When to Seek Professional Help for Agoraphobia

Once you recongize you are experiencing the symptoms of agoraphobia, you’ll probably need to decide if you are going to seek professional help or follow a self-help program.

To make this decision, here's a general rule of thumb:

If your symptoms are interfering with the regular flow of your daily life, it's time to get help. This is when the symptoms are hindering you at work, school, social events, or your relationships with family or friends.

To be more specific, whether or not you should seek professional help depends on the degree of avoidance behavior you engage in. If you are just feeling a lot of anxiety and have no or mild avoidance behaviors, then you probably don't need to see a professional psychologist. In this case, learning everything you can about agoraphobia by reading books like this one and following some self-help techniques may work really well for you.

However, if you are engaging in severe avoidance behavior that is disrupting your life (like missing work or school on a regular basis), then you probably need to find a good individual therapist or get involved in group therapy.

Article Source: http://www.agoraphobia.net

Stephen Price is a recovered agoraphobic with a master’s degree in psychology. His informational website on agoraphobia featuring a free newsletter can be found at: www.agoraphobia.ws

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