How Will Agoraphobia Affect My Children? Can I Do Anything to Protect Them?
This is a common question for parents with agoraphobia, especially if they have young children. If have agoraphobia, it’s natural to feel concerned about your children developing anxious or phobic behaviors from watching you.
The best information and advice for people in this situation is written in a book called “How to Help Your Loved One Recover From Agoraphobia” by Karen Williams (in Chapter 5 “How Agoraphobia Affects the Family”)
Here is a summary of what the chapter says:
There is some evidence that phobias, including agoraphobia, are passed on both genetically and by modeling (though experts disagree on the strength of each influence). So trying to hide agoraphobia from your children, or not talking about it won’t really protect them.
According to Dr. Arthur Hardy, who spent his life treating agoraphobics including Karen Williams (the author), “it helps children to be allowed to take part in the recovery process.” Dr. Hardy believes that this helps keep children from becoming phobic themselves. If you have agoraphobia, he suggests that you allow your children, if they are old enough, to help you in positive ways such as goal setting and practicing facing your fears.
But even if your children are not old enough to help in the recovery process, the best thing is to model recovery from agoraphobia and not avoidance behavior.
Also:
- Make sure your children know they are not to blame for your anxiety and panic attacks, that you are not mad at them, and they had nothing to do with the cause of your problem. Children have a tendency to blame themselves or feel guilty when a parent has a problem like agoraphobia that they don’t fully understand.
- Make sure your children have permission to be angry at the way agoraphobia makes you act sometimes, and give them a chance to talk about it.
- If agoraphobia is keeping you from paying the amount of attention to your children that you feel they need, communicate the reasons why the best you can and arrange for your child(ren) to receive attention from another source, such as a close relative or trusted friend. This will help keep your chidren’s self-esteem healthy, and keep them from feeling rejected.
Of course, the level of communication you can have with your children about agoraphobia will increase with their age, but “with a little attention and sensitivity on the part of the parent, children will come through this crisis better than most parents think they will” (quote from the author).