What is the best way to stop a panic attack?

The best way to stop a panic attack is to ground yourself to your surroundings. Panic attacks originate in the mind and manifest in our bodies as trembling, sweating, and dizziness. If we divert attention from the anxious thoughts in our head to simpler ones such as "What five things can I see around me? What five things can I hear around me?" and attempt to engage all five of our senses, we are better able to ward off a panic attack and stay calm.

To take deep breaths and take a break from what you are doing. Look around and realize what is causing the panic, then go get a drink of water to try to refocus.

Slowly inhale and exhale while thinkinging of things that make you happy and that make you smile....

Go somewhere quiet and cool, remove any layers of clothing that feel constricting if you feel comfortable, and breathe deeply into the stomach and actively breathe out. I try to remind myself that it will pass and make sure that I have water and some kind of snack with me to replenish my energy when it's over.

There really is no "best way." Everyone is unique and requires their own thing to help them. I believe grounding techniques are the best way as they bring you back into the present moment and force you to focus on the here and now. One thing you can do is "box breathing." All you have to do is hold your breath in for four seconds and exhale for four seconds. This isn’t 1 2 3 4, but actual seconds. If you’re not sure how long a second is, just count 1 mississippi, 2 mississippi, 3 mississippi, 4 mississippi. There's also the 54321 game where you list (aloud or in your head) 5 things you can see, 4 things you can hear, 3 things you can feel, 2 things you can smell, and 1 good thing about yourself.

To stop panic attack, it is important to practice and use deep breathing. Focus on taking deep breath in and out through your mouth, feeling the air and all the oxygen in it to slowly fill up your chest and belly and then slowly leave them again. For panic attack, it is important to breath in for a count of four, hold for a second and then breath out for a count of four. Sometimes panic attacks come from triggers that may be overwhelming to you and they come from your environment so you see them, hear or smell them. Sometimes just by closing your eyes or closing you ears you can block the stimuli and make it easier to focus on breathing.

For me when I’m having a panic attack I have to get up and walk around. Sometimes I find myself pacing which doesn’t help so I go outside in nature. The scenery helps to distract me from my racing thoughts. I might even take a paper bag in breathe in and out into it. I also find that playing music or humming a song helps. The end goal for me is to distract myself because it’s easy to fall into the rabbit hole of bad thoughts which only makes the panic attack worse. Remind yourself that this will pass soon.