Talk:Phone phobia

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Ginaphobia yours is similar to mine...

I'm afraid of talking to people I don't know... I can talk to close friends and very close family. I have trouble talking to my dads grandparents because I almost never see them. I don't know exactly why but I think it's something to do with not being able to see the person I'm talking to. Because I know my friends, I don't have a problem talking to them. I can predict what they will say to some extent. But if someone calls me and I have no idea who it is, I just don't pick up... I'm glad to see that there are other people! I kinda thought that I was weird or something =P

Woozle notes

This post references Ginaphobia's 2007 post. --Woozle 11:20, 12 June 2010 (EDT)

Nicole from Baltimore

I really thought that I was alone in this! I am "afraid" of communication with more than just the telephone. I am okay typing this comment out because I know that I know none of the people who posted here personally and therefore have no pressure to come back to see if anyone responded. But if I do need to type an email to someone, it takes me forever just as this comment will because it has to be just so. And using the phone? Forget it. It's weird because I answer phones at my work but I can handle that because I don't know the people I am talking to personally EXCEPT that now after working there for 3 years certain customers now recognise my voice and want to chat and I end up being extremly rude because I just can't do it. I have missed important legal appointments because I refuse to call to re-schedule. The sound of the phone makes me cringe and I actually get pains in my chest. So, 6 months ago, I start using FaceBook and all these people, literally almost 200, that I met during my lifetime sends me friend invites which is fine. But then they send me a message and I can't bring myself to open it! They just keep piling up and piling up until now it's overwhelming. I'm afraid to even go on the site in fear that someone will see me and want to chat. So I just keep myself offline. And I realize that this phone phobia is beyond just the phone. My mother suffers from the same thing. Hers started while pregnant with me (a whole story in itself)and I believe my phobia started because she always avoided the phone and made me answer it saying that it was probably a creditor wanting money that she didn't have or some relative or another that got on her nerves and that she didn't want to be bothered. So, I associate using the phone and answering it with bad news. I have been labeled a procrastinator (sp?)because of my avoidance to a phone and email. I don't know. At least I know I'm not alone. Now how do I explain to my freinds and others that I've avoided them for all this time because I'm afraid of email and phones? :S

Woozle says

Ouch! I think I know the kind of dread/fear you're talking about. What you're saying sounds to me like social phobia, which fits in with one of my theories that phone phobia may be an expression of social phobia, at least for some sufferers (not necessarily all).

I don't know if this will help any, but maybe it can evolve into something workable: you could write a stock paragraph explaining the situation, to send in response anytime you find yourself not answering someone -- something like this:

I apologize for not responding sooner. Lately I have found myself becoming highly avoidant -- or even phobic -- about responding to emails, online messages, and phone calls. As a result, I am only able to respond to a small number of messages at a time, and it may be awhile before I respond specifically to your message.

At that point, I wanted to continue with something like:

Please feel free to message me again if this is urgent, and that will help me to prioritize and respond to the most important messages first.

...but I didn't know if the idea of people sending you yet more messags would be panic-inducing or not. If it helps, consider that any repeat messages would be from people who had already messaged you before -- so you could essentially file away or discard whatever they said earlier, and by telling them "can't get back to you right now, but let me know if this is urgent" you can sort of toss the ball back into their court, and move their message into a "later" pile so it isn't staring you in the face.

And then you would finish up with something like:

I appreciate your understanding and patience while I work this out.

...and then sign it however you usually sign things.

That's just one idea; it will probably need some refinement to work for you, so don't be afraid to say why you don't like it -- maybe I can help fix the problems with it, or suggest other ideas. Obviously this won't work for responding to voicemails, for example -- I've found a number of ways of getting around having to actually call people most of the time (probably something I should type up a wiki page about).

Hang in there, remember to breathe, give yourself time to collect your energy. There seems to be a lot of social pressure which says that you should be able to respond immediately ("just pick up the phone and call -- what's so hard?"), that you're just being lazy or defiant or something -- but I find that feeling guilty about it just makes the problem worse. "Just try harder!" (something I've heard a lot) is not the answer. Unless I'm completely misreading your situation, you actually need to go the other direction, and cut yourself some slack so that you can function, even if that functioning is less than what other people expect or demand. --Woozle 09:07, 30 January 2010 (EST)

anonymous user 71.57.15.151

I have spent years thinking that I was just weird, lol. I'm not sure how this started, when I was younger, I had no problems. If I had to guess when it started, I would say when I was about 18 or 19. It takes me anywhere from 15 minutes to 2 days to work myself up to make a phone call...even to family. When the phone rings, I have to check the caller id, if I don't know the number I don't answer. Even if I know who it is, I still have a hard time answering, and most of the time, I just don't. This leads to my children not getting doctors appts. and important things not getting done.....I can't talk to anyone but my mom & my husband without some kind of small anxiety attack! I feel bad because my in-laws of 9 years want to talk to me, and I just can't! I try to tell my mom in law that it's nothing personal, but I can tell it hurts her feelings and I feel bad....I have been trying to get over it, but it seems as though it is getting worse year by year, so I don't know. If anyone has any advice I would love to hear it! Thanks in advance.

I'm a know-it-all to my phobia

My phobia of phones is similar to many others posted here. I know what it is, why it is, and how to correct it. But, the resolve deals with picking up the phone; I'm a know-it-all to my condition.

First to share what my phobia entails. I cannot say at the exact time my phobia began to manifest itself. I do know that at 35 is when I did something about it. I can talk on the phone just fine if someone calls me. In collage I worked for 3 years at a call center (in-coming calls). I can text, IM, email with ease. But, when I need to make a call... well, that is when uncontrollable fear sets in. Uncontrollable, unfounded, uneasy, jaw-clenching, heart-beating fear. I've even conquered my phobia for a while. And now it creeps back in, and so I begin the recovery anew.

I am sure anyone who suffers from telephobia will have a different view, outlook, experience than myself... but in sharing is the therapy for me and the hope for others.

One and a half years ago, my form-ifey (that's former-wifey) asked for a divorce. Things had not been going well for a year already and we had tried marriage counseling but in the end our marriage didn't weather the storm. During the separation and before we finalized the divorce, the form-ifey mentioned she would consider counseling one more time, but I would have to go on my own as well. I don't like to lose. I don't like to give-up. I was determined not to get a divorce, I knew we could fix it. (I was wrong, but I had hoped.)

I began researching counselors and techniques and found a therapist that had just opened a free clinic that assisted the homeless and low-income community. I figured a guy that would dedicate 2 days a week to therapy for the needy, with out getting paid would be a good guy to go to. The marriage counselor my form-ifey and I had visited before had simply gone "by the book". She would open a book and read things then give us books to read at home. The sessions did help me realize I had social anxiety. Didn't like to talk to people, meet new people, going out was fine as long as there was a plan and people I knew. By the book, she put me on medication. 10mg of Lexapro a day. Worked fine to ease some of that social tension at the get-go, but over time the body acclimates, and the dosage needs to be upped, and eventually changed to a new drug. Lexapro worked for me for the social phobia, but I hate depending on drugs.

Back to the new therapist, he uses regression hypno-therapy and New Age/Buddhist philosophies to engage and treat what ails ya. As much as I hated drugs, I hated psycho-voodoo. Until I started therapy.

The therapist's approach was to look at my past to define current behaviors. I already knew of my social phobias, but lurking under the umbrella was my telephobia. After a few months of repeat visits, my social phobia had abated. If my fear of social situations was 10 before, now it was a 2 or 3 at most. But, talking on the phone... still something I feared and avoided. Did I mention I am a small business owner? I have two business partners. If I had to call a client, I would make an excuse and have one of them do it. In my marriage, to make appointments or get information, I had always devised a way to get my form-ifey to do it.

After a few more sessions, I confronted my fear of the phone and its origin. Boiled down, it is a social phobia due to my lack of self-esteem, brought on by various events in my past. I didn't like the sound of my voice, I didn't like me, so why would someone on the other end of the phone? I can't see their reaction to me, so i can't tell if they like me or not. I can't tell if they are mocking me or agreeing with me. I can't tell if they are annoyed with my call that is probably interrupting something more pressing... all of this builds up before making a call, at times causing it to feel like a big hand reaching around my mid-section and just squeezing. So there it is. Revealed, confronted, healed. I picked up the phone and began calling and talking to everyone, co-workers, clients, friends and family I had long neglected, even a few friends I hadn't seen in 10 - 15 yrs. It felt good, liberating, en-livening!

That was almost 8 months ago. About 6 months ago, I had stopped attending sessions with my therapist. Being self-employed my cheap insurance didn't cover sessions with a therapist unless you are committed by a doctor. Out of pocket was getting expensive since business was down. Today I wanted to call a friend to invite her out, but I couldn't pick up the phone to call. Instead, I sent a text. "Hey, saw something that made me think of u. Call me when u have time." That made me realize, for the past month I have been avoiding the phone again. I re-evaluated. I would say social anxiety has gone up to a 5 lately. Telephobia 10.

Our brains are filled with synapses, pathways for the neurons to travel. For years they traveled the path that said, "You are afraid." Once you lessen those pathways and build new ones, you can alter your behavior. But, just like the muscles of your body, if you don't practice, work-out, keep them up, you loose the tone of them. The path of least resistance. You brain is re-wired, but you have to exercise it. I realize now it will be a life-long process. I know why. I know how. I know how to fix it. I'm a know-it-all of my phobia.

So today I resolved to visit my therapist again to get some more training and guidance. It is Sunday, first thing tomorrow morning, I'm going to pick up that phone and make the call to schedule the appointment. ...if only the therapist's website allowed me to schedule the appointment online...

M in Vegas

Kat from England

I'm not so scared of answering the phone as I am of making the phone calls. Often the thought of calling - even when it's in response to a missed call - will make my heart do that tight feeling (very literate...) and I sit there shaking, particularly if I know I have to make this phone call. The longer I try and put it off the tighter this feeling is because I don't want to muck up the phone call. The meal-time thing is definitely me, as is the lack of things to say. I hate talking to people that haven't met me, although I'm the same with everyone to a lesser degree - because on the phone I often panic (don't have a pen to write down their information, don't have the right documentation on me) and also because I'm a little scared of not being able to hear what they say and it's awkward to ask again. Also; I find it terrifying to think that they might misunderstand a joke/sarcastic comment on the phone as a mean comment (particularly with friends) and so I become suddenly stilted. The same things happen when I pick up the phone but to a much smaller degree because I'm forced to react to stop it ringing!

Sorry if that didn't make much sense...

Absolutely

It totally made sense. Most of it sounds like something I could have written. --Woozle 17:00, 4 June 2010 (EDT)

Jennifer in AZ

I along with everyone else it seems, am kind of shocked to find out that I am not the only one with this problem. I cannot even answer the phone when my own mother calls me from across the country. It is in no way a fear of the person or (for me) what they think of me. I just hate THE PHONE. I dislike walkie-talkies and I hate the drive-thru. I would much rather walk into a McDonalds than use the drive-thru. This has made my life so difficult. I've lost track of friends, come across as unreliable and flaky, and irresponsible. I avoid making all calls (even ones that HAVE to be made) for weeks on end if not months on end. I have tried seeking help for this (and a possibly contributing bi-polar disorder) but my avoidance to make calls has kept me from all except about one call a month for 6 months to try and make an appointment with a psychiatrist. No one believes that it is real, and I assure you, it is. If I do manage to make a call, I have to pace and walk around, sitting is not an option. My heart just about beats out of my chest, I talk too fast so the other person has trouble understanding me, and I feel like I am about to have a panic attack. I have finally gotten the name of a doctor who is taking new patients and I have tried twice today alone to get ahold of his secretary (twice!!!!! in one day!!!! it's a miracle for me) and keep getting the answering machine. This is even worse because the return call won't be on MY terms, I never know when it's coming and that scares the hell out of me. So here goes nothing, guys, I'm gonna try him one more time.... cross your fingers, b/c I think I'm gonna end up having a damn heart attack if I can't get this over with! --Jennifer in AZ

Woozle says

I'd forgotten about fast food drive-through speakers -- I hate those things too, but ordering face-to-face is sometimes almost as bad, so I've talked myself into using them. It's almost a script. (It helps when they have the little readout thingy which shows you what they think your order is... when it's working, anyway.) I do wish they would put out a small computer terminal where you could just place your order, though -- I've been wishing that since at least the 1990s... along with search engines for grocery stores which tell you what aisle something is on and whether they have any in stock, but now I'm getting off-topic.

I guess the doctor you found doesn't have email? That's definitely something to ask about; of the several doctors we've dealt with in the past 2 years, only one didn't have any email. Someone planning to treat phone phobia should be aware of the need for alternative contact methods.

Please feel free to print out this page, the main phone-phobia page, or anything from the Ning site which might help convince others that this isn't "just you", and bring it with you to the doctor.

Hope this is helpful! Good luck, and please feel free to let me/us know how things go. --Woozle 08:20, 8 June 2010 (EDT)

i'm also have a phone phobia

I think it started when I was a young child. My parents were in debt and getting calls from creditors. They didn't want to answer the phone in case the creditors were calling, (this was before caller id) so they would tell me to answer. It was terrifying. My mother would tell me to lie to them and tell them she wasn't home. I remember being yelled at by various strangers because my mom never called them back and they accused me of not giving her the messages. Eventually I completely refused to pick up the phone for her and we had several battles about it. I was punished for not answering the phone when it rang and accused of having a phobia. I was very young at the time. As I grew older I still would not pick up the phone, even after the creditors stopped calling. Nowadays, with caller id I'll pick up if I know the caller but not when an unknown number calls. I'm afraid of who it might be and if I'm in trouble and they will yell at me for something!

I am fine using the phones at work for customer service however recently they have asked me to make cold calls but when it comes to making a sales call I have terrible anxiety. I can't figure out what to say, and I'm afraid that I will forget what I'm saying mid-conversation. I also worry about not sounding professional, and how do I communicate with seasoned business people when I'm so inexperienced. Does anyone have advice for me? I physically can't seem to make the calls.

Woozle replies

The first advice I would give is something I say to a lot of people: do anything you can to take pressure off yourself, because pressure only makes it worse. If you can find other ways to communicate besides the phone (email, texting, letters, in person, faxes), use them wherever possible -- even if your inner critical voice says it seems like a waste of time. Other people may say "why don't you just call?" as if it were the easiest thing in the world -- to them, it probably is -- but to us, every phone call has a huge unspoken cost.

The second advice I would give is to find a good therapist, if that's possible. The technique known as "Cognitive therapy" seems to be somewhat effective in untangling the mental knots which drive this kind of phobia. A therapist also may be able to give you a piece of paper saying that making cold calls is bad for your mental health -- which you can then show to your boss and hopefully they will back off on that idea.

I don't know if it's possible for you to look for a different line of work -- one that involves less phoning -- but if it is, that would definitely be a reasonable thing to consider doing.

In the meantime, a few things that might help depending on the situation:

• Before calling, write out what you're planning to say or a list of points which need to be covered. If you find yourself lost for words in mid-conversation, you can say something like "hang on, I've lost my train of thought, let me check my list here" or "okay, let me see where we are now..." and then take a few seconds to look at the list and get yourself re-oriented.
• (This probably won't help much for cold business calls, but...) Ask the other person if they have an email address. This can make it easier to get off the phone and conduct the rest of the conversation via email. It also gives you a way out of having to call back if you need to talk with them again.
• Faxes and cellphone texting are also usable alternatives to email, if you happen to get hold of their fax or cellphone numbers. Google Voice will let you send text messages from your computer at no charge; let me know if you need an invite -- I have 3 left.

I hope this is helpful. Please do post more to let me know if anything seems to work, or if things get better/worse, etc. --Woozle 11:48, 12 June 2010 (EDT)

Jennifer in AZ again

I just rechecked this page after writing in a few weeks ago.. I really understand the whole answering the phone for the parents thing, come to think of it, my Mom would always make me answer the phone and lie and say she was in the tub or something. It was really hard because some people would not believe me (it's obvious when an 8 yer old is lying) and call me on it and say things like "did she tell you to say that?" and then how do you answer? If you say yes, you are disapointing your mom/dad/ whatever, and if you say no, you have to keep up an uncomfortable lie that isn't even yours. You know, I'd be curious to know how many of us who have this phobia have had similar expieriences. That really hits home as being one of the earliest uncomfortable phone expieriences I can remember. On a positive note, after a few hysterical fits and some crying episodes, I managed to make an appointment with a doc soon. So, wish me luck guys, I'm sending him to this webpage if he doubts me in any way! lol :)

anonymous user 98.250.29.196

im super depressed all the time and this is mostly the leading cause i never want to talk on the phone i feel so weird and with i could just suck it up but what am i feeling this way way cant i just call and talk on the phone be one those girls who can talk for hours that be nice but what really is killing me im having a hard time call jobs in my area just to see if there lookin for anyone ive put it off for two weeks now everyday i set wanting to call but cant ive gone to school passed with flying colors and now i cant call ???? what the hell is wrong with me my boyfriend even had to call when i wanted to start school and set it up for me it makes me sad i couldnt do it myself ive gone for help but people think its all in my head and i can control it no one can understand it but ive gone almost two years when i was super bad not talkin to my love ones and friends just to avoid the phone

Adam

I have problems similar to everyone here. Like another poster, I too had issues with bill collectors at a young age. In addition to that my parents were divorced and I was forced to call my dad.

Later in life when I was oh, 18-24, my mom was involved in a very abusive relationship and the phone became the way that people could threaten, yell at and accuse me of "letting her get hurt"

In grade school I was known as the "gentle giant" because I was bigger than everyone else but extremely nice and caring. It's unfortunate that I can't answer the phone, even on good terms. I often ignore emails or text messages for similar reasons.

For me, bill collectors used to be horrible but after I passed a stage where I learned to outsmart them it's gotten almost fun to yell at them. It's a way to cope with the problem.

I can't tell you how many jobs I've lost from not calling in late or sick. It's something like 20-30...