I've sat on this blog for a week as I wasn't sure where to take it as it's quite vunerable, last Friday actually started out as a good day.

I went for my usual morning walk, something I’ve made part of my recovery routine and have been doing daily for a while now. Afterwards, I felt calm, confident, and comfortable in my body.

The walk felt easy.

That might not sound like much, but after months of anxiety, feeling okay in your body again is a big deal. My breathing felt steady. My legs felt fine. Mentally, I felt lighter.

I wasn’t scanning for symptoms.

I was just walking in peace.

For the last three or four weeks, I’d decided to stop doing any other form of exercise. No boxing on the punch bags. No cardio. No weights. No yoga. I wanted to see how doing no exercise at all would affect my general anxiety levels.

And it helped.

My baseline anxiety had reduced. I wasn’t feeling the constant physical sensations in my body, and my head felt much clearer.

So when I got home feeling good, I decided to try exercising again to see how my body reacted.

Trying to Workout with Anxiety

I picked up some light weights.

And I mean light.

I used to chest press 25kg dumbells. Last friday, I bench-pressed just seven and a half kg. I didn’t push myself or strain. I probably did no more than 150 reps across a few muscle groups, and the whole thing lasted around eight minutes.

Normally, I’d train for nearly an hour.

This was barely anything.

At the time, it felt fine.

When My Body Didn’t Feel Right

A few minutes later, I started to feel really shaky.

Not awful, but uncomfortable.

At first, I tried not to think too much about it. I used all the techniques I’ve learned to bat away the sensations. Even at lunch, I felt okay, which is still something I still sometimes struggle with.

But when I stood up afterwards, the dizziness hit.

I’ve had dizzy spells before, but this one felt stronger. More unsettling. And instantly, my mind connected it to the exercis, because I'd stopped feeling the dizziness as much.

Also because I know how my body used to feel. Exercise used to energise me. It used to clear my head.

Now it was draining me and making me feel uncomfortable.

The Anxious Thoughts and Questions Started Coming

Thats when my thoughts began racing.

Am I missing something?
Minerals?
Supplements?
Nutrition?

Is there something wrong with my blood levels?

Or is this just anxiety again?

I couldn’t tell.

And not being able to tell is one of the hardest parts.

I was doing my best to stop the questions, but then I was hit by another bad bout of dizziness and honestly, it overwhelmed me.

I wasn’t having a panic attack, but I felt like something was wrong and that I needed to get to the bottom of it.

I decided I should probably speak to a doctor, just to rule out anything serious that might be linked to exercise.

The Ambulance

I rang 111 and asked to be put through to the mental health nurse. After explaining what was going on, she told me I needed to ring the emergency line instead.

I didn’t feel like it was an emergency but I didn’t feel good either.

So I rang.

I told them about the dizziness and the chest discomfort, and that I’d linked it to exercising. Not long after, they said they were sending an ambulance.

That wasn’t what I expected.

And once they said it, my anxiety shot up. Why do they think they need to send an ambulance? What's wrong?

By the time I got off the phone, I was on the edge of a panic attack. But I knew this was stupid, I knew I was fine but my body ws reacting to exercise and my mind was trying to protect me.

I managed to calm myself down, which, in itself, felt like progress. I didn't spiral.

Once I had, I rang back to cancel the ambulance, especially as they’d said it could take two to three hours to arrive.They asked me how I was feeling so I answered honestly as I still had sensations running around my body, I was still breathing from the top of my lungs, my stomach was tight and I was getting pangs in my chest. I know it was Anxiety and the stress response.

They didn’t cancel it.

So I waited on edge for the next 2 hours for them to arrive.

Part of me was still worried that something was wrong with me. Another part of me was worried they were coming out unnecessarily and that someone else might actually need them. I didnn't want to waste their time

When the Paramedics Arrived

When the paramedics arrived, I walked out to the gate to meet them. Something inside me smiled at the irony. 2 years ago I was picked up by an ambulance after having a panic attack, thinking I was having a stroke. After that my anxiety got so bad, I couldn't leave the house as I developed Agoraphobia. I couldn't walk to the front gate for months out of fear. And here I was now walking to the gate to meet an ambulance because I'd been on the verge of another panic attack.

I still felt in a heightened state, but I was aware enough of what was going on and nowhere near as fearful as I was the day I ended up in hospital. I thought to myself maybe this is a higher low.

The paramedic's couldn't have been more different. I had the Geordie chuckle brother and a very serious nurse. Their different approaches made me think about how I was reacting to my own Anxiety. Sometimes I was the serious nurse questioning what was wrong and other times I'm like the Geordie clown trying to make light of it.

They asked all their routine questions and started doing their tests on me. They took my blood pressure and did an ECG. My blood pressure was high at first, which made sense given how anxious I was, but my ECG was fine. When they took my blood pressure again later, it had come down to normal levels.

The chuckle brother had started to read my medical history and told me that my blood pressure and ECG results were better than when I went into hospital 2 years ago. Which was a good sign.

Miss serious did her best to calm me down and offered some very kind and caring words, reassuring me that everything was ok and I could relax.

But then she started to read my notes from 2 years ago and started to become really serious, suggesting that maybe I should go with them to hospital.

This confused me, but I managed to stay calm. My sister who was in the room told me later that the nurse had panicked her when she said that. It's like she had flipped 180 from trying to convince me I was ok to actually you might not be.

In the end they did their best to reassure me that everything looked okay and that it was understandable to feel anxious and stressed given everything I’ve been through over the last few years.

They offered to take me to A&E for further checks and blood tests, but by that point I was feeling okay and decided not to go.

Evening Panic Attack

After they left, I felt alright for a couple of hours.

But later that night, lying in bed, I had a panic attack.

My mind wouldn’t settle. My body was tense. My thoughts kept looping back to the same place how is this still happening to me?

I felt embarrassed that an ambulance had come out. I felt frustrated with myself. My thoughts were racing and my body felt wired. My chest was feeling tight again and I was getting a nervous twitch.

Having just had an ECG and my blood pressure done, I was able to reassure myself I was ok and that this was just the stress response from a stressful day.

Eventually, I managed to rein it all in enough to sleep.

Where I’m Left With It All

I’m still sitting with some unanswered questions, but I’m starting to understand something important.

This wasn’t a failure. It was my nervous system reacting to stress, change, and a body that’s still relearning safety.

Two years ago, an ambulance meant panic, loss of control, and weeks of fear afterwards. This time, I stayed present. I regulated myself. I didn’t spiral when the call was made. I walked to the gate. I spoke clearly. I made decisions. That matters more than how uncomfortable the day felt.

Yes, I still had a panic attack later that night. And no, I didn’t want that. But it didn’t undo the progress that came before it. It was the release after a long, heightened day not proof that I’m back at square one.

What frustrates me most is understanding anxiety intellectually while still feeling it physically. I know what’s happening, but knowing doesn’t instantly switch it off. And I’m finally accepting that this doesn’t mean I’m doing anything wrong. It means my body is still catching up.

I don’t fully trust my body yet. That honesty matters. But I trust myself more than I used to. I trust my ability to stay with discomfort, to question without catastrophising, and to recover faster than before.

And that’s the real shift.

Recovery isn’t about never feeling these sensations again. It’s about shorter spirals, less fear of the fear, and more belief in my own resilience. It’s about higher lows, not perfect days.

My nervous system is still recalibrating. I’m still rebuilding trust. And while this journey is uncomfortable at times, it’s no longer unfamiliar or overwhelming.

I’m not broken.
I’m not going backwards.
I’m learning how to feel safe in my body again.

And that is progress even on days like this.