Phobias and Anxiety
A phobia is an irrational fear, but the anxiety that comes with it is a normal emotion because we all experience it at some time or another, especially when faced with uncomfortable situations. Of course, these anxieties can help us when in potentially threatening situations – giving us the ability to run away or stand and fight (fight or flight response). However, when those feelings become so strong that they are either irrational or totally ‘over the top’ then they can restrict our lives dramatically and making the quality of our lives extremely uncomfortable.
A phobia therefore is an intense fear of a particular thing or situation that would not be deemed threatening to us normally. It is quite possible to have a phobia of literally anything, but will typically be one of the following:
- An animal (dogs, cats, frogs, spiders etc)
- An object (books, knives, needles, feathers etc)
- Place (hospitals, dentists, crowded places etc)
- Situation (planes, heights, motorways, going to the toilet etc)
The feelings of anxiety can be so intense that they can induce feelings or waves of panic, heart palpitations, excessive perspiration, muscular tension and cramps, hyperventilation, dizziness / fainting, indigestion / stomach pains, sickness / diarrhoea. This in turn will cause the sufferer to avoid those situations that they will become anxious in. Of course this avoidance actually worsens then situation and / or the beliefs – actually making the phobia worse, and never seemingly getting any better. This then leads to the person’s life to become more and more dominated by the wariness they have to take in avoiding that situation they fear.
So it can be seen that someone with a phobia will have intense feelings of anxiety, as described above, but of course they only occur in the times when they are in the situation(s) that they are fearful of. At other occasions they don't feel fearful. So, if you have a phobia of say cats, you will feel fine if there are no cats in your vicinity and if you are scared on aeroplanes, you feel OK when you don’t have to fly etc It is thought that more than 15% of the population suffer from phobia’s in their lives, and most simply just put up with them rather than seeking a resolution – which, if they realised it could change their lives quite dramatically for the better.
Phobias – Why ?
Whilst some phobias do seem to have a root cause (and finding the root cause is always the best way forward) – for instance seeing someone else being scared of something (particularly when you were young), or going through extreme turbulence on a plane, etc, some phobias just seem to make no sense at all and just seem to develop for no apparent reason. Phobias are therefore ‘figments of our imagination’ if you like, served up by our subconscious mind, to help protect us from ‘perceived’ dangers. Of course, what our sub conscious doesn’t seem to grasp is the fact that we are not in danger ! It can therefore be seen that our sub conscious minds are unable to disseminate between real / unreal and consequently doesn’t always get it right. So once it’s convinced that a certain thing or situation is dangerous, it acts in a way to protect us from this perceived danger and we get a reaction totally out of balance with the circumstances and find ourselves avoiding situations etc in an effort to avoid the ‘over the top’ anxiety it makes us feel.
Over the years I have successfully dealt with many hundreds of clients with phobia problems, some of the phobias are the well known examples such as fear of flying, needles/injections, dentists and spiders, others a little more lesser known, such as feathers and colours, but if you think about it, it’s quite possible to have an irrational fear of almost anything. Phobias do respond particularly well to therapy and I will work with you to bring about a resolution to your issues and fears. I use techniques from both Hypnotherapy and Cognitive Behavioural Therapy, which will help in bringing about relief to your problems and issues. This would normally take some 4/5 sessions, however, I will discuss this with you in more depth during consultation.