/08/02/2/