Bathophobia (from the Greek bathios, “depth” and φόβος - “fear”) is the name of one of the many existing phobias, namely, an obsessive fear of depth or a fear of swimming at depth, otherwise known as a phobia of water. Bathophobes usually experience a feeling of fear associated with the depths of oceans, seas, lakes or other bodies of water, so deep that the bottom is indistinguishable. It is also known that many people suffering from this phobia may be afraid of tunnels, long corridors or caves in which the end is not visible.
Therefore, they usually try to avoid pools, rivers, wells, mountain valleys or any other places that are deep or endless. When they are in such places, they tend to experience extreme anxiety and anxiety. They may also have a panic attack (panic attack). Despite all the understanding that this fear is groundless, these people cannot cope with it on their own.
Bathophobia
Causes of fear of depth
- This phobia can be passed on genetically from parents .
- Fear of depth often arises against the backdrop of a bad experience learning to swim . For example, if a person was thrown into the water in order to quickly learn to swim. This approach is fundamentally wrong and creates severe psychological trauma, especially in childhood.
- Sometimes a phobia of fear of depth occurs after cases where a person is seized by limb spasms in the water , the risk of drowning, or something in the water simply frightened him greatly.
- Impressionable people with unstable psyches experience fear of the abyss , imagining that the watery infinity can drag them in or they see monsters. Even watching a horror film about the water element can lead to this phobia.
- Another reason may be a person's innate anxiety . It is often associated with an unfavorable situation in the family, which leads to distrust of the world in general.
Reasons for the development of bathophobia
Fear of crowds - what is this phobia called and how does it manifest itself?
Being afraid of heights, the dark, or anything else can be due to mental illness. With certain disorders, a person perceives the world around him too sensitively, and any irritant will cause fear.
Bathophobia is the result of a negative experience. If a child or adult was taught to swim incorrectly or created traumatic situations, this will lead to a fear of depth.
Parents do not always attach importance to how they accustom their baby to water procedures
Sometimes bathophobia appears against the background of a high level of sensitivity. As soon as a person watches films with a small number of disasters, he begins to transfer them to real life.
How does bathophobia manifest (signs)
Symptoms of fear of water are divided into anxious and phobic. Anxious symptoms occur when a person has no contact with water, and phobic symptoms occur when there is direct contact.
Bathophobia is a severe psychological disorder that is accompanied by the following symptoms:
- attacks of chills or fever
- extreme thirst and dry mouth
- numbness of limbs, cold
- high blood pressure and rapid heartbeat
- nausea and dizziness
- panic attacks
- strong psychological arousal, the person suffocates, the heart begins to beat faster
- loss of control over body and emotions
- a person experiences anxiety from thoughts about depth
- imagination draws terrible pictures of death
The fear of depth manifests itself not only when a person is directly near the water, but panic begins even at the sight of pictures, photos and videos of deep bodies of water . Even excellent swimmers suffer from this phobia, who, unexpectedly in an instant, can experience panic at the sight of the depths beneath them. In such situations, it is very difficult to pull yourself together, cope with your fear and take control of your body. At such moments, the instinct of self-preservation must work; a person needs to abstract from thoughts about the depth and save his life.
The emergence of a huge number of symptoms and causes gives impetus to the fact that a person refuses to swim in bodies of water of any size. When such a disorder occurs, it is necessary to look for ways to help overcome fear.
Fear of dark water
In Greek, "estuary" means harbor or bay, in other words it refers to bodies of water where the water is calm. Well, “phobia” is a condition that causes a feeling of fear. Therefore, limnophobia is nothing more than a fear of the secrets of the depths of lakes, swamps and ponds. People experience a fear of depth before swimming or directly being on the water surface of a lake or pond. There are times when panic is caused by just one glance towards these water elements. Such people consider the mirror-like surface of water to be deceptive and insidious, and the dark depths of the water are full of mysterious and invisible dangers. For those suffering from limnophobia, shallow-depth pools in which the water is clear and the bottom is visible are most suitable.
This disorder usually occurs in a person during childhood:
- when he had to swallow water and could drown while swimming in the village pond;
- or the boat in which he was sailing capsized and became very frightened;
- or because of a friend’s joke when he unexpectedly pulled his legs to the bottom;
- at the sight of a drowned man;
- Horror films about monsters inhabiting dark waters, or old wives' horror stories about evil spirits found in swamps, also influence the appearance of symptoms of the disorder.
Even a mild form of limnophobia causes people to experience excessive anxiety and loss of orientation while in lake water.
Types of fear of depth or bathophobia
There are two types of bathophobia: destructive and objective.
In the destructive form, fear arises from a person’s negative thoughts that arise in his mind while swimming. That is, a person deceives himself, invents unrealistic situations or visualizes scary sea animals. This is often due to a lack of reliable information about bodies of water and the inhabitants of the seas and oceans. Or because the person is very impressionable and has taken to heart the scary pictures of a movie he watched, read or heard.
An objective type of phobia occurs when a person is really in danger . For example, he is actually carried away by the current, has a cramp in the water, etc.
Types of bathophobia
There are 2 main types of bathophobia: objective and destructive.
With objective bathophobia, a person is unable to dive and rise from the water independently. This happens at a time when he senses a real potential danger to his life.
With destructive bathophobia, negative thoughts appear even before a person gets into the water.
Child's fear of water
Children may begin to fear water due to procedures occurring in the womb. These are most often unfavorable factors that arose during the mother's pregnancy. Bathophobia may also appear due to the artificial opening of the amniotic sac. This procedure causes shock in the newborn, and in the future he becomes pathologically afraid of water.
Also, this problem arises with the assistance of the parents themselves. They begin to react anxiously when the child is in the water for a long time. Parents often exaggerate the problem, and this is the danger. The child takes it all literally, because he hears: “don’t wet your feet and you’ll get sick,” or “don’t swim far and you’ll drown,” etc.
Fear of depth in the sea
There is a type of person who immediately panics at the sight of water. Symptoms appear while swimming. At this time, some people feel a certain wariness at the sight of large amounts of water. This type of bathophobia is called thalasophobia.
The phobia is also widespread among children. To identify this disease in a child, it is necessary to observe him for some time while relaxing on the beach. If he does not bathe, but calmly builds sand castles, then he has a tendency to this disease. This condition is called neurotic symptoms.
Fear of dark water
This phenomenon is called limnophobia. In this case, people begin to fear even before the start of water procedures. Panic fear can arise even at the very sight of a water artery. Those who suffer from limnophobia are better off swimming in shallow pools with clear water.
The reasons begin in childhood:
- for example, a child could drown in a pond from swallowing water;
- horror stories about monsters;
- watching horror films with sea monsters;
- a friend's joke when he pulled his leg without warning;
- the boat capsized;
- if you saw a drowned man.
People suffering from limnophobia experience loss of orientation, as well as a strong neurotic state.
Fear of sea monsters
Some people are extremely afraid of sharks and other huge inhabitants of the marine world. A person may be frightened by a scene from a film. It happens that even professional divers begin to suffer from this disease. They are then afraid to swim in a regular pool.
Phobia of getting tangled in seaweed
This happens after a person becomes entangled in algae. Due to contact with aquatic vegetation, the swimmer may begin to move chaotically, which is fraught with a sharp loss of concentration. This type of phobia can be effectively treated with hypnotic sessions.
Phobia of drowning
It all lies in psychology or sudden problems with the vegetative-vascular system during swimming. If such a disease is not treated for a long time, then it goes into a deep stage, and this person begins to have convulsions while in the water. Even in the initial stages, this disease needs to be treated.
How to deal with the fear of depth
There are three ways to get rid of the fear of depth, which is called bathophobia:
- Psychotherapy.
- Pharmacotherapy.
- Functional training.
Let's take a closer look at these techniques.
Psychotherapy is the best and most effective way to deal with fear . Sometimes, by talking with a psychologist and finding out the cause of the fear, you can quickly and easily get rid of this phobia. Group trainings are often used in psychology, when people with the same problem get together. Then the person realizes that he is not alone and the reasons for fear sometimes seem ridiculous and groundless. This helps you realize that fear is simply caused by negative thoughts that you have created for yourself.
As for functional training , this method consists of immersing a person in water, teaching him to hold his breath and fight fear in direct contact with water.
If a phobia prevents a person from living, he experiences constant tension and cannot get rid of obsessive thoughts about death associated with water and depth, then he is prescribed drug treatment . Drugs with sedative, anti-anxiety effects, antidepressants.
Creepy Abyss
The fear of water depths dates back to ancient times.
Then man was unable to explain the terrible natural phenomena that threatened his life. Huge waves destroyed ships, tsunamis destroyed settlements, and deep monsters dragged people under water. Fear was a reaction necessary to preserve life. The feeling of fear helps modern man to survive. This emotional process must be generated by actual danger.
Unfortunately, quite often it arises due to imaginary, man-made threats. And over time, it can degenerate into real phobias.
Many experts agree that bathophobia is similar to the fear of death. A person is afraid of depth precisely because he does not see or feel the bottom. This means that there could be danger lurking in the darkness that could kill the swimmer. For example, a shark, a crocodile or a monster from a recently watched horror movie.
It is typical that fear of depth occurs mainly in people who are good swimmers. Since they are the ones who most often swim far from the shore. Having stopped to rest, a person suddenly realizes that there is a huge thickness of water under him, and several tens of meters to the bottom. Such a huge mass of water can hide a variety of dangers that can destroy a person in an instant.
In such a situation, the usual sense of self-preservation can develop into panic.
And this is a real danger to life. The swimmer loses control of the situation. Instead of calmly swimming to the shore, he begins to flounder vigorously and quickly becomes exhausted. Some try to find support and quickly choke. All this only aggravates the situation and significantly reduces the chances of salvation.
Causes of fear
To understand the causes of this mental disorder, it is worth considering that bathophobia is divided into two types:
- Objective . It is caused by real potential danger. For example, a person swam far from the shore in a place where sharks or poisonous creatures were seen. For example, sea snakes, urchins, jellyfish or fish. In addition, the possibility of a swimmer getting caught under the blades of a sea vessel cannot be ruled out.
- Destructive . Caused by irrational, negative expectations and thoughts. A person is afraid that terrible ancient reptiles or mermaids are hiding in the depths. And some are sure that the ocean is a living creature that hates humanity.
A mild form of objective bathophobia can be overcome on your own. Dealing with its severe and destructive form is much more difficult. First of all, a specialist needs to find out the root cause. The main factors are:
- Features of the nervous system . Emotional, sensitive and easily suggestible individuals are more prone to panic attacks and phobic disorders than others.
- Genetics . Prerequisites for the manifestation of various nervous disorders may exist according to heredity.
- Family problems . Frequent conflict situations in the family traumatize the child’s psyche and lead to the development of complexes and phobias.
- Bad experience . Some parents use rather harsh methods to teach their child to swim - simply by throwing him into the depths. This leads to psychological trauma for the baby, which will force him to avoid swimming in the sea even in adulthood.
- Dangerous incidents in the water . A bad joke from friends or an accident can cause a fear of depth.
- Fear of the unknown . It is impossible to see what is at depth. In addition to real predators, according to the bathophobe, monsters from recently watched horror films may also be hiding there.
Those close to the bathophobe need to take a closer look at him. Bathophobia is an irrational fear. If a patient claims that he is afraid of the abyss because he sees monsters in it or hears the voices of mermaids, this is a symptom of a much more serious disease. He may have paranoid personality disorder or schizophrenia.
Assistance in such a situation should only be provided by a qualified specialist.
Manifestation of the disorder
Fear of depth is a phobia that affects everyone differently.
Most often, the patient avoids traveling to bodies of water. And in those cases when he does find himself near the water, he finds any excuse not to swim and to stay as far from the shore as possible. If one of your friends decides to joke and begins to forcefully drag the bathophobe into the water, this may result in him losing consciousness due to the shock he has suffered. Children suffering from bathophobia may even be afraid of taking a bath. Parents often do not understand the seriousness of the situation, mistaking the child’s fear for an ordinary whim. Severe coercion to comply with adult demands will only worsen the situation.
Bathophobia can manifest itself with both physical and psychological symptoms. The main ones include:
- cardiopalmus;
- chills or fever;
- dry mouth;
- increasing suffocation;
- nausea, vomiting;
- loss of balance and orientation in space;
- muscle numbness;
- a sharp increase in pressure;
- paralysis of limbs.
Bathophobes are afraid of losing control of the situation in the presence of strangers in case of contact with water.
And also go crazy when they realize that a trip to a pond is inevitable. In a critical situation they may lose their sense of reality. Mentally transport themselves to another time or place. Such phobias, even in safe situations, can provoke an inappropriate reaction.
Psychologists about fear of depth
Psychologists often compare the fear of depth with the fear of death , since a person is sure that he can die, the depth will simply suck him in and he will not be able to get out. If you are serious about getting rid of fear, you need to start with a consultation with a psychologist who will help you understand the root causes of this fear. This is the most important stage in the fight against a phobia.
Psychologists also . To begin with, you can conduct classes in the pool, immerse yourself in the water. Of course, this is a real test, but without such training you will not be able to trust and be convinced that the water will not harm you, that it can be safe. Naturally, such exercises must be performed under the supervision of a specialist. An important component of such exercises is the ability to hold your breath under water.
It would be even better to move on to diving after training in the pool . Perhaps a closer acquaintance with the underwater world will arouse interest in you instead of fear. This will help you get rid of the fear of depth forever.
In addition, you need to work with a trainer who will teach you to relax and relax on the water, without concentrating on thoughts about the depth. It is necessary to study such issues as the properties of water and its benefits for humanity. Also watch reports on water sports - rowing, surfing.
It is important to form a positive image of water . Imagine a beautiful sandy beach, blue surface of water, foam of waves crashing on the shore. You can listen to audio recordings with the sounds of the sea. Realize how calming they act on the human psyche.
Positive statements about water, a kind of affirmations, can also help. Eg:
The ocean is so beautiful...
The underwater world is impressive...
I love water…
I love feeling its coolness...
Often, those who cannot swim are afraid of water . That is why it is worth contacting a good trainer who will teach you not only how to swim and dive, but also how to relax on the water. Training should take place smoothly, step by step, in a comfortable environment. First, lessons should begin in the pool, and then move on to ponds. The first swim to the depths should be done in a life jacket, so that you do not immediately panic and give up the idea of learning to swim forever.
Causes
The reasons for this phenomenon may be different. They depend on both internal and external factors. The first reason is an unstable or weakened nervous system. Therefore, people who often worry about any problems, small or large, are always at risk and can contract this phobia.
Also, those who cannot swim are afraid of depth. They simply try to avoid swimming so that nothing bad happens to them at this moment.
Unfavorable social climate in the family. Bathophobia can arise due to a conflict situation in the family, when children are constantly afraid of something. Perhaps this is due to a traumatized child’s psyche, when there are constant quarrels and assault in the family. Bathophobia can also manifest itself if the child lived in an incomplete family or without a family at all. These and other problems can cause panicky thoughts even in adulthood. Thus, not only bathophobia arises, but also other possible types of phobias.
Bad memories associated with water. Events such as a seizure, accidents, attacks by inappropriate people or animals while swimming, or a bad joke from friends also contribute to the development of bathophobia. Then the person begins to have panic dreams, fear of everything possible, and an obsessive state. If this happens to someone, then it is necessary to contact a psychotherapist for immediate psychological help.
Why is it difficult to get rid of a phobia yourself?
A person is seized with such panic that he simply becomes numb with horror. Very often, such a phobia is observed in young children who flatly refuse to swim, and parents perceive this behavior as whims. They begin to insist, forcefully immerse the child in water, thus aggravating the child’s condition. After this, the fear of depth can remain with the child for many years. That is why you need to treat your child very carefully and attentively and help him fight his fears only with the help of specialists.
Much depends on the ability to control yourself, both physically and psychologically . Therefore, when entering a body of water, you need to concentrate on the pleasant sensations and think that there is no risk to life from contact with water. Convince yourself that it is safe, pleasant, interesting. But first, you can just sit by the water, wet your feet, enjoy the beautiful scenery, and feel at one with nature.
Naturally, to combat bathophobia, you first need to try to control your condition yourself, but if that doesn’t work, you should consult a specialist . He will analyze your situation, reveal the cause of your fear and develop an individual treatment regimen for you.
In any case, it is worth making every effort to overcome the fear of depth and enjoy life to the fullest.
What can you do about bathophobia yourself?
- Create positive associations with water. Watch positive films about fish, beautiful photographs of the depths of the sea.
- Slowly force yourself to go into the water. First, just wet your feet. Then - knee-deep. And so gradually. You can do this in the pool.
- Remember all possible traumatic situations that contributed to the development of bathophobia. Take them apart. Develop the correct reaction.
- Eliminate fear from the subconscious, replace it with positive feelings. Every time you feel fear, replace it, for example, with sympathy for sea creatures. Admiration for sailors and surfers.
The list is small. Psychotherapy is an ever-evolving industry. And this is the best solution for everyone who suffers from one form or another of bathophobia. Psychologists see more than a person can understand on their own. In some cases, psychologists suggest using hypnosis. In a state of hypnosis, the doctor works directly with the subconscious. This way you can not only find a forgotten memory from childhood, but also change negative associations. This is an impact directly on the cause of the problem.
After treatment with a psychotherapist, the fear of depth disappears. There are no more negative associations with water. A person does not feel in danger while on the coast or in his own bathroom.
How to help your child overcome his fear of depth
Children's fears are more complex and deeper than those of adults. It is better to take a child suffering from bathophobia to a psychotherapist. You can only do things on your own that you know won’t do any harm. You can watch documentaries about the inhabitants of the sea. Show the sea from the good side. You can fill the bath with some water and let your baby play. Be sure to wear sleeves to completely prevent water from getting into his nose. Children don't like this.
