You don’t have to match someone’s panic to prove you care.

Panic is contagious, and matching it can feel like loyalty, as though staying calm would mean you had not grasped how bad things are. But two frantic people in a room leave nobody steady. Your calm is not indifference; it is the thing that makes you useful, and often the thing that lets them come down, because people borrow the nervous system in front of them.

When somebody turns up frantic, slow your own voice on purpose and ask one practical question: what has to happen next. Then help with that. You can say you are worried too without performing it at their volume.