How is agoraphobia caused?

Agoraphobia typically produces an anxiety reaction to open spaces or being
a long distance from a place or person of security. Often, agoraphobics
cannot move around freely without a person they trust and/or within a very
tight vicinity of a safe ‘escape’.

The agoraphobia response is a completely appropriate reaction to threat and
forms part of our natural instinct for self-preservation. However, when agoraphobia becomes intrusive and constant, it must be dealt with and eliminated.

Encountering a 'threatening' situation, a sufferer will often take extreme
measures to avoid potential 'harm'. While this offers some short-term comfort, over the longer term, it can severely restrict the lives of sufferers and their families, not to mention its direct reinforcement of the anxious behaviors that cause it. Agoraphobics are often accompanied by a person they trust and will only travel certain distances from home, or to places, they trust, or know, I order to prevent high anxiety and/or panic attacks from happening.

Avoidance of anxiety provoking situations is NOT an effective of overcoming
agoraphobia. But neither are 'Face your Fear' techniques which are used by
many psychologists and psychiatrists. These can actually make your anxiety
far worse by exposing you to your worst fears, hence pushing your anxiety
levels passed an acceptable level. This sort of practice only serves to
reinforce rather than remove the agoraphobic reaction.

Agoraphobia is driven by underlying, high levels of anxiety and it is this which
must be eliminated in order for a sufferer to make a full recovery. Agoraphobia and social phobia are usually accompanied by other anxiety
symptoms such as panic attacks, obsessions or generalized anxiety disorder.
Our agoraphobic and socially phobic clients make full recoveries from their
symptoms once they have removed the underlying anxiety which fuels their
conditions which demonstrates conclusively that agoraphobia is a symptom
of and not a separate, anxiety condition.

Agoraphobia is an anxiety reaction resulting from a person's geographic
location and rarely occurs in places of safety such as at home, for example.
Often sufferers become so agoraphobic that even the minutest geographic
movements between rooms in their homes can cause heightened anxiety.

How is agoraphobia caused?

Please understand this. I reiterate: agoraphobia is a symptom of an anxiety
disorder. Without anxiety this phobia simply CAN'T exist! So, by eliminating
the underlying anxiety disorder, agoraphobia can be eliminated 100%.
Anxiety, panic, phobias and other anxiety disorder symptoms can be
eliminated 100% by addressing the root cause directly. The cause of all these
conditions is the amygdala that controls the anxiety reaction. The Amygdala
becomes 're-set' when life circumstances cause it to release anxious
responses repeatedly; it LEARNS to become inappropriately anxious -
through repetition. This is called Operant Conditioning.

When agoraphobia forms, the sufferer avoids the place where they felt most
anxious in order to prevent it happening again, but as the anxiety increases
during the formation of an anxiety condition, they begin to experience anxiety
in a multitude of locations and subsequently avoid those locations. Before
long, they have trained the amygdala to respond with high anxiety in most
locations and their world’s become smaller and smaller until they become
housebound.

So, by eliminating this reaction in The Amygdala, anxiety can be reduced
quickly and efficiently, permanently eliminating your agoraphobia. This can
and often does, happen in a few days IF the correct process of anxiety
elimination is followed.

So, to recap and be clear it’s vital that you understand this:

When a person experiences high anxiety which causes symptoms in the
body, the symptoms are perceived by the amygdala as a ‘threat’ and if you
are in the supermarket when this threat becomes apparent, your amygdala
will form a connection in the brain’s circuitry that says “supermarket =
Anxiety”. The next time you go to the supermarket, your brain will react with
anxiety. It is this ‘connection’ which causes agoraphobia.

What agoraphobia treatments are available?

There are very few agoraphobia treatments available through accessible,
general practice, most include talking therapies and medication which often
have very limited therapeutic affect; the proof stands to reason, if they
worked, no one would still be suffering.

A true CURATIVE agoraphobia treatment is accessible, seamless, targeted
and structured. It is possible to remove agoraphobia completely and eliminate
the underlying anxiety that causes it but this must be administered by
qualified and experienced professionals with an understanding of the
condition and a proven structure which undermines and removes the high
anxiety at its SOURCE.