Contents
We are glad to welcome you, dear readers of the site! Decidophobia is an irrational fear of taking responsibility, making decisions, making choices and prioritizing.
And today we will try to figure out why it occurs and how it is possible to cope with it. Ready to find out?
What is it like?
In principle, every person has ever experienced uncertainty, confusion, anxiety and even horror before the need to decide how to proceed.
Especially if it was an extremely important issue to be resolved. Suppose you choose a profession, change your place of residence, work, or even completely tie the knot.
And it is quite natural that at such moments there are doubts about whether I will make the right choice?
After all, this will affect the whole future life, changing it radically. And it is impossible to predict in which direction, better or worse.
But a person who does not have a history of mental disorders will somehow try to cope with the situation.
If he is internally mature and decisive, then he will listen to his desires, try to assess the likely problems and still make a choice.
Those who are accustomed to avoid responsibility and just go with the flow will wait for the moment when everything will be resolved by itself. Or he will try to shift this work onto the shoulders of loved ones.
But decidophobe from fright can lose consciousness. It seems that the usual actions for us, in terms of decision-making, cause him to have a panic attack.
And forced to run without looking back in search of a safe place. Where you do not need to think, weigh the pros and cons, and so on.
Impact on life and health
With a mild course of the disorder, the fob is still considering options for the development of events, thinking about how to act. Anxious at the same time, but completely masters the stage of reflection.
But when the matter approaches directly to active actions, the implementation of the planned into reality, he capitulates, as he “falls” into a panic.
He is trying in every possible way to sabotage this moment, coming up with some difficulties, thanks to which it becomes possible to play for time.
But with a severe form, panic begins just at the thought that you have to make a choice. Such a person is simply not able to buy clothes for himself, cook food, or just go shopping.
After all, every time you need to decide where exactly to go, what goods to pick up, what is worth paying for, and what is better not to.
In general, decidophobia affects the quality of life, and significantly, introducing a lot of restrictions into it, regardless of the form of manifestation.
Uncertainty in one’s abilities, as well as thoughts that one is not suitable for anything in this life and is not able to do anything well leads to complexes, low self-esteem and a feeling of total loneliness.
After all, failures one after another arise both in work, especially in business, and in personal, friendly relations.
This is followed by depression and in some cases attempts to commit suicide. To get rid of fear, pain and other negative feelings that accompany a phobia almost around the clock.
Naturally, this destroys health, provoking the development of chronic diseases against the background of stress. A person suffers from insomnia, which depletes the body’s resources even more and leads to asthenia.
Symptoms
During a panic attack, a person begins to feel dizzy, may feel nauseous, up to vomiting and loss of consciousness. The heart is beating so fast that thoughts of a heart attack arise, because at the same time it also pricks strongly in the chest.
Breathing becomes frequent and shallow, due to which the amount of oxygen in the blood becomes so much that a paradoxical thing happens — a person suffocates.
Which is even more scary. After all, death by suffocation seems extremely painful and undesirable in principle, especially at the moment.
And being frightened even more, he, accordingly, begins to gasp for air even more often, bringing himself to hysteria. The symptoms are only getting worse.
The pressure rises, the stomach hurts, sweating increases. The brain perceives the cause of fear as a mortal danger, so it goes into “survival” mode.
There is a release of adrenaline into the blood so that the fob can escape. What he is doing and trying to do. Only now the tunnel consciousness prevents us from adequately perceiving the surrounding reality.
A person is so absorbed in anxiety that he does not notice the obstacles in his path, which causes injury to himself. For example, falling down the stairs, crashing into the wall.
There were situations when people simply «went» out the window, their feelings were so overwhelmed at such a moment that they were simply not able to orient themselves and saw only one way out, so to speak, the way to escape from the room in which danger arose.
Causes
Hyperopia
Fear of making decisions usually occurs in those people who are not used to dealing with problems on their own. For one simple reason — other people did it instead of them.
Parents, due to their characteristics and life experience, psychological trauma, literally deprive their child of the opportunity to live fully, independently.
They are so eager to keep him out of trouble that they do all his work for him. As if regretting, protecting.
In their perception, this is called love and care. In fact, this is the so-called «disservice», which does not allow the baby to develop.
And if at first he makes attempts to be indignant, to rebel, then he resigns himself, focusing on the benefit.
After all, he does not need to do anything, everything happens like magic. One has only to cry, get upset, complain, and so on, as excited adults come running and do well back. It doesn’t matter at what cost.
Such overprotection does not bring happiness, but provokes the development of infantilism and, of course, decylophobia.
The task of every parent is not just to protect their child from failures and difficulties, not at all.
The task is to teach him to overcome obstacles on his own, to listen to himself, while remaining true to his identity, and also to bear responsibility for the consequences of his choices and actions.
Life is unpredictable. How should this child be if suddenly at one moment his super-caring parents are gone? Who will decide instead of him what he needs and how it is worth acting in order to realize what he wants?
That’s just the loss of guardians, who ensured life, and leads to phobias.
Since a person who is physically adult, but mentally completely immature receives tremendous stress, trauma, left alone with his problems.
Authoritarian parenting style
And there is a situation completely opposite to overprotection — this is authoritarianism and cruelty towards the child.
When parents are not at all interested in what their child wants, what he likes and what not, this can also provoke decidophobia.
The kid has no choice but to reconcile, submit and forget about his needs and characteristics for the sake of survival. After all, every attempt to disobey ends with punishment, both emotional and physical.
When the requirements are too high, the same consequences are observed. The child is afraid to make a mistake, because he knows what will follow.
Why does he prefer to unconditionally follow any instructions, without showing initiative, so as not to accidentally get into a mess.
If adults do not consider it necessary to encourage, praise, but only criticize and condemn. Where does the desire to do something come from?
Such a kid will believe that he is not capable of something in this life. Therefore, if it is necessary to make a decision, he will panic, because in any case he will choose the wrong option and everyone will find out how insignificant he is.
Just imagine the shame he has to face. So it is not surprising that subsequently excessive stress affects the mental state.
Ambitiousness
Only now the ambition of not a child, but of his parents can provoke the emergence of a phobia. This is when parents take their children as their extension too literally.
That is, they seek to make up for their losses and limitations at their expense. Used as a crutch.
For example, my mother wanted to become a ballerina, but it didn’t work out. And, having given birth to a daughter, she, despite her desire to do karate or chess, will be forcibly taken to the ballet. And to force from morning to night to work out positions, jumps and so on.
Having determined the future of his child and not giving him the opportunity to do it on his own, an adult seems to be depriving him of his life. At least because he will not spend it the way he wanted.
Have you heard about stories when a person achieved tremendous success, became a millionaire, very famous, but did not feel happiness?
Why did he commit suicide, or chose another, slower way of suicide — drugs, alcohol in large quantities, and so on. One of the options for the outcome of events may well be a mental disorder.
Treatment
Decidophobia is a mental disorder that requires treatment and observation. Willpower and the words “calm down” are not enough to just take it and relax, and, moreover, forget about your fears.
Therefore, you should definitely consult with a specialist. In the case of an easy stage, go to a psychotherapist.
If you understand that things have gone too far, and you have limited your social circle, quit, lost your source of income, in general, you live through failure after failure, you need to consult a psychiatrist to undergo comprehensive treatment.
That is, he will prescribe the necessary drugs that will help improve well-being. For example, relieve insomnia, or anxiety and obsessive thoughts. Relax the nervous system and stabilize the emotional state.
Cognitive psychotherapy, hypnosis and gestalt therapy showed good results in the fight against decidophobia. Group work allows you to feel supported.
After all, it usually seems to the phobe that he is the only one in the world so strange and timid, crazy.
In the process of therapy, he will be able to share his experience, how to cope with fears of making decisions, and listen to what helps others in this difficult state to find peace and take control of the situation in their own hands.
Recommendations
- Practice meditation, breathing techniques for relaxation. So you will learn to feel your body, harmony inside and peace.
- Try to visualize a favorable outcome of events more often. As soon as you notice that panic appears, immediately begin to imagine something pleasant that causes joy, happiness, or at least a smile.
- Praise yourself for even the smallest step towards recovery. In this case, maximalism will not help you at all.
- Watch your loved ones, friends. How do they deal with difficulties? How do they understand what they want? As a last resort, contact them for help. Only not so that they do some piece of work instead of you, but to share their experience of how they do it.
- Every night before going to bed, try to focus on your body. What happens in it? Maybe your legs are aching, your back is pulling, or your heel is itching? When it comes out without alertness to listen to your feelings, go to the next level — try to notice what feelings you are experiencing. Then take the bar higher — be aware of your desires. Thus, over time, planning and listening to yourself will seem like a normal thing to you, and not a mortal danger.
Completion
And that’s all for today, dear readers! If you are interested in finding out what methods of planning your activities and life in general exist, follow this link.
And subscribe to site updates. There are many more phobias, quite interesting, unusual or rare.
For example, did you know that there are people who are terribly afraid of germs, dirt? Or start to choke if someone accidentally touches them?
In general, stay with us and be happy!
The material was prepared by a psychologist, Gestalt therapist, Zhuravina Alina