Agoraphobia?

Hi littleneck...

Guess it's time for me to "come out of the closet" on this one. Over the past 30 years or so I have had terrible bouts of agoraphobia but have kept it to myself. Most of the time I prefer to just stay home...it's safe here. If I make myself go out I usually do OK, but other times I all of a sudden get panicky and need! to get home!! NOW! Then it's often I stay home for as long as I can again.

There are times when I can psych myself into going on a trip, but we take our trailer and then I'm fine. It's my own little 'home' and hubby is with me. For some reason I'm OK with that, but if I had to stay in a motel or someone's house I would be very uncomfortable. So I do understand your 'fearful' feeling.

Hugs,
Chutzie

Of course one needs a bed close by at all times when we get hit with a bout of fatique that wipes us out. It can happen anywhere. Home Depot, hugh, exhausted by the time I find the aisle with the do dads, and have to get son to stand in line to pay while I bolt for the truck.

 My seat folds way back like almost flat, I put one of the three sweaters I have partially removed, under my head and breathe. Sometimes breathing is about all I can manage. 

The picking up the groceries thing and handing the money to the kid thing to pay for it and hauling to get outside got me. I did that one for months when I was raising my daughter and she was about 17. That's when I knew my stress level was really climbing. Shopping has been a real drag for a long time, but when the stress level was to much to even check out, if I had a way out of it, I was getting on the edge of the cliff then. I kept telling everyone around me for months, to please back off, I was barely hanging in there. Nobody understood or heeded the warnings and finally big crash number two happened.

And the result of that became this after my daughter hit 18 and moved out to live with her husband of 8 years now.

I had Agoraphobia for about 6 months bad. It started off as something sort of benign after losing my home business and home and feeling like I just had to escape. My brother invited me to come to his house and gave me, rented me a room. I still had money left to support myself for a couple of years. Till then, moving to his place, I had been going through a heavy bout of anxiety, pain, breathing problems for about a year and a half. So, I went to his house and he introduced me to playing this online game that totaly fixated me. As long as I was fixated, I was relaxed. I was very comfortable just sitting in that bedroom playing that game. It got to the point I didn't want to come out, then it turned into a fear of going out after a couple of months. Just going out to shop once a week took all I could muster to go out the door. It finally reached the point that having to go out that once a week was causing panic. I finally realized that if I didn't get my life back out of that bedroom I was going to lose it completely, packed up all my stuff and headed back west. Within a couple of days I was fine again being out, well, as fine as you can be when the day is slowly or sometimes speedily going to pot on your body and brain.

Anyhow, as long as you keep going out, you shouldn't developed a really extreme problem with leaving your safe haven at home.

For me, I have to get out. Even if I have a home business I can do, there is no way I could go from my bed to eating something to working. I have to get out for at least 2 or 3 hours minimum first thing in the day and usually run it up to about 2 pm in the afternoon. By then I am dragging everywhere and ready to just go home and do whatever is left that I can do, which is usually either rest watching TV, or go back and forth from that to the computer, or sleep.

Real agoraphobia starts off as just a reluctance to go out and face stress and anxiety triggers when staying home feels better. As long as you continue going out that is about where it stays, a reluctance to go out. If you quit going out that reluctance can turn to dread, but staying home all the time isn't a answer, because the anxiety and stress finally follows you into your safe spot. Being there becomes just as bad.

Hi Littleneck-

I had agoraphobia in my early 20's and it was a nightmare. Mine was from anxiety- like Grailhunter stated, it was to avoid anxiety triggers. And it was sheer panic almost 24/7.

I do not have it now, but when my pain and fatigue is bad I don't want to do anything or go anywhere either. Most the time I find though if I stay busy and get a walk in or just keep moving the pain and fatigue is better. I do take a rest late morning and late afternoon whenever I can and that also seems to help. The winter was awful. I don't want to go anywhere when it is cold, just hibernate. And the pain and fatigue was awful. Now that the milder temps are here I am starting to feel better and then I feel like doing a little more. 

Hope that will be the same for you-  

GamJill  

Pain causes depression. Docs and Pharmaceutical Co.'s want you to believe it's the other way around b/c then they can sell more psychoactive drugs. If we push through the depression, the result is anxiety. That's been proven over and over. Just grabbing yourself by your bootstraps, calling yourself a bunch of names; lazy, stupid, hopeless, sub-par, etc. just increases both depression and anxiety. The only way out is to treat the pain, treat the depression, and if necessary, treat the anxiety. I remember years of not being able to get up and get going. This has been happening since childhood, a very rocky childhood to say the least. So, don't torture yourself, it's counter-productive. You have to start feeling better emotionally and physically, then start desensitization treatment. iI you can't find a pro to help here get a good book. primarily, one introduces the feared activity/situation, in small increments allowing one to get used to it at every level. Like overcoming fear of mice. First they get you to visualize a mouse, for like, ten seconds. Next session; look at a picture of a mouse. Then up to being in a room with a mouse in a cage. Finally, provided they're tame mice, hold a mouse in your hand. many can't reach this level. That's ok. Everybody has their achilles heel, ie. something that scares them, they usually keep it hidden and quietly avoid situations where the stimulus (mice) live.

Lost in Philly, how old is your puppy??? I have a 7 1/2 mo old bichon that didn't get socalized over the winter like she should have and she is having a hard time when she sees people that she doesn't know. She seen my neighbor and his little 4 yr old out yesterday and she didn't want any part of them and tried running back to the house. I feel so bad for her cause it is not her fault. So I'm also out when we have nice days working on socalizing her.

 

I had horrible anxiety driving for several years. I had a panic attack while driving so of course that was the beginning, my brain associated driving with panic. It was pure hell driving most of the time but I knew if I gave into it, which would have been the easy thing to do, I would give up my freedom and I was not going to do that cause to me the ultimate freedom is getting in my car and going where I want when I want. The first time I made a four hour trip by myself I cried cause I was so happy. So I do think that phobias can be overcome with lots of work.

 

luv and hugs

Marlee

Marlee, I have Sabra out every day but she is afraid of children!  She loves adults and cats but is fearful of kids and other dogs.  It just could be her nature and not because she was in the house a lot this winter.

 

I don't have agoraphobia but I do like to stay home.  I'm far more comfortable there and don't notice my health issues nearly as much.  So, that may be playing into this.  I do make myself get out several times a week but I'm always glad to get back home.

 

Sherrine

Yah, its quite weird Tyno. Usually I get up very lethargic and numb, go outside and stumble around in a half daze and smoke, then I start feeling the stiffness and pain kicking in, then I come in, check my email, check what has been said or posted here, then go out and smoke another, kinda semi depressed the whole time. By then I am usually okay to get changed and go start my day by leaving the house and doing whatever. Now, on these mornings, which are the vast majority I don't tend to feel allot of stress or anxiety, beyond the slight stress of wanting out of that house for awhile.

Now, every once in awhile, I get up very clear headed and go outside to do my morning smoke. No fog, no depression, the pains and stiffness are there, but mentally I feel quite alert, and I have a much greater feeling of stress and mild anxiety. Which I find really odd. Brain and senses are working as well as they can, and I am more anxious.

I think its because there is no consistency to it. The overwhelming number of mornings are such a drag, that everything has as you said, adjusted to that. Now toss in a morning of energy and clarity and your not used to it. You have become programmed that the other way, with fatigue, lethargy, stiffness, pain, depression as being the normal.

I actually think, in a way, our whole lives, even before Fibro were like this. We might wake up badly and just move into our day and it got better, or we might wake up good, but with a little higher stress level, and move into our day and it went away once we got going.

Now its not like that anymore. Regardless, were Ego programmed that this is who we are, this is the condition were in, this is how we must deal with it and there is not enough healthy consistency going on to re-program us to a different way of viewing it. It takes a long time where things have changed for the better, before our minds start picking up on it and re-adjust.