HUMAN LOSS & SEPARATION ANXIETY DISTRESS:

A Personal Story of Panic Attack and Anxiety Understood

Through Jaak Panksepp’s 7 Emotional Brains Model
And the Lesson of Loss Learned for the Family of Humanity
“He has well profited who learns by loss.” Michelangelo

This is Jack Carney, July 2017, in Auckland, New Zealand from 2 years
in Santiago, Chile after 13 years in China, and before this Australia,
Canada and the U.S.
These words will introduce you to a topic I have had a life long interest and
experience in: HUMAN LOSS in all its forms but particularly the deaths of most
highly valued, intimate others. In terms of the Michelangelo quote I am a billionaire
in LOSS. I have learned from the TEST of LOSS its necessary LESSON of CARE. I
learned to use my L.O.S.S. to LINK me to others (L.inking O.ur S.eparate S.elves).

I claim the seminal work of the affective neuroscientist Jaak Panksepp and the
cardiologist-epidemiologist James J. Lynch scientifically explain the CAUSE of the
MENTAL DISORDER EPIDEMIC WORLDWIDE in the Welfare States. And I am
convinced that if you understand their work you will also know the CURE for the
CAUSE. My 72 years of life lived in six countries with four wives, two children and
many LOSS experiences embody the living proof of the truth of Panksepp’s and
Lynch’s findings.
I created a non-profit, Social Enterprise, I named LOSS LINKS to understand and
support HUMAN LOSS in all its varieties and variables:
Facebook page: https://www.facebook.com/LOSSLINKS/
Website: http://losslinks.webs.com/
Accompanying LOSS LINKS now also are my CARERS FOR HEALTH CARERS
as well as MOUNT MASLOW MENTORS.
www.facebook.com/CarersForHealthCarers
www.facebook.com/groups/MountMaslowMentors
These three Social Enterprises are based on providing a free Worldwide Call-in
Service (chat, speak, or view) available 24/7/365 in multiple languages via an
application, for persons suffering Loss who feel isolated, lonely and without anyone
to care for them. Callers can talk intimately—and anonymously if desired—with
volunteer Mentor-Listeners capable of Heart-felt Communication. I am seeking a
donor-philanthropist to fund the startup of this Worldwide Call-in Service that I
believe is desperately needed.
The 21st Century has witnessed an Epidemic of Isolation and
Loneliness in response to Human LOSS. Neither traditional Family
and Religion nor Modern Medicine has slowed the explosive
growth of Mental and Social Disorders. Today we prematurely die
of Communicative Diseases (poor relationships) more than
Communicable Diseases (influenza). The World’s Uncared for are
Crying Out for Care—heartfelt talk that connects them intimately to
another Human Being. Being linked by talk to another who Cares
brings healing. The CURE is CARE.

1
JACK’S HISTORY OF ANXIETY AND PANIC
What follows is my life story of HUMAN LOSS in terms of its expression as PANIC
and ANXIETY that result from Separation Anxiety Distress (appropriate acronym
S.A.D.) and the Life Lessons I learned from the Tests of Loss.
My first Anxiety Episode (low level Panic Attack) came in 1989 when I was the
sole full time carer for my second wife, Elaine, who was dying from terminal
cancer. Her dying took place over some 9 months, and about midway through
this period, I experienced the first and sudden appearance of a strong sense of
Anxiety/Fear coming from no particular event. Nothing specific seemed to cause
it. I was puzzled as well as scared.
In 1989 as a self-reliant male of 45 years, who had been through many relatively
extreme emotional experiences including spiritual deaths/rebirths, etc., to have
this Anxiety/Fear rise so strongly in me from nowhere challenged my sense of
self-respect and I felt some shame when I went to my doctor for help. We were
friends and he gave me a small amount of some benzodiazepine with the
comforting comment that he too would feel anxious doing what I was doing and
knowing me he was not worried about me becoming dependent on the drug and
just take a little and see if it helps. As I think back on it, the disclosure of my
vulnerability was probably the main helper, as I took only a little of the
medication several times and the Anxiety went away for the remaining period of
my wife’s dying. I continued without any further Anxiety through her death and
my grieving until 1991.
A month after Elaine’s death, May 1989, I met Katharine, the 1st
of 3 Grand Turning Points of my life. Now, an explanation of
why I met Katharine so quickly after Elaine’s death. I had been
separated from Elaine for four years when I went back to be her
full time carer for the nine months from when her cancer
returned after an absence of six years to when she died. So after
Elaine’s death I resumed my search for a woman to share my
life with. It only took a month to find her through an exclusive
dating agency in Australia.
It was Love at First Sight and Love of my Life. Katharine moved in to live with me
for the first three months after we met. But I valued my independent freedom
more than committing to an exclusive relationship with her that she desired and
so she went back to Brisbane to live nearer her work. For two years, every
weekend I drove the one-hour trip from my home to stay the weekend with her.
Although I chose not to commit to her, I had no interest in any other woman
from the time I first saw her. I had no hint of Anxiety with her during the three
years I lived in Australia.
Then in 1991 I left Katharine to move to America to make my fortune. I had
invented a new household product and sold it to a marketing company who
thought it had considerable profit potential. I was finally going to make my
entrepreneurial adventures pay-off; I had many past business failures but this
would make me financially comfortable at last. I flew Katharine over to be with
me and I rented a Jeep and we toured America for 2 months flying high. Then a
series of events occurred that left me broke on the mean streets of Los Angeles
with only a credit card, my wits and the woman who loved me through all the

2
ups and downs. To add to the insecurity I was in a country where I was in a legal
limbo due to my past refusal to fight a war and being deemed a criminal by the
Empire of that time. I bought a car with the last of my credit and became one of
the best paid courier drivers in L.A. Katharine rode in the passenger’s seat and
navigated as I sped expertly through the L.A. traffic jams using my car racing
skills from youth. However, the Anxiety reappeared even stronger (although not
what I now would term a full blown Panic Attack) than when it first appeared in
1989.
I could not sleep and was often restless and resorted to running and exercise to
relax. I went to a doctor who diagnosed me as “depressed”. He gave me a
Tricyclic medication that enabled me to get the sleep I could not seem to obtain
without it. I refused the label of “depressed” as I had not withdrawn in any way
from life. To the contrary I was working 12 hour days, 6 days a week, exercising,
writing poetry and prose, and living with a wonderfully supportive woman—
Katharine—who loved me in spite of my inability to decide to marry her as she
wished. My Anxiety (never a full blown Panic Attack) continued up and down as I
earned a living trying to recoup my financial loss while enjoying Katharine as
much as my “fallen” status would allow me—which turned out to be not enough
for her—rightly so. In August of 1992 she decided to leave me to go back to
Australia and resume the executive market research work she had
been doing that would grant her more self-worth and earnings. My
refusal to commit to her exclusively with marriage settled the issue.
On the day she left from L.A.X. airport I noticed a small hole
opening up where my belly button used to be. Day by day with her absence from
me the hole grew ever larger until the Void in the center of me made the message
overwhelmingly clear. She was the ONE, my Soul Mate, my Other Half—our
values matched almost totally as did our self-development too except for my
immaturity of non-commitment. My vaunted freedom as
independence from any constraining relationship suddenly
became the adolescent orientation it always was. My giving
up my “Independence” for the much greater value of our
“Interdependence” became the 2nd Great Turning for me.
Commitment was the key that unlocked me from the cell of
my solitary confinement. For when Katharine was with me
in L.A. and I did not commit, my Anxiety remained. It was only her leaving me to
go back to Australia that finally woke me to fully understand (embody
emotionally) her supreme value to me. Once I committed to her, my Anxiety-
Panic disappeared. I had no Anxiety-Panic whatsoever—not a trace, NONE. In
retrospect it remains astounding to me that I took three years to finally grow up
and mature from the Love of Wisdom to the Wisdom of Love. I count myself as
the most fortunate of men who had a woman who valued me enough to wait for
me to live what became our Great Love. The four years from the day I decided to
commit to her were the happiest years of my life to that point in time and since.
My 3rd Great Turning was Katharine’s nine months of dying and
death on December 17, 1996. Only a few days after Katharine’s
death, the Anxiety returned as ABSOLUTE PANIC. I staggered
through the disintegration of who I was as I lived out her loss. I

3
slept only a few hours a night and would often wake in the middle of the night
with a Panic Attack that necessitated my main way of coping with it: taking a
walk, going out for a drive, walking in a public place such as a shopping mall if
they were open. I tried to use my friends to help me cope but they were too
frightened by Katharine’s death at a youthful 34 (I was 18 years older than her
and all her friends were her age) to be strong enough to
bear my grief and to be there for me when the Panic
Attacked. Katharine’s dying and death were the 3rd Great
Turning (the last?) of my life because from this
experience I finally understood the Human Condition
and learned the LESSON OF LOVE FROM THE TEST OF
LOSS. I learned to use LOSS TO LINK ME TO OTHERS.
From Katharine’s death in 1996 until meeting my Chinese fourth wife, Helene, in
late 2005, the full blown Panic Attacks receded and mutated into a chronic off-on
Anxiety. I coped with by using tricyclics, controlled drinking (alcohol), working,
riding my bike, and connecting with friends and loved ones as much as I could.
For two months from the initial commitment to permanent relationship my bond
was strong and clear with Helene who later became my fourth wife, and my
anxiety disappeared.
A few months later after our “honeymoon” period, Helene’s bipolar disorder
came between us, and although we were married, I knew our relationship would
not continue as a marriage. The Anxiety began to come back little by little up
until our divorce in 2008 when my Anxiety-Panic roared back again and
remained until 2010.
In this year I met another wonderful woman, Zoe, who moved in and lived with
me. She stayed with me a year during which I was doing my usual working,
drinking and taking the tricyclics as I had been doing since 1997. During this
year of our intimate and satisfying relationship, the Anxiety-Panic almost
disappeared again.
When Zoe left to live on her own, my Anxiety-Panic returned with the most
physically disabling Panic Attack ever that left me face down on the ground and
for which an ambulance was called (neighbors thought I
had a heart attack but all was ok, only Panic!).
Thankfully, I have not had to endure such an episode
since.
From that time to this 2017, the anxiety comes and goes
at various intensities and for various periods. About 16
months ago I stopped drinking alcohol for the first time
in many years, and thus am better able to use my anxiety
more directly to link me to life and intimate others. The
acronym L.O.S.S. contains the core of Wisdom of LOSS.
We must use loss to link us again to life and others:
L.inking O.ur S.eparate S.elves.

SEPARATION DISTRESS IS THE PRECIPITATING CAUSE OF MENTAL DISORDERS

4
The Loss of Loved Ones and its linkage to the Anxiety/Panic episodes I think is
well evidenced in the events reported above. Research backs me on this. In Life
Events Preceding the Onset of Panic Disorder (1985) Faravelli, writes that panic
patients were more likely to have ‘underwent a major life event (death or severe
illness, either personal or of a cohabiting relative) in the two months preceding
the onset of symptoms.’ And, from an article on Jaak Panksepp, the affective
neuroscientist, Sarah-Neena Koch, wrote: “He cites research that points to early
childhood loss as a major risk factor for future depression and panic attacks. He
proposes that one may be more vulnerable to depression and panic attacks
‘because of permanent developmental modification of the emotional substrates
of separation distress.’”
Beyond the Losses of the women as an adult I recorded above, my entire life has
been found in LOSS from infancy on. My mother died when I was 3; my father
when I was 14. Two wives
(as described above) died from cancer their hand in
mine to the end. I divorced two wives. My adopted son, suffering from
schizophrenia, killed himself. My Chinese fourth wife was a diagnosed bi-polar
who I helped out of a lockup ward. Too many friends and clients killed
themselves outright or through various drawn out self-destructive addictions to
alcohol and other drugs. Professionally, I have worked in Palliative Care and as a
researcher for Queensland Health interviewing addicts and the mentally ill.
Further, I had a number of friends who had been diagnosed with serious mental
illnesses. So I am familiar with LOSS in most of its forms.

JAAK PANKSEPP AND THE 7 PRIMARY PROCESS BRAINS

My most important explanatory discovery about LOSS in general and its specific
relationship to Panic Attacks and Anxiety, came when I began reading the work
of the renowned affective neuroscientist, Jaak Panksepp. Here is a brief
introduction to his work:
"Jaak Panksepp’s work defines seven fundamental emotions [Emotional Brains—
note Panksepp intentionally capitalizes the terms]: SEEKING, RAGE, FEAR, LUST,
CARE, PANIC/GRIEF (ATTACHMENT) and PLAY. Discovered using brain-
stimulation techniques to isolate emotion circuits, these primary-process
systems are instinctual emotional systems - what we may think of as ‘drives’ or
‘motivations’. The Attachment system, or PANIC/GRIEF system as Dr. Panksepp

5
calls it, serves an evolutionary function in helping us secure bonds with our
parents as infants and with romantic partners, friends and family as adults. It’s
governed by opioids (endorphins), chemicals in the brain that induce a feeling of
comfort and satisfaction when triggered by an intimate bonding experience. If
we’re separated from a caregiver in childhood or a partner in adulthood, a panic
response is triggered. This is characterized by distress, which later turns to grief
and sadness. This response is thought to have evolved from when a lost juvenile
animal would call for its mother and try to attract her attention in the wild after
which the brain mechanism prompts the mammal to ‘give up’ as a means of self-
preservation and protection." Antonia Short
“Jaak Panksepp explains that ‘as indexed by diverse as primates, rodents, and
birds,’ PANIC/LOSS neurocircuitry is clearly distinct from FEAR neurocircuitry.
Electrical stimulation to very specific brain areas produces the separation calls.
He decided to call the neurocircuitry that generates feelings of loneliness, grief,
and separation distress—as well as panic attacks in humans—the PANIC system.
Panksepp emphasizes that the PANIC/LOSS system ‘is especially important in
the elaboration of social emotional processes related to attachment.’” Sarah-
Neena Koch
“I would anticipate that clients will often experience enormous relief to be
simply educated about their emotional primes and to recognize how they can
become masters over these primes rather than being mastered by them. The
mere act of learning about them as ancient evolutionary tools for living can take
an enormous burden off troubled minds. A better understanding of our ancient
emotional energies may allow individuals to better deal with the upsetting
feelings of the brain and develop cognitive habits that help engender more
positive feelings.” Jaak Panksepp
NOTE for therapists/counsellors:
It is interesting to me, and I think might be of interest to the therapeutic
community using Panksepp’s model to help those suffering from mental
disorders, is the fact that I have never fallen into “Depression”. For whatever
reason(s), my 6th PANIC/LOSS Brain has become stuck in “Panic” mode. When I
can’t obtain enough CARE, I keep being sent by my PANIC Brain to my 1st
SEEKING Brain to get that CARE. This has enabled me to not only survive my
multiple losses but to thrive through them. As I wrote above it is through LOSS
that I learned the LESSON OF LOVE which is CARE beyond genes or money.

HOW PANKSEPP’S WORK APPLIES TO HUMANITY AS WELL AS ME

The etymological meaning of CARE: PIE root gar- "cry out, call,
scream"
I am convinced the CAUSE OF THE MENTAL ILLNESS EPIDEMIC
worldwide in the Welfare States (anxiety, depression, bipolar,
schizophrenia) is now clearly established by Panksepp’s work
and that of the epidemiologist-cardiologist, James J. Lynch’s
three books on the Medical Consequences of Loneliness.
“Mental and substance use disorders are the leading cause of
nonfatal illness worldwide, with a global disease burden that

6
trumps that of HIV/AIDS, tuberculosis, diabetes, or transport injuries, new
research shows.” Medscape
“Communicative Disease, coined by Dr. Lynch, is the absence of heartfelt
communication in human relationships which leads to loneliness and social
isolation.” Olive Poison
“At times it seems as if our nation [U.S.A.], having
reached its high-water mark of prosperity, is
simultaneously awash and drowning in a sea of
narcotics and prescriptive medications to help deaden
the pain of isolation and loneliness. It is almost as if we
have agreed to submit voluntarily to a national,
chemically-induced frontal lobotomy to cope with the
loneliness and disconnectedness of our age. For all of the recent health data
suggest that if current trends persist, Communicative Disease, and its resultant
loneliness, will equal Communicable Disease as a leading cause of premature
death in all post-industrialized nations during the twenty-first century.” James J.
Lynch

The CAUSE: The CARE 5th Brain has been socially disconnected from our 6th
PANIC Brain. CARE is what keeps our species going. Without it we would be
extinct along with the other 98% of species that didn’t make it. If this Crying Out
for CARE is not responded to properly it leads to the litany Mental Disorders
plaguing the advance economy, Western Welfare States. A significant proportion
of the population in all age ranges—some 20% to 50%—is struggling with
controlling its FEELINGS OF SEPARATION DISTRESS that are at the core of
substance abuse, under-and-over-eating, crime, and a host of other self-and-
other-destructive behaviors.
Thus, what the West in general is suffering from, is a
disruption or compromise of its CARE behavior upon which
its survival depends. When you break the primordial link
between Parent/Carer and Child/Cared For (of any age) you
have the personal emotional disaster of titanic dimensions
known as the Mental Illness Epidemic—especially depression
and anxiety—that we now have in the Welfare States. The
reasons for this profound DISCONNECT I sum in the phrase
the “IRON CAGE” which I will not go into here.
Because we know the CAUSE OF THE EPIDEMIC, we also know the only
PERMANENT CURE: Freely entered into and responsibly maintained INTIMATE
RELATIONSHIPS OF MUTUAL CARE—to link once again the 5th CARE Brain
to the 6th PANIC Brain.
I invite any contacts.

My email: themesofjack@gmail.com;
Skype: Jack Carney FreeEach
Cell (Auckland, New Zealand): 64 (0)22 409 4035
Jack, at Home in the Universe, using L.O.S.S.
(L.inking O.ur S.eparate S.elves) to Link me to Others and Life.

7
8
9
10
11