This past December I flew to Florida—my first plane trip in over two years. Before boarding the flight back home I spoke to my husband who informed me it was Really, Really windy outside with Really Bad storms. That weather update, coupled with an intense visit to see my grandmother who was in a convalescent home, added to my nerves.
· I don’t like viewing other planes flying above and below us from my window. If I wanted to see others on the highway I would drive.
· I don’t like hearing any noises from the aircraft itself. Some sound like Morse code type signals to the flight attendants to prepare for disaster. I search their faces for clues.
· I don’t like any turbulence. I white-knuckle the armrest waiting for us to drop thousands of feet in two seconds with our beverage cups flying all over the cabin.
· I don’t like thinking about how we are in a metal container carrying people and stuff through the sky at hundreds of miles per hour. I read to forget where I am.
· I don’t like sharp turns. It makes me think we are dodging another plane at the last possible second because someone has screwed up.
We went to a New Year’s Eve party at a neighbor’s and I met a man who’s been flying for 30 years. It did make me feel a lot better to address my concerns with him. Such as bad weather: “What about that time in Dallas years ago when windshear tossed the plane to the ground!!!!” He calmly stated how much wind it really takes to do that and how experts learn tons from every event. He explained about the technology to keep planes away from each other and addressed all those plane noises. And then these things happened in January:
- This mortal god named Chesley Sullenberger landed a plane with no engines into the Hudson River.
- Vanity Fair magazine arrived with a story about those two planes that collided over two years ago over the Amazon.
- A plane took off in NJ and crashed on a house in NY.
I need to fly back to Florida to visit my grandmother again. I have to admit I have been putting off making my reservation. I'm not so bad off to allow my recent added flying anxiety to stop me from my obligations or trips for pleasure. If someone were to give us five free tickets today for a Caribbean vacation I would personally pack our five suitcases in less than an hour and not even look back. But I’d wish that Pilot Sullenberger would be flying the plane.
6 comments:
I am so with you on the flying. Hate it, hate it. Having no control in a sardine can, knowing there's not enough room to go wild and have a fit if I wanted to. Being stuck in your seat like a kid in a high chair when the tray table comes down for your meal. See how long it's been? They don't even serve meals anymore.
Having said that, I can tolerate the experience on Southwest. The crews are so relaxed that I relax . . . a little.
I can't really help you either. I never had any issues with flying until I had kids. I have been a basket case ever since. My recommendation? Xanax. Seriously.
BTW- My middle name is Renee too! Crazy!
OMG I am laughing so hard right now I a coughing up a lung! Seriously, your description of your anxieties had me roaring! But all kidding aside, you know I'm with you, too. I get my doc to prescribe Valium and take it, and it seems to do the trick, but, the IDEA of traveling just sends shivers up my spine. Taurus homebody and brutal fear of flying. Now we have other things to worry about, too. If I see a guy scratching his ankle, I am on him like white on rice!
We all get a certain amount of built-in ability to deal with uncertainty. We get anxious about the outcome. Some of us handle it better than others. We therapists believe it has a lot to do with whether enough feelings of security was built into the relationship between the young child and the caregivers.
Though most of us look back and think of early life as secure, there are major differences which, because we don't have comparative experience, don't recognize.
The major difference, we believe, is whether or not the caregivers "tuned in" enough to actually feel what you were feeling. Or, whether they tried to intellectually figure it out.
A child who develops in an environment where there is a feeling connection from the caregivers, also feels the connection and develops security.
For the child where the connection is intellectual, the feeling connection is unknown. Though unknown, it is nevertheless missed because we are genetically encoded to have feeling connections.
Fast forward to adulthood. When the feeling connection and the security that comes with it is not solidly established for us, we have anxiety problems. So, we make up for feelings of uncertainty by trying to establish certainty. We use control. We try to take the uncertainty out. Still, we want a way out; and escape route.
If we have both control and escape, we feel synthetically secure.
But when flying, these two "security blankets" (control and escape) are taken away.
We, thus, are thrown back to only the built in simi-security of early childhood. It isn't enough. We panic.
Having worked with this both as an airline captain and as a therapist, I have found ways to fix the problem. If you would like to read more about it, there is a library of articles on it at www.fearofflying.com/wordpress
I don't have any advice for you either. I've never been overly scared to fly until recently. We flew from Biloxi to FL last year and were in the very last seat on the plane. When we hit a patch of turbulence, I thought I was going to freak. The only thing that's ever worked for me is having a few drinks before boarding but that's not always a feasible option...
Thanks for the comment! I read the pilot/therapist's comment and while his words seem to hit the nail on the head about control (which I am WELL AWARE I have a hard time with) and an escape route (which is also true), unfortunately, I had a well rounded childhood with caregivers who took me on airplanes and told me it would be okay, and I've had fine experiences on them, most likely because I trusted my mom and dad when they told me it was all right. Now, I am an adult, and need to come to terms with the fact that I need to tell myself it will all be alright.
The biggest facet of my fear is that I HAVE TO hand control over to someone else. If the captain who brought the plane down in the Hudson was to be my pilot, I would probably feel better about it, but I am buying a ticket on purpose to give someone else the choice to take a chance with my life. Yikes. I enjoyed your post very much. Thank you for sharing!
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