Published on 12, July, 2020
Hi,
Am curious to know if anyone here suffers from travel anxiety? When I was little occasionally I used to suffer from bad anxiety when we had to travel than the few miles into our town, but the 45 miles to where my grandparents live was too much and resulted in anxiety and attacks leading up to the day in question. Then on the day of travel, we would take my dads car, if I went nine times out of ten I'd have a panic attack and end up sick along the way.
I'm a bit older now but my travel anxiety is even worse now. Any journey even the short ones into town make me so anxious and give me anxiety symptoms leading up to it and on the day.
I never go anywhere now. No job, no friends just extreme anxiety. Also another form of this is that when I'm in the car and travelling I need the toilet and need to wee literally within five minutes of the journey starting. And on hour long journeys it becomes so difficult, especially as most public toilets are closed here now.
This morning I was meant to go with my dad to see my grandma but the anxiety was severe and I backed out and now I feel so guilty and bad.
I know that the logical thing to do is to go to the doctors but I get severe panic attacks when I go so I don't go.But I realize that this is becoming really bad for me.
MEEEE! I hate being in cars, cars are a no for me. busy buses cant stand them and I will get off one if it gets busy or looks like it could be busy. I am okay with buses but if someone i dont like sits besides me I want to get off. Trains are the best as long as they are not busy. I once had to run off a busy train I started saying let me off let me off, and one woman who I think was autistic started crying as she must have felt cramped too.
I have to plan travel so so much, and have back up plans and where are the stops that are near cafes so if it is busy I can have coffee and wait till the next bus/train. It takes a lot of money to travel sometimes.
I tend to not go into the city centre unless at quiet day times. I tend to go to the post area near me which is a nice bus ride and quiet with nice people on it that behave, I tend to go to the little shopping centre there for coffee and a look round the shops. I cant travel abroad as I fear planes. I dont mind a ferry on a mild day.
TBH I prefer to walk places as I have more control and I like to walk to a nice little park near me with a local cafe.
I choose to live in a nice area with lots of shops and things to do to save me travelling to city centre. It has local concerts too, and I can sit quite in a cafe and feel that people are nearby and not feel lonely because of that.
I understand you so much.
The last time I was in a car the person did not go where they were supposed to go, they dropped off at a supermarket and got a trolly out. Because of this I panicked as they had not told me that that was the plan we were supposed to go for tea, so I ran away (they do not know I am autistic). I guess it sadly links back to the fact that an abusive man once went to drive me over a ledge and he stopped just in the nick of time or we would have went over and died. So I cant do cars much. I hate taxis. it would have to be an emergency for me to be in a car.
I might be okay with a big car like a rolls royce I dont know why that is but I think they are nice.