ABC News Correspondent Matt Gutman - Author of No Time To Panic

ABOUT MATT GUTMAN AND HIS BOOK NO TIME TO PANIC

For nearly two decades working for ABC News, Matt Gutman lived with a secret. In NO TIME TO PANIC: How I Conquered a Lifetime of Panic Attacks by Crying with Strangers, Bear-Hugging My Fear, and Dialing Down My Anxiety (Doubleday; September 12, 2023; $28.00), the award-winning chief national correspondent opens up about his stop-at-nothing journey to find a remedy to halt his panic attacks in their tracks.

In his live broadcasts, viewers saw an unflappable and gregarious reporter, known for shaking off close scrapes with danger to get the critical scoop-surviving captivity under Venezuela's secret police, anacondas in the Amazon, the eyes of literal hurricanes, and sniper fire abroad. What viewers didn't see was Matt's decades long grapple with panic attacks, hidden behind the façade of imperturbability he'd carefully constructed in their wake. A January 2020 broadcast caused this public persona to crumble. Mid-panic Gutman would misstate the facts of a major story, leading to a month-long suspension, public shame, and overwhelming regret. It was a wakeup call to address his condition head-on for the first time.

What ensued was a three-year quest for knowledge and treatment. Matt turned the handle of almost any door he could find: from searching for a magic pharmaceutical cocktail cure, to breathwork, to researching (and trying) psychedelics, and much more. By accessibly outlining the history of panic, Gutman's personal psychological landscape, and the lengths he goes to free himself, NO TIME TO PANIC dismantles the stigma associated with panic disorders.

Matt, and in turn the reader, would discover that more than a quarter of all Americans will suffer a panic attack in their lifetimes. That over 2.5 million Americans rush to a hospital each year thinking they could be dying of heart failure, when in fact they are having a panic attack. A personal journey and a guide, Gutman's NO TIME TO PANIC energetically outlines best practices, helpful tips, and practical solutions to finding possible paths towards an ultimate mind-body truce to help one overcome panic and anxiety.

*** NO TIME TO PANIC by MATT GUTMAN, ABC News’s chief national correspondent - an unflinching look at panic attacks by a reporter whose career was nearly derailed by them, offering readers a guide to making a truce with their warring minds.

Matt Gutman can tell you the precise moment when his life was upended. Reporting live on a huge story in January 2020, he found himself in the throes of an on-air panic attack-and not for the first time. The truth is that Gutman had been enduring panic attacks in secret for twenty years: soul-bruising episodes that left his vision constricted, his body damp, his nerves shot. Despite the challenges, he had carved out a formidable career, reporting from war zones and natural disasters before millions of viewers on Good Morning America, World News Tonight, and 20/20. He typically "punched through" to audiences, his TV appearances kinetic and often unforgettable.

But his January 2020 broadcast was unusual for all the wrong reasons. Mid-panic, Gutman misstated the facts of a story, a blunder that led to a monthlong suspension, not to mention public shame and personal regret. It was a reckoning. Gutman's panic attacks were too much for him to bear in secret. He needed help.

So began a personal journey into the science and treatment of panic attacks. Gutman would talk to the world's foremost scholars on panic and anxiety, who showed him that his mind wasn't broken; it's our perception of panic that needs recalibration. He would consult therapists and shamans, trying everything from group treatment and cognitive behavioral therapy to ayahuasca and psilocybin. And he would take a hard look at the trauma reverberating inside him-from his childhood, but also from his years as a conflict