CBT to tackle Agoraphobia - my experience

[little wren]

Tufty - thanks for the reply. I am not an angry person either - too passive sometimes. Yeh, you're right the fight/flight response cannot be sustained over a long time. I was just wondering though as CBT mentions the evolutionary benefits of adrenaline. Anger has a place - perhaps by not recognizing when you should be feeling angry it gives rise to anxiety. Who knows...Acceptance is the key definitely.


Lyn - I hope I get to feel happy walking my dog soon - I wish the clocks had gone backwards and not forwards - so I had more time in the early mornings before people are around (it starts getting very busy where I live around 8 am). If no-one is around I don't have to worry about make-up and ironed clothes - I can just go.

Bernie - glad you got it all sorted. I think you meant to post on Agoraphobia 2013 which is the main one where most people read. I'm glad you got a reply on this one though. I think you are doing really well - remember how scared you were when you had your first meeting...and now to chat for an hour and a half with him....that is so good I am struggling at the moment walking the dog around my cul-de-sac - the snow put me back and then the clocks changing. For 10 days whilst you walk up your road - I will be starting back on walking the dog - I will be thinking of you, let me know how you are getting on....it helps so much hearing of other peoples cbt journeys x

[Alabasterlyn]

I am feeling quite down today after my assessment yesterday for CBT.

I was told when I spoke with the triage person who phoned me a couple of weeks ago that as long as I went to the surgery for an assessment that the CBT therapist would come to my home due to my agoraphobia.

The appt for yesterday had been on my mind ever since I got the letter and I was a mess all morning. The traffic getting to the surgery was nose to tail all the way there and back and in total it took 2hrs. The heat in the surgery was overwhelming and I could feel myself getting very anxious.

At the end of an hour of pouring my heart out the therapist said she would be happy to give me 6/8 sessions but I would have to go to the surgery for them. I have to say I was gutted as there is no way I can get there without my OH taking me and he was only able to take me yesterday because he took a day off work, something he can't keep on doing.

What made things even worse is that the therapist then said that if I had been "totally housebound" then perhaps they would have relaxed the rules a bit, but as I had made the effort and got to the surgery then I was "recovered enough" to keep on going there.

I have complained to the local Mental Health Team but it was like water off a ducks back

[little wren]

Lyn - really sorry to hear that - how on earth can they justify not allowing you home visits (when they will 'bend' the rules for some people)? I hope you manage some compromise with them - maybe they would do a few sessions over the phone to start with? Why is it so damn hard to get any proper help from the NHS?????

[Alabasterlyn]

Lyn - really sorry to hear that - how on earth can they justify not allowing you home visits (when they will 'bend' the rules for some people)? I hope you manage some compromise with them - maybe they would do a few sessions over the phone to start with? Why is it so damn hard to get any proper help from the NHS?????

I get the feeling it's all about NHS cutbacks and I think mental health has always been at the bottom of their list when it comes to priorities and anxiety disorders most likely come way below other disorders like schizophrenia where they feel someone may be a danger to the public.

It does make me very angry when I read in the papers about people coming to the UK from overseas purely to get free NHS treatment that costs thousands of pounds which they aren't even entitled to and those of us who have been born and brought up here and contributed to the system with our taxes are penalised.

[little wren]

May follow flossie and register with no panic for their phone CBT alongside Robins programme as I find it hard to go out after Ive been stuck in for awhile...it was the excuse of snow that did it...then the clocks going forward so I kept missing my early walk with pup... but I will take him out with OH later - have to force myself to go - get back into the routine of going. I know for it to work for me I have to practice DAILY whether I feel brave enough or not.

[little wren]

13.04.13
Ok have been really thinking about the CBT approach. Each day try and adopt it into a lifestyle change - a real change in the way I am thinking. Frustrating as the going out is difficult - the apprehension. Practice, Practice, Practice. Been also reading Claire Weekes as a lot of people have recommended. Been practicing CBT for OCD too and it is working - the float past, the let it be, the step back and observe instead of becoming enmeshed within it.