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Afraid to Leave the House By Ayla Kremb Nayeli was having severe panic attacks that had escalated to the point where she was afraid of leaving the house by herself. If she did leave her home by herself, even if only for a 5 min walk, she would bring an arsenal of "survival tools" like water,snacks, books etc. This stress was initially triggered by an impending career decision, whether to move to London or not, a decision that to her seemed like a life or death choice. Her fear was that if she didn't make the right career move, she would end up in a dead end job for the rest of her life and always regret the choice she made. The first thing we did was the NLP phobia technique and several relaxation breathing techniques. Over 3 sessions we did it numerous times to make sure that she felt comfortable before we started doing exposure therapy. We picked 20 levels of exposure, starting with leaving the house by herself in the first place, subsequently leaving her survival kit at home and finally staying outside for longer stretches of time. Over the next 2 months she went through all her steps and eventually arrived at a place where she felt comfortable enough to return to work and go on with her life. She says that there are times when she feels her anexiety swelling up, but she now has the tools to deal with the situation and the knowledge that she has overcome panic attacks that were much more severe.
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