Phone Phobia: Do You Have This Problem?

Do you feel your heart rate peaking when you hear a ring on the other side of the phone. Have you avoided taking calls due to such a fear. Are you a confident speaker in real life who cringes like a wussy over the phone receiver. And all this even if the person on the other side wasn’t a psycho, but just a friend from school/work. Then you have been diagnosed with phone phobia also known as tele phobia. I used to feel ashamed of my fear of telephones until I went online and met with a whole community of people who suffer from the same syndrome.

One may wonder how someone who could be terrified of a harmless device such as the telephone. Most people who have this condition would give you a dozen reasons. I personally found the following difficulties when attending the phone.

1. Dread of the person picking up the phone, despite knowing who it is that I’m calling.
2. Dread of the mood of the person.
3. Mind always distracted by the thoughts and emotions of the person on the other side
4. Difficulty speaking coherently because of trouble tuning in with the other person’s replies.
5. Fear of being misunderstood
6. Mind going blank even though you rehearsed what you were planning on saying.

These are just some of the difficulties I have faced when attending the phone. These may sound strange to a normal person, but unfortunately this condition exists among a large number of people and in certain cases are severe enough to disrupt lives. Since our phones are one of the primary forms of communication, people avoiding it can cause relations to be cut off, jobs to be in peril and rifts between friends who might not buy such an excuse. (I’m sorry I couldn’t pick up your phone or call you back because I was afraid of speaking on the phone)

Some doctors say that a traumatic incident involving the phone or a conversation over it could be the reason for this condition. This was what made me dig deep into my past and recall all the unpleasant events that included a phone call. The only incident that I could think of that affected me emotionally was a phone call from an uncle of mine who had abused me as a child. I can still feel the chills when I think of that grisly voice on the other end. The strangest thing is that I recall quite clearly how I never had trouble speaking on the phone up until then.

But how do we deal with such a condition. There are therapies assuring a 100 percent recovery, but most people view it with trepidation. I personally tried writing down my scripts when I made a call, but that ended up making me more nervous. Some people have used acting as a means to get over their fear. Pretending you’re someone else for the short duration on the phone has cured some people at least partially. There are several articles online on how to cure this problem, but none of them seem effective enough. Some people also suggest increasing the frequency of calls to rid the fear. However I have spoken to people who work in call centers, who handle thousands of phone calls a day who cringe at the thought of making or attending a personal phone call.

There are several variants to this condition. Some people complain trouble only when dealing with personal phone calls. Personally I feel much more confident making a professional phone call, but wither away when I have to call a dear friend. There are cases when it is the reverse, when people have more trouble dealing with business calls but somehow handle personal calls more easily.

However the one thing that alleviates the shame and the embarrassment is to speak to fellow sufferers. Communities online offer a haven for such people; by discussing issues and exchanging advices one feels slightly more confident of dealing with this problem.

I on the other hand am still trying to figure out a means to stamp this fear out of me, especially since I have to attend telephonic interviews for jobs. But whats even worse is the number of people I am losing contact with due to my inability to call them up or pick up the phone when they call me. Most people struggle with the same problems. One hopes that someone would soon discover a comprehensive method that truly cures this condition and rids us of this life disrupting fear.