The fear of confined spaces or “claustrophobia” as it is most commonly known affects around one in every thirty people, and can cause panic attacks or even worse in some instances. This can be a real problem for anyone who works for mining companies or are tasked with working underground, and so today I’m going to do my best to highlight some techniques these people might like to use, if they start to suffer. At the end of the day, fears like this are just figments of our imagination, and rarely represent any real, physical or tangible issue, which means they can be beat by training our minds to ignore them.
Don’t get me wrong, I’m not an official claustrophobia expert, so if you’re looking for one of those, it’s probably best you check out Aba Engineering or a similar company that specialise in this kind of training. However, I do have a background in psychology, and so I’m usually quite handy when it comes to issues like this. With that in mind, here are some great techniques I’ve come up with to make the lives of claustrophobia sufferers a little more bearable. Try them out and see how you get on. You’ve got nothing to lose, right?
Accept Your Anxiety
The single most effective method for dealing with a fear of confined spaces is to simply accept your situation and accept the anxiety you feel. This usually takes a long time to achieve, as many people do start having panic attacks almost instantly. Although it’s difficult, you must take deep breaths, concentrate on the job in hand, and ignore your surroundings.
Use Cognitive Treatment
If you went off to see a claustrophobia specialist, he would start cognitive therapy by sitting you down in a large dark room and locking the door. This would likely make you feel anxious, but hopefully not claustrophobic. After a couple of hours, he would have you move into the cupboard, which is obviously very confined and very dark. Now, though you may well panic to begin with, you should get used to the small space. So, why not cut the specialist out altogether and just do it all yourself at home? It would be a little less embarrassing if nothing else.
Seek Medical Help
If all else fails and you really don’t seem to be able to shake this claustrophobia, then a trip to see your doctor is most definitely in order. Most GP’s have questions these days designed to let them know what the main cause of your fear is. For instance, he or she will be able to determine if you have a fear of confinement, a fear or suffocation or a mixture of both. This will help them suggest more effective treatments.
Always remember that irrational fears like this should not be allowed to control your life. Much like people who are scared of spiders, you might find you become timid and eventually suffer from nervous conditions if you don’t sort it out as quickly as possible, so take your first steps today.
See you next time!
