Dementophobia: symptoms, causes and treatment of this phobia

Extreme fear of dementia can cause severe episodes of anxiety.

Mental health is something to which, fortunately, more and more attention is being paid. Gradually the population is becoming more aware of the existence of different psychiatric disorders and the difficulties they entail, and it is no longer rare to hear about someone with depression or anxiety disorders, and the need to seek professional help. the need to seek professional help in the presence of symptoms of depression or anxiety disorders..

However, there is still a great social stigma towards mental disorders, especially in cases such as schizophrenia, as well as a great fear of everything they represent.

In some people there is also an excessive, disabling and even pathological fear of suffering a psychiatric disorder, which is colloquially referred to (although it is a derogatory and imprecise term that ignores a large number of variables and generates a separation between "healthy" and "clinical" subjects that is not as bipolar as it seems) as "going crazy", or losing one's mind. It is what happens to people with dementophobia..

Dementophobia and its main implications.

Also called agaetophobia or maniaphobia, dementophobia is conceptualized as the phobia of the possibility of going insane or losing one's mind. It is a specific phobia that can cause severe limitations in the sufferer's life. As a phobia, it implies the occurrence of an irrational fear that is disproportionate to the actual danger involved in a given stimulus. In general, the fear is usually recognized as excessive by the subject him/herself.

Exposure to the stimulus itself or the possibility of its appearance triggers a high level of anxiety, which in turn usually generates physiological alterations such as sweating, trembling, tachycardia, hyperventilation or even anxiety crises. This anxiety leads to active avoidance or escape from the situation in which the phobic stimulus appears or may appear.

In the case at hand, the fear of "going crazy" implies a high level of anxiety in any situation that generates this possibility or exposure to situations in which the subject may lose control or have diminished capacities, as well as the linking of his or her own person with that which is related to the mental disorder (especially if it is severe). This fear of the loss of reasoning can be in situations in which there is a permanent loss of capacities, but it can also appear in situations in which the loss is transitory.

It must be taken into account, as with other phobias, we are talking about a fear that must be disproportionate and irrational. We are not talking about the existence of a certain fear of suffering from a psychological problem: it is highly doubtful that there is anyone who really wants to suffer from a mental disorder, since it is something that in all cases generates great suffering or limitation to the sufferer. Not to mention disorders that generate cognitive impairment, such as dementia.such as dementia. It is natural to fear to some extent the possibility of suffering a limitation or a progressive loss of capabilities.

The problem exists when this fear itself generates a limitation in the subject's life and prevents a normative performance of their daily life, to the point of avoiding certain stimuli or people, and generating anxiety at the slightest possibility of this happening.

Day-to-day symptoms

Although it may seem that we are generally not exposed to situations that someone with fear of losing their mind may fear, the truth is that in severe cases we can find ourselves with a severe limitation in day-to-day life..

People with dementophobia can suffer great anxiety in any type of situation in which they can interpret that they are suffering a loss of faculties or control of reality. Thus, for example, the loss of memory that occurs at the normative level with age will be a cause of great distress and quickly associated with dementia. Alterations such as memory lapses due to stress or fatigue or phenomena such as the tip-of-the-tongue phenomenon (that you do not finish evoking the word you want to say although you have the feeling that it is there) also generate a high level of suffering.

Another aspect to take into account is the possible appearance of compulsive checking behaviors, frequently assessing your mental state or your capacities. Rigid and inflexible behavior patterns are also likely to appear, making it difficult to alter your mental state (although it is natural that our capacities, emotions, motivations and levels of activation vary from day to day).

Likewise the presence of perceptual disturbances often generates a high level of anxiety.avoiding any situation that may generate it. This could include the consumption of alcohol or other substances, but also some medications.

They also tend to avoid mental health centers and contact with people with different disorders, sometimes expressing a clear rejection towards them. Although less common, it is also possible that exactly the opposite happens: that the fear of suffering from some kind of problem or going crazy leads them to constantly frequent contact with professionals in the sector who confirm that they do not suffer from any disorder.

In extreme cases the subject can get to isolate itself completely, harming the social, interpersonal or even labor scopes (since it is probable that they avoid situations of stress).

• Article related: "Types of Anxiety Disorders and their characteristics".

Causes of this phobia

There is no single cause for the onset of dementophobia, as this phobia has a multicausal origin that can be affected by several variables. In the first place, it is possible that there is a Biological predisposition to suffer phobic reactions, born of a high physiological reactivity, which can end up triggering a phobia if the necessary environmental conditions are present.

Bearing in mind that suffering from a mental disorder implies a certain level of difficulties and suffering, dementophobia is born of a fear that is to some extent adaptive in the sense that it protection of the subject from a state considered to be aversive.. Likewise, the high social stigma that although today has diminished still exists around mental health problems conditions the subjects, in such a way that the association of loss of control with pain, loss and social marginalization increases the probabilities of suffering from this type of phobia.

In this sense, having grown up in an environment and with rigid parental models in which special emphasis has been placed on the importance of reason and control can also favor the appearance of dementophobia. Similarly, the opposite situation can also favor it: overprotective educational models in which the child has no exposure to reality and the existence of diversity in mental functioning among people.

The interpretation given to the mental disorder in the home of origin can also be a determining factor: if it is seen as a punishment, or as something horrible that directly impedes the person's life, fear will be greater.

Likewise, having observed during development (especially in childhood) and/or throughout life how people in our environment have suffered some neurodegenerative process or a mental disorder that generates a high level of dysfunction or that has caused damage to the affected person or to others can trigger the fear of suffering a similar problem, to the point of causing great anxiety and can culminate in the onset of phobia.

Treating dementophobia

The treatment of dementophobia is certainly complex, since unlike phobias such as animal phobias (e.g. spiders or dogs) or phobias of specific situations such as storms, airplanes or heights, there is no clear stimulus that the subject physically avoids, the fear being directed towards a mental aspect that is not visible to the naked eye.

In any case, dementophobia is treatable. Although the situations that generate fear can be very diverse, it is possible to elaborate together with the patient a hierarchy in order to make a gradual exposure therapy or a systematic desensitization. This point is one of the most fundamental, because it generates that the subject is able to resist the anxiety in situations that generate it and with time it is diluted.

Another fundamental point, especially in this type of phobia, is the treatment of the patient's beliefs and fears, so that not only anxiety is reduced but also the patient learns to interpret reality in a more adaptive way. First of all, it would be necessary to analyze the meaning of "going crazy" or losing one's mind for the subject, if he has experienced any situation in which this has happened or what it could imply for him. Also the fears that may be behind it. After that, a cognitive restructuring would be carried out.The subject's beliefs and fears as hypotheses and then trying to construct other interpretations of them.

In extreme cases, the use of tranquilizers and anxiolytic drugs may be advisable in order to lower the level of activation and to be able to work more efficiently at a psychological level.