Come Undone: Robbie Williams' documentary and experiencing panic attacks

What I've noticed #9

Have you ever felt panic?

The pure terrifying, I am going to die panic.

The panic that can come from nowhere. The panic that scoops you up and pulls you under like the huge ocean waves when they crash over your head. The panic that comes with profuse sweating, not being able to catch your breath. Panic that freezes and tenses your muscles so you cannot move. The panic that steals your voice. The panic that makes you fearful. The panic that makes your heart race and your head spin. The dizziness lifting you up and out of your body, so you are floating mid-air looking down on yourself. 

This is what it can be like to experience a panic attack.

What may surprise you is that you can experience the above and no-one will have a clue. You can keep it all in. You can mask. The people you are with might think you are acting a little odd, but they may not be aware that you are gripped in your own personal waking nightmare. It will feel like you have been trapped there forever, if only for five minutes. 

This is what it can be like to experience a panic attack.

For those of us who have panic attacks we learn how to cover it up so no-one knows. We cope. We keep going and pretend everything is fine. “I’m fine” we say through gritted teeth and wide eyes. We push it down as far and deep as it can go. We may not speak about it or utter a single word to reach out to someone to say we are in despair. Internally we are flailing. We desperately need help and we are frightened. 

All of the above is what it feels like for me when I have a panic attack.

Recently I have binge-watched the much hyped Netflix Robbie Williams documentary. I went to watch Robbie in Sydney at the height of his solo fame in 2003. As one of the UK’s biggest selling solo artists and let’s face it, one of the biggest artists in the world,  I loved his music but I wasn’t what I would call a fan. But oh he was incredible. He was electric and magnetic. The charisma he radiates, he is a born entertainer. He kept everyone memorised the entire set.  He is one of the few acts in my lifetime that I’m glad I saw him live. This was the era at the height of his fame, when he begins to fall apart. The documentary is fascinating, have you watched it?  It is a raw, powerful and vulnerable take, as he dives into previously unseen archive footage. We watch along with him, witnessing his massive highs and his massive lows. At times it is incredibly painful viewing, as he himself struggles with the film. 

The documentary shows his mental health declining as he is criticised heavily in the British media. This reaches a climax with his show in Roundhay Park in Leeds, where Robbie - post massive IV steroid drip to help him on stage - describes how he experiences a panic attack that lasts the entire show. He says “it’s like those nightmares where you don’t know what’s happening and you can’t remember anything and you’re terrified. It was like that all night.” 

It is incomprehensible to imagine what that must be like being on stage with 90,000 people staring and idolising you whilst in flown blown panic. Caught in your own waking nightmare of dark terror. At one point he looks up to the sky and mouths “F**k me”. It seems impossible for someone to understand that you could be stood on a stage performing and experience that level of panic attack and not be able to deal with it. To keep it hidden the whole time. Looking back at the footage of him on stage it is clear he is not okay. But when he is done with the show and he says that’s it he can’t do it anymore, he is told he must get back up the following evening and perform or they are bankrupt. The story does not go well from there. 

Weirdly on the back of watching the documentary this week I recalled a memory I had pushed down. Shame has kept me company over the years about my own mental health struggles, so I’m sure there are lots of these events buried away. In 2017 I took part in a client pitch for a media agency. I remember heading into the glass box of a meeting room and starting the pitch with the team. Even now I can feel the sterile nature of the room and the exposure of being trapped inside this glass cube. Before this meeting I hadn’t been coping well.

I remember the feeling coming over me as I was presenting to the room. It gripped me from all sides. I tensed. My whole body in sheer terror. I felt I completely lost the capacity to speak, but somehow I was still talking although I didn’t feel like it was coming from my mouth. I was very red. Very hot, very sweaty. I wanted to scream my head off. I wanted to flee and run from that room. I needed to get out But I didn’t move I was transfixed to the spot. I don’t recall much of what was said or how it finished.

Needless to say the pitch did not go well. My team knew I wasn’t on my A game but no-one knew I was having an actual panic attack until afterwards. Leaving the building I recall standing outside this cool building and apologising “I am sorry I messed that up, I was having a panic attack”. They were shocked and said they had no idea. Why didn’t I say something? 

I gave myself a hard time about this meeting for a very long time afterwards.

We didn’t win the pitch.

Whether it is 90,000 people in front of you on a stage or 9 people in a meeting room, we can still miss the signs when someone is struggling with a panic attack. I don’t think it’s taken as seriously in contrast to how serious it can feel to the individual. There is a lot of misunderstanding. If someone is fine to walk and talk post panic, then it’s easy to brush the impact away. We don’t consider how this might leave their mind and body. What these panic attacks add up to over time and the internal monologue of flagellation that we are rubbish, stupid, not good enough…

The weight of shame held by people who experience panic attacks can be heavy. This shame often hits hard during the aftermath of terror, when we question ourselves and our fragile ability to hold everything inside together.

This is the very space where we do in fact come undone.