Some people are worriers. I’m one of those.

Some people are procrastinators. Guilty as charged.

Some people are panickers. I’m not only one of those, but I lead the pack.

I’d like to be the person who remains calm in a crisis, talks others off the ledge and can quietly guide the masses to peaceful pastures. Instead, I think the worst is going to happen, freak out and gallop full speed ahead in panic mode.

I wasn’t always like this. When I was a teenager, I looked at disasters as adventures. After I got my driver’s license, my dad let me have his old Pontiac Executive, but the tank had its quirks.

The brakes didn’t always catch, but if I pumped them hard enough, I’d eventually come to a stop. Still, I didn’t panic when that happened, which was most of the time.

I can’t blame panicking on genetics. My mom is one of the calmest people I’ve ever observed in an emergency.

One afternoon, my great aunt came to visit with her daughter. Aunt Adele was sitting at the table, and Mom noticed she’d become glassy eyed and then her aunt slowly started to slip out of the chair.

Her daughter started screaming, but my mom remained perfectly calm.

“Go get a glass of water and a cold washcloth,” she told me, all the while holding my aunt’s head up and telling her cousin to calm down.

Her aunt came around in a minute or two, but my mom never lost her cool. I was quite impressed with her calm presence, and I’ve never forgotten that incident.

I believe the panic stage started when I had my first child. I would go in and check on him almost every hour to make sure he was breathing. Occasionally, I’d have to nudge him a little to get him to move so I’d be sure he was okay.

With my second son, I relaxed a little – not a whole lot – but I’d still go in and nudge him a couple of times during the night to make sure he was okay. With the third son, I just let him sleep with us until he was about a year old so I wouldn’t have to get out of bed.

Forget peanut butter or hot dogs until they were in first grade. I’d read toddlers could choke on those two foods. So they were banned from the pantry.

I’ve read hundreds of articles on how to remain calm, but I can’t seem to follow their advice when things go haywire even though I intellectually know they’re right.

Step one – before reacting, assess what’s happening. My assessment is the ship is not only taking on water, but it’s sinking and sinking fast.

Step two – breathe. Experts say to breathe in deeply and calmly while taking stock of the situation. Oh, I’m breathing all right – fire and brimstone and sheer panic. My heart’s pounding, sweat is rolling down my back and all I can think is – why is somebody telling me to breathe instead of helping fix the “we’re-all-doomed” problem.

Step three – call for help. That one’s easy because my mom or my husband are two people I call for help. I’ve seen my mom in action, and my husband is the calmest, most capable person I’ve ever met in an emergency.

He’s the reassuring presence in my life, and after I ratchet down from screaming “Call 911 immediately” back to the “I-can-handle-this” level, I have to apologize for running around like the sky’s falling in.

Luckily, after almost 40 years, the man gets me.

And never reminds me to breathe.

This column was originally published in The Fort Bend Herald.