because i am not gonna be able to stay on this plane for 3/12 hours." and, i mean, i was embarrassed. i was crying, but i couldn't control the panic attack. the pilot said, "okay, fine. we have to get her off the flight." >> my mom would sit me down or tell me before i would leave that she might not be the when i got back. she would allude to the fact that she was going to kill herself. i thought it was my responsibility to make sure that those bad things that i feared did not happen, and that's when my panic attacks started. >> well, my self-esteem plummeted, and i lost all of my confidence. no independence. i just started to depend on people. i became a victim, you know. i just turned myself into a viim of these circumstances, and it was just an awful, awful feeling to be so powerless. and i figured, "this is just terrible.

i'm 35 years old, and this it. this is gonna be for the rest of my life, and i hate it," but i sort of just started to accept it. >> i think i stayed in bed for, like, six months. i was just totally depressed. i didn't--i didn't want to live anymore because it was too painful to watch myself just basically fall apart. >> i became socially phobic. i was uncomfortable staying in other people's houses. i was uncomfortable traveling in other people's cars. and i lived in my own little world, and i didn't tell anyone. i would go to bed at night and just lie there and worry that i was gonna become possessed, that i was going to become mentally ill, or that i was gonna die of a terminal illness. those seemed to be my three fears at about 14. >> i think one of my biggest symptoms was, i felt kind of dizzy and light-headed, and i felt like i was gonna pass out. and my biggest fear was, driving with my two young kids in the car?" and that scared the heck out of me.

and even if i was in a store, i thought, "well, what if i pass out right here and then, you know, the ambulance has to come or something like that, and then my little daughter o's just two years old is standing there wondering what's happening to mommy? what if i never wake up? what if i end up in a mental institution?" i mean, all those things were going through my mind. >> after my first incident, where i had to stop driving the fire engine, i probably wenthrough a dozen or more doctors. i was in a shop with a doctor. she was a specialist on balance and inner-ear problems. and she was having me do a bunch of balance tests, and they had strobe lights going and the whole bit. she finally stopped the whole thing, and she just kind of chuckled, and she said, "why are we doing this?" she says, "i know what's wrong with you." she says, "you're having panic attacks." i can remember i looked at her, and i went, "you're kidding, right?" i said, "do you know what i do for a living? i'm a fireman, so i'm not afraid of anything." i said, "do you know where i've been and what i've seen in my career and in my life?" and she said, "well, it's real common with motor officers,

with firefighters, with soldiers." she says, "it's the stress that you're under that you don't realize." >> i work with couples and families and individuals, people who have problems in their relationships, people who have problems with anxiety and depression, addictions. i myself had anxiety disorder when i was in my 20s, and it kind of came on me very suddenly, and it was very debilitating. so i know the terrible feeling of anxiety disorder, the horrors of a panic attack. i've experienced that myself. >> the thing that alcohol did for me is, it numbed the depression. the depression was 24-7. i was able to work a job and really excel with it, because i had learned to be a hard worker. and once i got home, i had nowhere to turn. my mom was a nurse. pills were everywhere. in fact, when i started the program, my mom says, "why don't you just take a pill?" >> anxiety and depression are two of the main reasons people miss work, visit the family doctor, and take prescription

medication. take control of your anxiety and depression, and you'll take control of your life. you'll think more clearly, have more energy, sleep better, and be happier. take the first step right now. there is hope. there are options. call for a wonderful free cd that will show you how. >> it was unbelievable to me that you can do and you can achievwhatever you want. >> it's motivated me to do many different things that i've always wanted to do but was just so scared to do. >> i'm feeling physically better. you know, suddenly i could sleep. suddenly i was able to take my kids to disneyland. i could do all these things and not be afraid that i was gonna have to leave. >> before i found the attacking anxiety and depression program, there wasn't a single therapy that helped me. thank god for this. i am so blessed. y want help for your anxiety and depression. you want to feel better. you just don't know what to do.

let the midwest center help you take the first step. >> i think the program was wonderful. it did--was a miracle to me. >> these are life skills that really, really do stay with you. >> i cleared out my attic. then i found me. and i found out i like me. >> like, i never get anxious, and i'll never have a panic attack for the rest of my life. and i know i won't, 'cause i'll never allow that to happen. >> it was just so freeing to feel that heaviness come off myself. there's hope. there is a way out of this. >> right now there's someone waiting to talk to you who understands what you're going through. call now for this wonderful free cd. >> i was on medication after medication. i think every six weeks for a couple of years, i was being switched to a different medication and going through the side effects and weight loss and weight gain and nausea

and irritability. it was horrible, and i was doing it to self. i was on this quest for something that would make me feel better immediately. >> and i'm getting angrier because there's nobody helping me medically. all the doctors are saying is take, you know, prescriptions and try another antidepressant and try this anti-- you know, they just kept switching the drugs around. and i said, "but that's-- it's not helping. none of it's helping." so i finally went into therapy, and i just didn't find it helpful at all. i was just frustrated with them. i said, "but i need to understand what i'm going through and why i'm going through and how i can fix this." >> i remember there was no safe place anymore. i couldn't talk to my mother on the phone. that made me anxious. i couldn't drive to my favorite grocery store. that made me anxious. i just was living in this little shell wondering how much worse it was gonna get, and i prayed to god, and i said, "please, show me one person that's gone through this and lived and

thrived, and i'll help you for the rest of my life." and the next morning, i woke up and turned a show on, and it was a woman talking about panic attacks. >> when you're dealing with anxiety and depression, you know, you go tough so many different physical symptoms, and one of them is insomnia. and so anyway, one morning at 4:00 in the morning, i get up, and i said, "i'm gonna switch on the tv. i'm not sleeping anyway." and then i see lucinda. i'm listening to her, and i'm going, "oh, my gosh. that sounds just like me." >> i was so incredibly excited when i found the midwest center for stress and anxiety. i knew that i was on to something. i had found something that was gonna work for me. >> nobody ever told me that it's about changing the way that you think, and that was-- when i found this attacking anxiety and depression program, that was the major, major thing. and it's something so simple. i wish would have learned before then. >> the first thing that was so helpful was, i understood exactly what anxiety was. she described it, she explained it, and she told you why it is

and what it does to you physically and emotionally and the whole chemistry imbalance in your body. and i'm thinking, "why couldn't a doctor tell me that?" >> i really enjoy working with peoplen therapy who are using the program, because it is a great complement to the therapy. it's just great to have people kind of in that therapeutic environment for the entire week other than when--the hour that they're with me. if people don't have access to therapy or don't particularly need therapy but have the program, they can do a really god job by working with this program and with the midwest center to recover from anxiety and depression. there is a lot of support from the midwest center, phone support. there's coaching support. >> i could take a negative thought and run with it, and i could catastrophize the worst-case scenarios. and talking with other coaches, i find out that this is probably one of the biggest obstacles for everyone, and certainly, the clients that i've coached,

that's the main focus that i work on. >> my days started to change. my thoughts started to change, and it changed my life. it gave me the freedom to live my life, because before, i didn't. i was too scared. >> i had to give up my security blanket, and my security blanket was fear. my security blanket was, "do not go there." my security blanket was, "don't do that. don't trust the world." because i was brought up in believing that it was a bad ple. >> it was a shock, 'cause it was like, "oh, my gosh. it's been me all along? like, i'm the one that's causing this?" but then when you find out that it is under your control and you can solve it, that in itself just gives you that oomph. "oh, okay. i've just got to follow this program." you don't want to listen to the fact that, you know, you've been victimizing yourself all this time, because you're very angry at the fact that you've allowed yourself

to do that. >> you know, it was a whole different way of thinking, because for a long time, people believed that people who were anxious and depressed were deficient or that they were sick or unstable or incapable of helping themselves. and the different twist that i saw to the whole thing is th, "no, wait a minute. people with anxiety and depression are creative and intuitive and futuristic thinkers, and they have a vivid imagination. and if you could take all that creative energy that they're turning inward and making themselves sick with and turn it outward where it belongs, these people could conquer the world." >> i learned what i was missing, and it lit a fire under me that i don't know anybody could ever put out. my world opened up, and my life opened up, and my heart opened up, and my mind opened up. and the things that i probably should have been doing or could have been doing for the first 30 years started happening.

i was not living. and i'm living now. >> the program is utilizing cognitive behavioral therapy. it helps you to learn to identify how your own thinking is impacting your feelings and that your body is responding to your thinking and creating this panic and anxiety. medication can relieve the symptoms of e anxiety disorder, but the medication really doesn't do anything at all to correct the negative self-talk that's going on. >> yes, you can take medication. yes, you can self-medicate with alcohol, but that's not gonna help you in the long term. and that's not the kind of message you want your children to see. you want to be self-empowered. you want to know that no matter what, you can pick yourself up, dust yourself off, and get your energy and your confidence back no matter what's going on around you. and that's what this program does. >> the macho image-- it's hard for people to open up. it's hard for men topen up,

to get them to admit their weaknesses, to show their emotions, to really come up with a plan of action, to take control of their life, and just admit their fears. >> in fact, i've been told that, by a psychiatrist, that my defense mechanism is always on. [laughs] i'm always denying that there's a problem and that it's the way that it is. same thing with pain is, that's the way that i get through my life day to day: i deny that i'm hurt. i think one of the hugest breakthroughs that encouraged me to start the program was the information, and something i had never heard from one of my doctors is that i wasn't sick, i didn't have a disease, that it was a condition that basically i had developed throughout my life and that i didn't have to be cured from it, that i could teach myself and use the tools that were provided through the program to get over it. >> i like the way that it made

me realize that i was causing the problem, and i think that's one of the things that took me a long time to get into my head, but as it went on and on, i think i finally realized that nothing outside is making this happen. it is me that's causing it. >> life for me now is amazing. i can seriously say that i'm just--i'm blessed, and i'm so happy. i could have never been on a plane, you know, before and fly for six hours by myself, but i'm just my own safe person now. i don't rely on others to cheer me up all the time. i can do that for me now. >> you cannot put a price on what it gives you. it gave me my life back. it made me find me. >> the attacking anxiety and depression program is something that i keep in my car, i keep on my ipod. i go back to it all the time. it's like having a good friend that's sitting in my car with me. if i'm worried, i'll put in the "worry" cd, and i remember that that doesn't do me any good.

"it doesn't do me any good to worry. what can i do to change that?" and you know what? sometimes we need that friend. we need that, "you know, you can do this. you might have forgotten that you can do this, but you can do this. i've seen you get through worse things." and that's what it is for me. >> it's time to take control of your worry, anxiety, and depression. it's time to put an end to the fear and "what if" thinking it creates. please, pick up the phone and call right now for a wonderful free cd that will show you how to finally free yourself from the obsessive worry, fear, and exhaustion that's caused by anxiety and depression. you can get your life back. you can feel good again. call now for your free cd to learn how. >> just to get that freedom and be able to appreciate the things i had really, really--it was more than help. it was a dream come true. every day in my prayers i thank god for that blessing. >> i think the program gave me a new way of looking at things

and looking at life, and it made me feel like i can do anything. >> keep practicing the skills, and it will work. and i'm proof that it works. >> we want to help you help yourself. you can control your anxiety, stress, and depression, and we can show you how. call now. >> it hit home. there were people that had exactly what i had. >> life now is much, much, much better. i feel like i can handle my life now. >> it's amazing. sometimes i have to step back and say, "oh, my god. i used to do that. i used to worry all the time. i used to make myself sick. i just am so happy with where i am in my life. >> the midwest center saved me in so many different ways that i could honestly say that i'm no longer scared to death. i feel like i'm a part of something now. this program really works. >> you have a right to be happy. you have a right to not feel anxious and depressed. life is supposed to feel good.

call now for this motivating free cd and take control of your life. >> there is a changing your life. you have to commit to it. you have to believe that you're worth it. and you just keep going. but if you don't use it, it's not gonna do you any good. i go back to it every day. i live it. it's a way of life. >> i'm a totally different person. i am so in control of my life. i'm so happy. i have confidence. my self-esteem is just fantastic, and i can't even believe that i put myself through that. i feel like i had to probably go through it to get to where i am in my li. it's given me my independence back, and it's totally empowered me to know that i can succeed and do and work at anything i want to do. >> it's literally allowed me

to get my life back in order; whereas before, it was just chaotic. >> i definitely feel like the program saved my life. i mean, i don't know what i would have done without it, because you are your own parachute, and i was the only one who could save myself. it's actually one of my proudest accomplishments. >> it's something i definitely could have used years earlier, and i think it would have helped me even before i had panic attacks. it was a life changer for me, a real life changer. >> i've changed. it's not the world around me that has changed. it's still the same world that i grew up in, but it doesn't scare me like it used to, because i know who i am now. and i know that no matter what happens, good or bad, i will land on my feet and i'm gonna get through it, and good and bad things happen to us all, and it's about choosing whether or not you want to be a victim or you want to be a victor.

>> i think this program could help everybody in the way they think about life. it's full of wisdom about how to live your life in a successful way and in a healthy way, and most of us didn't get that blueprint. so, you know, this program has kind of gathered up thinking from just a huge range of places and made it accessible in one place. >> i mean, life is life, and stress is stress, but the incredible thing about it is, you know when it's coming on and you see that you're gonna be in a stressful situation. you just have the skills to deal with it. you just live in the moment, and that's a definite you'll have to do. don't go sweating about the past and beating yourself up about the past. don't get too far into the future, because you really have no control over the future. and it's to stay in the present moment, and that's where i've been for the last year and a half--staying in the present moment. and my life has been fantastic. >> it was so simple, because knowledge is power. and getting the education and

having someone explain to me what was happening with my body and that i wasn't the only one going through it and that other people have been successful at it-- there's a recipe for success right there. >> because of the attacking anxiety and depression program, i am more confident than ever, any time in my entire life, that i can decide for myself. i can live with my choices. it's like you're unleashing the side of you that's nice, that's normal. it empowers you in such a way that you never even thought possible. it makes you prouder of yourself than ever before. >> this program is for any single person living in this day and age. our lives are so stressful. it's life skills that you need to learn. whether you have problems with anxiety, stress, worry, depression, it certainly helps. and it helps you keep on the straight and narrow. i still pull out the cds and listen to 'em when i'm frazzled or i notice myself going back

into some negative phrases and things like that. >> i have grown backwards. i think i was 80 when i was about 8. [laughs] then in my 30s, i'm starting to play. this is the first time i've ever had a childhood, and i'm gonna have it. i'm gonna experience every single thing about it that i can and i wasn't able to before. and i can now. >> i wanted to illustrate what i was like before the program. basically, i was hunched over, basically like the hunchback of notre dame basically. thiss how i'd be walking. just like that. but after the program, check it out. the sky's the limits. whoo! >> it just worked. you get control of yourself and control of your mind and your life. and i took control, and i've

been traveling ever since, and i've got total independence. i went to stay in new zealand for fi or six weeks. then i went up to australia for a month, and then i went over to thailand for 2 1/2 months, and i did all of this by myself. trains, planes, and automobiles. >> life now is fantastic. i appreciate each day. i've learned how to slow down. i've learned how to relax. i've learned how to actually do nothing and feel good about it and know that it's healthy to do nothing. i used to have a belief that you had to be doing something productive at every minute or you're wasting your time. and that's not the case at all. that's not being healthy. i'm enjoying life. >> don't let anyone ever tell you that you have to live with anxiety and depression the rest of your life or that you have to take medication for the rest of your life, because it's not true. what you need to do is believe in yourself and go deep inside of yourself and take a look at who you really are. and you need the skills to know how to get your confidence back

and be self-empowered so that you can live in the moment and help yourself. >> i know what it feels like to live on that edge and hoping beyond hope that somebody would just go ahead and push me over and get it over with. i also know what it feels like to have somebody come up and take my hand and walk me away and show me the beauty that, you know, was beyond that cliff. and i'm no better than anybody else. i don't--i'm no smarter. it's taking the program, the attacking anxiety and depression program, and it is attacking all of those bad things that you've been telling yourself, all of those horrible things that you may have learned, and it is putting your foot down and refusing to

live the way that you've been living any longer. you just have to say no. [uplifting music] ♪ >> how long are you gonna let anxiety and depression be your excuse for not feeling good? how long are you going to depend on medications with side effects? how long are you going to suffer needlessly? stop it all with real proven self-help that could last a litime. call now for a wonderful free cd that will show you how. it's your life. take it back. call now.

>> announcer: the following is a paid presentation for richard simmons project h.o.p.e., brought to you by gaiam. >> we all know as adults what it's like to feel overextended... [ echoing ] overextended. my day is so busy, i have no time to work out. more american families struggle to deal with the chronic illnesses such as diabetes and hypertension. >> i come from the "if it's on your plate, you eat it" club. >> 165 million people will be obese. >> americans are not winning

their battle against obesity. >> hope for e ture wasn't something i had a lot of. >> announcer: over the past 38 years, millions of pounds lost, bodies literally transformed, lives truly changed, and it's all because of one man. >> reach higher. reach for your goals! >> announcer: richard simmons is the nation's most revered and beloved fitness expert. using his unique wit, passion, and enthusiasm, richard continues his crusade to reach out to the masses, encouraging them ttakeontrol of their fitness destiny. delivering a serious message with his trademark humor, richard has helped millions of overweight people worldwide achieve unparalleled results like these. and now, get ready for richard simmons like you've never seen him before. introducing richard simmons project h.o.p.e. for the first time ever, richard

is introducing his new, 90-day progressive work-out system, featuring his unique triple training method, along with his complete 90-day meal program. whether you're active right now, or you haven't broken a sweat in years, your goal for a better, slimmer, healthier you is just 90 days away. richard's progressive workouts and food program are fun and doable for where you are right now. the secret to richard's work-out results? his triple training method. richard's triple training method is a combination of low-impact cardio and toning, arranged in a safe and effective progression that's sequenced to maximize weight loss. as your fitness level builds, richard changes up the moves, the reps, and the intensity to make the workouts more challenging, so you never get bored, and youever plateau. and richard's triple training method can help you burn up to three times more fat, compared to traditional cardio alone. and best of all, every workout is just 30 minutes or less. plus, with richard's complete 90-day meal program, the power to choose delicious foods and perfect portions has never been

easier. the combination of workouts and the meal program will help turn your body into a lean, mean, fat-melting machine. you'll also get the encouragement you need with richard by your side every step of the way, motivating you to succeed. >> one! i'm proud of you. just say, "i can do it"! >> announcer: now join tv journalist and host kinga philipps as she talks to the legend himself, richard simmons, about how you can reclaim your health in a fun, safe, and effective way and finally become the person you've always wanted to be with the new richard simmons project h.o.p.e. >> hi, everyone, and thank you for being with us today, as we take a deeper look at richard simmons, an american icon. 38 years and 3 million pounds later, richard simmons continues his crusade to reach out to the masses, encouraging them to take control of their fitness destiny. even if you don't believe in yourself, richard still believes in you, and that is why i'm so honored to have joining me today the one and only

richard simmons. >> thank you, kinga, for your kind words. >> well, let's start with the bigger picture. why is it that your programs are so effective for so many different people? >> i've never lied about how to exercise. i've never lied about how to lose weight. i've been consistent for all these years not only with them, but with myself. everybody pretty much knows my story. i was obese. i became a compulsive eater, and i had to turn that around, and i opened my little exercise studio 38 years ago called slimmons. and i make it safe and fun, because i believe if you're happy when you exercise, i think you'll stick to it. >> what has become your number-one mission? >> my number-one mission is the name of my new program -- project h.o.p.e. h-o-p-e -- health, optimism, passion, and energy. project h.o.p.e. gives you support, and a lot of people