My first anxiety attack the night Kanye premieres ‘808s and Heartbreaks’... WTF is this?
I had my very first anxiety attack in 2008. I was the Senior Director of Urban Marketing at the #1 website in the world at the time, MySpace.com, overseeing all the urban music features, events and integrated marketing programs. I had been with the company since it’s early start in 2004 and through everyone’s hard work in promoting the first global social networking platform, we were constantly busy with producing content, features, and events with the top established and most buzzworthy emerging artists in the world.
The night before my first anxiety attack I was out with my best friend Randy. We LOVED going to any and every event we could to support the artists and music industry executives that we worked with. That night was Kanye West’s unique listening session for his album, 808s and Heartbreaks where dozens of women stood in the middle of the room while the entire album played for an industry filled audience. I commuted daily from where I lived in Orange County to our office in Beverly Hills, waking up as early as 7AM for a 1.5 to 2 hour commute and didn’t leave the office until traffic died down around 8PM, most of the days I was tired but it was my passion for music and the exciting growth of our company that kept me pushing through each day. As I started to get tired through the night, I would drink Redbulls, extremely easy to get in large consumption with all of the open bars we were invited to.
Post Kanye listening session, down the way, Bay Area rapper/icon, E-40 was having an album release party for his album, The Ballstreet Journal. I was exhausted from the day but again I wanted to show support for E-40 and team that we had gotten close to since he premiered his 2006 album My Ghetto Report Card which featured mega-hit Tell Me When To Go produced by Lil Jon. We celebrated at the event and when the drowsiness kicked in again, I ordered another Redbull, sometimes with and sometimes without Vodka to stay awake knowing I had a long drive home. This night wasn’t different than every other day filled with long hours at the office followed by late nights out but I’m thinking it was a culmination of the past 4 years going at full speed almost everyday that finally caught up to me.
After the drive home, which was faster at night, around 35 minutes, I could not sleep, obviously from all of the Redbull I had drank. Rather than go to bed, I spent hours on the computer blogging about the different release parties and promoting the new albums and photos on MySpace.com, encouraging the over 95,000 “friends” I had gathered over the years. I found excitement as the comments rolled in about people wanting to listen or buy either album.
At around 530AM, when I was prepared to leave around 7AM I started to feel a pain in my chest, it felt like a sharp pain and a sore muscle right in the middle of my chest. No matter how many times I massaged it, the pain wouldn’t go away. I took Tylenol in hopes that it would help the pain go away, which it did for a few hours as I got ready to go to work and drive thru the traffic again. On my drive to work, I typically played music to keep the time going by faster, my typical route was taking the 57 South to the 91 West to the 5 North freeway back on to the 10 West to exit La Cienega, once you exit La Cienega, there is another trek of traffic up to Beverly Hills. For those of you that know this drive, you feel my pain. I did this daily to our first office in El Segundo than to Santa Monica and now in Beverly Hills. It wasn’t as rough my first few years, there were times that I would come in later to avoid the morning traffic but because I couldn’t sleep the night before I figured it would be better to just come in early and work throughout the day.
As I drove thru traffic, I started to feel the pain again near my heart, I massaged it all the way up until I arrived at the office. Once I got into the office I started answering emails and planning for our Atlanta MySpace Release Show with Lloyd and coverage of the BET Hip Hop Awards red carpet during that same weekend the following day. The pain in my heart would not subside and I started thinking negative thoughts of what the pain may be - am I having a heart attack and I don’t know? In the movies you usually before the character has a heart attack you see them grab their chest and fall to the floor, I thought nervously - was that going to happen to me? How long should I wait before I tell someone how I’m feeling? I googled "heart attack symptoms” which made it worse because I related to everything that was listed on the site from heart pain to palpations to now what seemed like dizziness. Nervously I wanted to escape before any of my co-workers saw that something was wrong with me and I worried them. I walked into my co-worker Isac Walter’s office who I always confided in and he was on the phone unfortunately, I wrote on a post-it note “having chest pain - need to go home.”
I walked back to my desk frantically to grab my stuff and worry started to rush my brain from knowing that I couldn’t just “GET” home. It was the middle of the day and rush hour traffic in LA would keep me trapped in my car with this incredible pain, would I die alone? Right when I started to pack my things, Isac walked up to my desk and being the funny guy that he is, he tried to make me laugh by jokingly saying “Are you having a heart attack? Do you want me to call 911 with a smirk?”
Next thing I know my heart is racing 100 miles an hour with palpitations and the entire room looks like it’s moving, I can barely see his face and I say “Yes, call 911!!!” When I woke back up into consciousness I was embarrassingly in the lobby of our MySpace office with the ambulance and fire truck outside the office, what I learned that day is that when 911 is called the fire truck also comes with it. There goes trying to be invisible with this heart pain. The ambulance guys tell me to breathe and breathe slowly because my blood pressure was racing. They didn’t tell me I was having an anxiety attack, they just tell me to calm down and that we were going to the nearest hospital which was Sedar’s Sinai.
Isac rode with me in the ambulance holding my hand and I couldn’t say a word, I was extremely nervous and tears were slowly running down my eyes. The last thing I was when leaving the office was people outside and on our 2nd floor balcony looking to see what happened. I was completely embarrassed and was asking God why couldn’t I die privately. How dramatic right?
After a few tests I sat in the hospital bed waiting to hear the diagnosis, my pain in my heart hadn’t gone away but I felt more at ease being at a hospital and plugged into an IV rather than in the world which now seemed completely dangerous to me. For my entire life I had pride in myself that I was independent, rarely asking anyone for help with anything yet at this point I felt completely helpless. My sister walks in with her daughter Marlee and being so young and at the hospital, breaks into tears not knowing what’s going on. Seeing that it was 6PM I apologize to my sister for having to drive thru the horrible traffic to come see me. The doctors came in and said that they had tested me and that there wasn’t anything physically wrong with me, they said my blood pressure had gone from being extremely high to near normal and recommended I see a physician. Afraid to drive home, I rode in the back as my sister took me home and all I could think about was that I had a flight at 8AM the next day to Atlanta to catch.
Rather than go completely home, I stayed at my sister’s house. At that time I had been up for more than 24 hours straight and was exhausted, I told her I had a flight in the morning and she asked if I was sure I would still take the trip. I slept for a few hours and knowingly that if I didn’t go there wouldn’t be someone in charge, I adamantly said I was going. I picked up my luggage and asked for my friends Randy and Mike to pick me up.
By that time, I had traveled around the world and frequently, at times weekly to different states speaking at various events, producing concerts in everywhere from London to Mexico City to Miami. Traveling was something I loved to do but it also stressed me being away from email for so many hours, I was glued to my blackberry before we took off and as soon as we landed, at times not even looking up to talk to the taxi cab driver or the waitress. BUT - this airport trip was extremely different to me, a sudden fear came over me that was similar to what I felt before the first incident. Negative thoughts flooded my mind about being the center of attention again because ambulance had to be called or dying in front of everyone, minimal thoughts like who would produce the show if I died?
I managed to get on the airplane and sit through the flight but it was the most uncomfortable flight I had ever been on. I constantly checked my watch for when we would arrive and asked to change seats to sit by my best friend and photographer, Mike when there was only one hour left of the flight. I nervously grabbed him and told him that I felt like I was going to die on the plane and we needed to land ASAP. My heart was beating so fast that I thought it was going to explode and again I would ruin the day of the people around me.
Luckily, the plane landed and my feelings subsided. I was able to check into the hotel room with a slight nervousness but not something that I felt I couldn’t handle. Thinking that I could jump back into our typical travel routine, we headed to a place we all loved - Benihana! Once we got into the restaurant and were seated, nervousness kicked in again. The smoke that I loved before suddenly seemed unbearable, right when the waitress was about to take our order, I told the guys we had to leave and we had to leave NOW. We headed back to the hotel and I was upset at myself for ruining our dinner. We went back to the room and told them I would try to sleep it off but instead I cried. I couldn’t kick the nervous feeling from me and now I was thousands of miles away from home, what if I died in Atlanta was my constant thought, away from my family and friends. The worries started to frequent my head that I started to having the chest pain again and the heart palpitations, without knowing what else to do I had them call 911. The ambulance came to the hotel room and told me to RELAX, that NOTHING was wrong with me. IT WAS IN MY HEAD. They told me to drink tea, take tylenonl night time and sleep. I felt calm when they were there but as soon as they left, I started to feel worry again.
The next day was the BET Awards and the Lloyd show, I had to be honest with the guys and tell them I was too nervous to leave the hotel room. I was scared another incident similar to what happened at the office, at the airplane and at the restaurant would happen again instead in front of all the cameras, artists and celebrities we would see on the red carpet. Sadly, I flew ALL the way to Atlanta and told them to go without me. Because I was too nervous to stay completely alone, I actually stayed on a couch that was conveniently in the middle of our floor of the hotel that had a TV. I called my family and friends to make small talk and lied that I was ok, in fear that telling them the truth would spark to the repetitive negative feelings.
The show was great and contrary to my thoughts went on without a hitch. The artists did ask where I was but they just told them I wasn’t able to attend. I beat myself up for not being able to go but was honestly relieved that I didn’t have to be around everyone. It was hard for me to sleep, to eat or to do anything but wonder what was happening to me. Why all of a sudden at 28 years old was I losing control of my life and would that prevent me from ever traveling again or doing what I love? A sadness came over me and I couldn’t wait to get home, my biggest fear now was managing the flight all the way home without another panic attack.
While at the airport, of course our flight was delayed. Typically at the airport we would laugh, make jokes, run around and eat but this time I stuck to the airport chairs and closed my eyes. Even as people that knew us that were also in town for the BET Hip Hop Awards came up to say Hi, I told them I was exhausted and they immediately thought it was because I was partying too hard and didn’t know I spent the weekend in our hotel room.
Thanks be to God I made it home and rather than go home I asked to be dropped off at my sisters. In the morning I had talked to my mom about scheduling a visit to the physician to get checked out, I wanted to know IMMEDIATELY what was wrong with me so that I could get it fixed and get right back to working hard again.
When we visited the nearest physician, my mom’s doctor, I was completely nervous and she was nervous for me. My chest pain had returned and I sat in the corner as she paced back and forth waiting for the doctor who was a physician’s assistant because the doctor was not in. When I went to talk to the PA, he asked me a series of questions while reviewing my blood pressure and checking my vitals. He asked what symptoms I was having and as I explained them I would get nervous. I was so nervous that I asked him not to close the door because I was scared of being in the review room alone. I didn’t want to die alone in the room. When he returned he again told me that NOTHING WAS WRONG WITH ME. IT WAS IN MY HEAD. I had wished that what I had was something as simple as a broken arm or a cold where just time and rest would let it heal, but unfortunately that wasn’t the case.
I tell him I needed SOMETHING to help with this constant anxiety and to help me sleep. He asked if I was depressed and I told him I wasn’t yet he said that I was suffering from something called “anxiety and depression” and he prescibed me anti-anxiety medication called Lexapro and Ambien sleeping pills to help me sleep. He did not give me anything for my chest pain nor explain why I was having this pain. I took the prescription immediately, with trust and hope and returned to my mom’s house rather than my own. After years of being on my own and prideful of my independence, I had resorted to constant fear of being alone and wanting my mom by my side. I stayed in my sister Chrystal’s room and took the medication which made me feel a little bit more calm, I also took the sleeping pill to fall asleep. I told my office that I needed some time off, I couldn’t imagine driving the long commute to the office at this time. I thought every negative thought there could be that would potentially happen and dreaded the office chatter or laughs that I would get when I returned. I called Isac and told him I might have to quit the job I loved so much and he told me to take some time to really think about it.
And that’s where this long story ends but my long battle and journey with anxiety begins. What followed after was a few days of restlessness and literally just waiting to when I felt the need to take the anti-anxiety medication and then the sleeping pill to fall asleep. I felt like a zombie, I stayed in the bath for what seemed like hours and I wonder when I would snap out of it. Was I losing my mind? Was I “depressed” as the doctor said? The doctor gave me this medication but didn’t give me an end date, would that mean I would need it forever? Rather than help me it seemed that I was growing an addiction to it AND my chest pain was still there. My mom was worried so she made an appointment with a cardiologist. The cardiologist was a really nice man who actually took time to talk to me not like the previous physician’s assistant who seemed to look quickly at me and prescribe me the closest thing he could.
The cardiologist told me I was too young to be taking sleeping pills nightly and asked that I stopped taking these immediately. He said my heart was fine and prescribed me a muscle relaxer for the chest pain that I was feeling and I was frustrated that the first doctor hadn’t thought of that. He said it was merely a muscle strain/pain that I was feeling but by that time I was reliant on the Lexapro originally prescribed in order to do the everyday activities like going to the store or driving. I was 28 years old but I was fearful of doing anything and everything I loved, the Lexapro helped made me not feel those thoughts for a few hours before feeling them again the next day, driving me to take the medication again. I thought about what the cardiologist said and even though he said that I didn’t need either medication, I just didn’t want to risk having another panic attack in front of everyone.
Soon I was able to return to work, and just in time, we had a big show with rapper T.I. to celebrate the release of new album, Paper Trail at the Key Club in Los Angeles a few weeks before he would have to go to jail that I could not miss. I had to write a note to ask permission for him to stay out past 10PM and CNN was onsite to interview T.I. I had planned the show with Atlantic Records and his surprise guests for the evening were going to be Kanye West and newcomer, Rihanna performing “Swagger Like Us” and “Live Your Life” LIVE with him. MySpace.com shows were the times that you pulled in your biggest friends to join you on stage because you knew that everyone would be talking about who you were able to perform with you. Artists got accustomed to bringing each other out for their shows and that was the highlight of my job as well. Above you’ll see the video of the concert where Kanye also performed “Heartless” for the first time from his new album, “808s and Heartbreaks.” It was an incredible night, unforgettable where I also created the award for “MySpace Double Platinum” to give to T.I. to make him feel special before he had to go away. DJ Drama helped us surprise T.I. and our counterparts that I helped start MySpace London were also in town.
I finally felt like I could beat these stupid anxiety attacks handling a stressful evening but without incident. All my friends and family were also there was from Walnut to witness this amazing event but because I hadn’t dealt with my anxiety properly, I would later find it to return... More to come soon...
Have you suffered from an anxiety attack? Did you know what it was when you were feeling it? What did you do during and after it? Do you take medication? Did it help? I’d love to hear your stories as well alongside questions to help start the dialogue. Email me at [email protected] and in the interim, check out the awesome T.I. show above.
