The actual name for those people who have driving phobia is hodophobia. For whatever type of treatment in relation to driving phobia, the retraining the brain is always the main goal. As a matter of fact, there are a number of things that might have contributed to the phobia and two of it may be because of a near miss or a previous accident. Having an existing disorder for such is pretty common among motorists who are suffering from driving phobia.
Basically, the problem takes place when your brain is associated between driving and anger. Those who have this kind of phobia could also go through high level of anxiety by just riding a car even as a passenger. By the time that your thoughts drifted towards the thought of driving, then you might start to feel the symptoms that come along with high level of anxiety which includes rapid heartbeat, seating, dizziness, scary thoughts, weak limbs, nausea and among other things.
Within just milliseconds of thinking about driving, your brain is triggering already your flight or fight response. Basically, this is a natural thing among everyone else whenever we’re dealing with an overwhelming situation in life or faced with dangerous situations. The thing is, this response shouldn’t be happening whenever you’re behind the wheel. Hormones adrenaline and cortisol are released which might annoy the nervous system. This isn’t an action in our body that we can control but what you can do is retrain your brain to associate driving with relaxation and fun.
And when it comes to treatment options, there are basically 2 primary options for it. You may seek therapy with professionals who are dealing with this kind of phobia. By taking this route, you would be given with an anti-anxiety pill to be able to help you feel more relaxed the moment that you start to drive. Even though it is helpful, you need to know that therapy can be quite expensive and it is something that not everyone could afford. Considering self-help techniques is yet another option that you can take. As a matter of fact, doing breathing exercises and taking things gradually will be your priority. With breathing exercises, it can help to slow down your rapid heartbeat and by taking things slowly, it can help you to feel accomplished. These steps that you are doing might be small but its impact is big.
Today, there are many self-help resources you could use. Probably, you can easily find thousands of books in relation to driving phobia treatment processes and driving phobias. Online, you can literally find almost anything even about hodophobia, some even have programs designed to walk you through the entire process of overcoming the phobia.