To ask if Anxiety is an acceptable excuse for not wearing a mask?

[balihai550]

Just this...I had a mild panic attack in M&S today because for some reason masks make me feel closed in and like I can't breathe.

So I took it off and then had to explain to three people why I couldn't wear it. Anxiety in their view wasn't a good enough reason.

I often try to get online shops but atm all the ocado, Sainsbury's and Waitrose slots in my area are gone, so have to venture out.

Is not wearing a mask because of Anxiety and panic attacks unreasonable?

@olistryder trigeminal neuralgia. Google its it's not called the suicide disease for nothing.

@Balhammom

Utterly appalled at some of the comments calling posters “ableist”. The fact some people cannot (or, more often, will not) wear a mask does not give them a right to endanger other’s lives.

And to the armchair lawyers and other morons suggesting the law gives you a “right” to enter shops or other premises without a mask if you have “reasonable excuse”, it doesn’t. It merely means that doing so isn’t a criminal offence. Having a legal right to do so is an entirely separate matter, not covered in any of the current legislation.

People have a right to do anything that they choose that is not a criminal offence. That is the entire point. We don't prescribe in law all actions that people can do, we state what is prohibited and anything else is legal. I think you are perhaps confusing our legal right to do anything that is not illegal, with human rights which are an entirely different matter and supercede legislation is there is a conflict?

@borntobequiet

By the way, I pay over £40,000 in tax per year towards the NHS.

Are you sure?

Yes. I am.

You don't have to explain why. And there is no facility for doctors to provide notes.
But it would be better for YOU to teach yourself to tolerate the mask. I have to wear one all day at work, active and communicating all day. My tips would be:
try a few different ones at home - wear for an hour doing housework. In my experience the widely available lightweight medical ones are good, personally I find the curved cloth kind - sort of domed so it sits off your nose - most comfortable.

You could try adding a dab of lavender oil, comforting and calming smell - or any essential oil that you like.

Top tip - don't overdress when you go out - getting hot is the precursor to a panic attack, sometimes this used to happen to me before masks in shops when I had a winter jumper and coat on!

Oh I forgot to add - if you wear glasses, sit them over the edge of the mask to avoid steaming up (which certainly doesn't help with the panicky feeling!)

@PurpleFrames 🙌🙌

when this is over some people arent going to know what to do with themselves, they've been so used to quoting the rules and telling others what to do.

@MagentaDoesNotExist

I very much doubt you pay £40 000 per year towards the NHS.

Pensions take 23 percent of central spending, and health care, the National Health Service, takes a 24 percent share. Defence amounts to 7 percent of central government spending. All other spending, including interest on the national debt, takes 45 percent of central government spending.

Of your income tax, only 24% goes to the NHS. As a very rough calculation that means if you pay £40 000 tax a year to them, your full tax bill is around £100 000. I’d love to know what job you do that pays you so much you have to pay £100 000 in tax!

[quote sunsetorange]@PurpleFrames 🙌🙌

when this is over some people arent going to know what to do with themselves, they've been so used to quoting the rules and telling others what to do.[/quote]
I think everyone will be very haopy when/if this is over.

@FuriousWithTheNHS

I had a panic attack in boots from wearing a mask. I ripped it off and was spectacularly and violently sick all over their counter. They haven't hassled me about wearing one since.

You mean you've actually been back?

Why didn't you just leave the shop to get some air outside and take some time to deep breath and calm down, once you felt the panic attack coming on? Why carry on with your shopping until you got so panicky that you vomited?

Some people are so strange.

Odd I've felt panic in mine. I go and take it off outside for a bit...I know panic attacks come on fast...but on the counter...in a pandemic?

@FuriousWithTheNHS

I had a panic attack in boots from wearing a mask. I ripped it off and was spectacularly and violently sick all over their counter. They haven't hassled me about wearing one since.

You mean you've actually been back?

Why didn't you just leave the shop to get some air outside and take some time to deep breath and calm down, once you felt the panic attack coming on? Why carry on with your shopping until you got so panicky that you vomited?

Some people are so strange.

Because it almost certainly didn't happen.

I couldn't leave I had to wait for my prescription. Its the only pharmacy in walking distance, I live in a small town. I panic pretty much as soon as the mask is on, I can tolerate maybe 30 seconds. I was sexually assaulted as a child with a hoodie over my face so things over my face trigger a pretty instant flashback

[quote Soontobe60]@MagentaDoesNotExist

I very much doubt you pay £40 000 per year towards the NHS.

Pensions take 23 percent of central spending, and health care, the National Health Service, takes a 24 percent share. Defence amounts to 7 percent of central government spending. All other spending, including interest on the national debt, takes 45 percent of central government spending.

Of your income tax, only 24% goes to the NHS. As a very rough calculation that means if you pay £40 000 tax a year to them, your full tax bill is around £100 000. I’d love to know what job you do that pays you so much you have to pay £100 000 in tax![/quote]
It’s not impossible. My father has a relatively small business and his personal income from that has been as high 250k pa and he was taxed 60% on that and had no personal allowance. That year he had to pay £150,000 in tax.

I couldn't leave I had to wait for my prescription.

Of course you could leave. The script would still be waiting for you when you got back. I frequently go off to run another errand and return for my prescriptions instead of hanging around while they prep it.

You could have ordered it then waited outside and therefore been able to take the mask off, just replacing it to nip in quickly again 20 mins later instead of staying in the shop to wait if it's really that traumatic for you.

In fact I'm not sure why you would even choose to stay in the shop under the circumstances. If you can't wear a mask you are far safer outside anyway.

@LAgeDeRaisin

Hi OP, I'm a doctor on a covid ward.

I get anxious wearing a mask and full PPE at work because lots of my patients are dying of covid. I get stressed because the visors steam up and make it hard to see to cannulate/do other procedures. My anxiety is made worse because all of these things can slow down how fast I can treat patients, how quickly I can move from one patient to another. The time lag to attending an emergency.

This whole bloody pandemic is awful for everyone. We've all got to do things we really don't find comfortable. People are dying, and it's people like me that have to (over and over and OVER AND OVER and over again) call hysterical families to tell them their brother, son, sister, daughter, mother, friend, whoever is dead. Dead forever. Dead when they might not be dead if everyone wore a mask, at all times, when out of their own homes.

Why should your anxiety about masks override my anxiety about another mass of the population dying? People who otherwise might be leading happy lives for many more years?

Why does your anxiety trump mine?

Just because you can't see the outcome of your actions, doesn't mean I dont.

Next time you feel anxious in a mask, leave the shop and come in again once you've calmed down. Don't risk somebody's life.

Well said. And thank you.

How about everyone who panics at the pharmacy think about how the staff and other customers there feel too, and get their prescriptions delivered??

On a practical note, if you (the OP) are wearing a cloth mask you might find a surgical mask easier to wear. They provide better filtration but are more breathable than cloth.

@nothingcanhurtmewithmyeyesshut Please don't feel like you have to explain yourself on here. The fact certain people ignore your abuse disclosure and prefer to lay in to you more says volumes about them, not you. I hope you have a peaceful day and don't let this thread get you down.

Please don't feel like you have to explain yourself on here. The fact certain people ignore your abuse disclosure and prefer to lay in to you more says volumes about them, not you.

I take issue with that. This thread isn't for discussing the abuse disclosure. We don't have to discuss everyone's reason for not wearing a mask - it's irrelevant. Besides, that was covered in another thread started by the OP if I remember correctly.

The point is that whatever your reason, whether medical or psychological or plain tragic, you shouldn't be putting others or yourself at risk if you really don't have to. And in this instance she really didn't have to.

If waiting inside Boots with a mask is too traumatic you wait outside and take off your mask, minimising the panic response. that seems like common sense to me.

If waiting inside Boots without a mask puts you and others at potential risk then you minimise that risk by waiting outside Boots until your prescription is ready or you get someone else to collect it for you. That also seems like common sense to me.

It's not difficult, and pointing that out does not in any way indicate that I am unsympathetic about the abuse. It just doesn't change my position on the matter.

Where a shield

You could have ordered it then waited outside and therefore been able to take the mask off, just replacing it to nip in quickly again 20 mins later instead of staying in the shop to wait if it's really that traumatic for you.

I was waiting at the counter for them to take the form. Can't really be avoided. They don't deliver, at least ours doesn't. And yes being smothered really is that traumatic when you're nine.

But you also chose to wait inside while they prepped it, to the point where you needed to vomit. I don't mean to sound unkind but I just can't see your logic or your justification for it, as truly sorry as I truly am for your experiences.

Try wearing the mask at home just for a minute or a few seconds OP, then gradually increase the amount of time you wear it until you are comfortable wearing it for long periods.

Actually I didn't. I threw up while waiting to give them the form. As you would know if you actually read my post before you jumped on me. I waited outside for the actual meds.

It takes me about a minute at most to get to the point of throwing up. Flashbacks are intense, you don't feel them coming on like a sneeze. You are literally back there in an instant. Its not a slow build. Its instant blind panic.

You are just so determined that no one can possibly have any good reason for not wearing a mask (I do wear a visor, not that they do any good) that you refuse to even consider that not everyone experiences the world like you do.

I really think that some people need to educate themselves about PTSD because a lot of people are struggling and being brushed off as though they're just not trying hard enough. To me it's not just a mask, its a hoodie being pushed into my face and holding me down. I can even smell his body spray that I'm pretty sure they dont even make anymore.

I'd love to be able to wear one, I'd feel a damn sight safer. But I cant. Same as I cant go out without my hair tied up in case it blows into my mouth and I can't stand the smell of Amber Lynx.

I've no doubt there are people taking the piss out of the rules but you have no way of knowing who they are and you have no right to make people feel worse for something they can't help.

You're not at all sorry for the posters experiences or you wouldn't keep laying into them without an ounce of human kindness just to make a point which has been made over and over again on this thread.

I agree there needs to be much greater awareness of ptsd and wider illness/disability. I'd like to think the ableism rife in mumsnet and wider society is just due to overegged fear of a virus but I really doubt it.