Australian ABC News meteorologist Nate Byrne had just told viewers about the rainy days ahead when he started rubbing his hands together. “I’m actually going to need to stop for a second,” he says evenly into the camera, during a live broadcast last week. “Some of you may know that I occasionally get affected by some panic attacks, and actually that’s happening right now. Lisa,” he says to his ABC News Breakfast cohost, Lisa Millar, “maybe I can hand it back to you.”
Graciously taking the reins, Millar directs viewers to an article Byrne had penned two years earlier about experiencing panic attacks at work. In it, he’d written that one of the most important lessons he learned during an on-air attack was about his coworkers. “Making sure your support network knows that you sometimes need assistance, and how they can support you,” he wrote, “is essential.”
What are panic attacks, and who experiences them?
A panic attack is a “sudden onset of intense anxiety with a sense of urgency and often a feeling of needing to escape,” says psychologist Seth Gillihan. It happens when the body’s “fight or flight response gets triggered” inappropriately, adds psychologist Bonnie Zucker, who specializes in anxiety. Adrenaline pumps and breathing hastens but without any real, present danger.
It’s important to know about panic attacks because of how many people experience them. Per the Cleveland Clinic, up to 11% in the U.S. have panic attacks each year, while the National Institute of Mental Health estimates “2.7% of U.S. adults had panic disorder in the past year.”
Having a panic attack isn’t the same as having a panic disorder, which is a condition that can stem from panic attacks. “What defines [panic disorder] is fearing future [panic] attacks or being really afraid of what the attacks themselves mean,” says Gillihan. Sufferers’ lives can become consumed by trying to avoid panic attacks, and the anxiety of that can build to the point of actually triggering a panic attack, trapping those with panic disorders in a terrifying cycle. The experience can feel so intense, says Zucker, that “a very significant proportion of ER visits due to cardiac complaints are actually because of panic.”
Disruptive to people’s personal lives, panic conditions can also greatly affect a person’s comfort and productivity at work. They may lead to more sick days due to fear of having an attack at the office, or missed meetings caused by the anxiety of panicking in front of a group.
“Work is almost a higher-stakes situation,” says Zucker, “because you’re financially dependent on your job,” which can compound anxiety. For both those who experience panic attacks and their colleagues, knowing the tools available to deal with those anxiety-ridden moments can foster a more inclusive and productive workplace.
Panic attacks at work
Unfortunately, for those looking to identify panic attacks from the outside, it’s not so straightforward. “Panic attacks often feel much worse than they actually look,” says Zucker.
A colleague abruptly leaving a meeting after appearing slightly uncomfortable might be the best indicator, short of them announcing what’s going on, as Byrne did during his recent weather broadcast. Even he writes that “watching back the videos of me having a panic attack on live television has shown me that it’s not always obvious . . . from the outside.”
The symptoms that do present, however, are common among those who experience panic attacks. They include difficult or rapid breathing, heart palpitations, chest pain, lightheadedness, sweating, shaking hands, and possible nausea. Nonphysical symptoms, says Gillihan, might include feeling that “reality is ending,” or that their surroundings no longer seem real. Agoraphobia also can stem from panic disorders since people may stay home to avoid situations that could provoke an attack.
While symptoms are relatively uniform across sufferers, the ones people find most disturbing can vary greatly. “For one person, the sense of derealization might be the most upsetting,” he says. “For others, it might be the pounding heart.”
In addition to leading to increased absences at work, panic attacks may cause employees to avoid certain in-office duties. Generally anxiety-provoking experiences like public speaking can be particularly “triggering” for people with panic disorders, he says. So can aspects of a job that overlap with other phobias or anxieties, like modes of travel.
“Driving over bridges can be really difficult for people with panic disorder,” he says, “or being in an airplane, where you can’t escape.” The lack of an exit often plays into panic attacks. Even going to a restaurant with coworkers creates a situation where it’s awkward to leave early, thus limiting “escape” routes. “For anybody who works with other people,” adds Gillihan, “the other people themselves can be an added challenge.”
What to do—and not do—for colleagues experiencing a panic attack
The best thing to do if you see someone panicking is to not panic.
“If you start to freak out with [someone having a panic attack], it often will raise their anxiety,” says Zucker. Same goes for telling them to calm down. They’re panicking, in part, because they can’t calm down, so demanding they do the one thing they’re trying and failing to do won’t help.
Similarly, trying to assuage a colleague who’s having a panic attack by insisting there’s nothing wrong can miss the point—included in their panic is the knowledge that it’s happening even though nothing’s wrong. “Trying to reason with the person when they’re panicking doesn’t tend to be very effective because their mind isn’t working at that level,” says Gillihan.
Frame the objective differently, he suggests. Instead of approaching someone having a panic attack with the aim of stopping the attack, it’s better to say something like “let’s help you ride this out.”
Supporting by simply offering a calming presence is often the best approach. Some useful practices can include slow breathing exercises. “When someone is breathing in an obvious pattern, we’ll often fall into that same pattern,” says Gillihan, so modeling steady breaths can help set the pace for another’s breathing. Grounding exercises can work, too, like asking the person, if they’re seated, to concentrate on the weight of their body pressing into the chair. That helps limit the “unreality” or disorientation people often feel during panic attacks, he says.
Of course, it’s not always appropriate to approach a colleague who’s having a panic attack. Both Zucker and Gillihan advise against calling attention to someone experiencing an attack in a group setting, as that will only heighten anxiety. Providing physical comfort, like an arm around a shoulder, can feel like a “natural response,” says Gillihan, and while some find that helpful, “[for] a lot of people, the last thing they want is to feel confined by another person, or that level of intimacy, especially with someone they don’t know that well.”
While giving space should be the default, it’s also fine to ask a colleague if they’d like physical support. “You can always check in and say, ‘Would you like [me to put] my hand on your back?’” says Gillihan.
Supporting beyond the attack
Fostering a safe environment for workers who get panic attacks means acknowledging the issue outside moments of acute panic. “Having mental health resources available to employees is really important,” says Zucker, for “normalizing mental health issues in the work setting . . . because they’re so common.”
According to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC), more than 20% of U.S. adults live with a mental illness. Many companies’ health insurance policies cover mental health providers. Zucker brings up Lyra, a mental healthcare benefits provider used by companies including Zoom and Morgan Stanley, that offers some free private practice therapy sessions.
Strategizing in advance with colleagues who share about their panic conditions can help prepare others in the office to act appropriately at an attack’s onset. “Talk with them about anything you can do that might make it easier for them,” says Gillihan, “and how they would like you to respond if you see they’re panicking.”
If you have a particularly close relationship with a colleague, you can go deeper. While it’s crucial to be very careful about recommending that someone seek mental healthcare, Gillihan and Zucker both say that within certain work relationships, it could be okay to talk treatment. After all, panic attacks are “really treatable” with therapy, Zucker says, so bringing up that option “matter-of-factly” instead of “shamefully” might be worth a shot.
When working with clients who have panic attacks, Zucker tries to help them take proactive steps that address their specific anxieties. For those who are “afraid of dying,” for example, she’ll “make sure they’re up to date with their medical appointments.” If panic attacks feel like heart attacks to a sufferer, she says, having a doctor say “your heart is totally fine” can help nip some of that unwarranted anxiety in the bud.
Learning from experience
Since Byrne wrote his piece on panic attacks in 2022, not only has he experienced additional ones, but he’s watched colleagues go through them too. Because of his personal experience, he’s better equipped to help.
“It’s changed my perspective on mental health,” he wrote. “I had no idea about the complete lack of control you can sometimes have over your brain, nor the ways in which it can take over.”
His colleagues have also improved when it comes to their support. Millar calmly taking over the broadcast during Byrne’s most recent attack shows how she learned to help him ride it out instead of adding to the alarm.
“On News Breakfast, we’ve seen several people dealing with their anxiety on live television,” Byrne wrote in 2022, “and the team is quick to jump into action to make sure the show goes on without too much fuss, and that the person is safe and cared for.”