11yo panic attack over phobias

[EllaMenopee]

Ds is 11 and today had a massive panic attack over a crane fly. He was in a room upstairs and the crane fly was outside the door at the top of the stairs, up at the corner of the (admittedly lowish, but definitely high enough) ceiling. It took about 20 minutes for me to talk him out of the room, with him crying and hyperventilating. It was brutal. He's never been a fan of spiders or flying bugs, but despite having been stung by a wasp, he's never had a reaction like this before to an insect/spider. The only time he's had such a huge panic was getting an injection a couple of years ago, but he had a very traumatic blood sample as a toddler which i think is the root cause there.

I really want to help him conquer both phobias before they take hold of his life. He gives the appearance of a happy go lucky kid, which he mostly is, but clearly has anxiety in some areas of his life and finds change hard. I'm going to get him some anxiety hypnotherapy tracks to listen to but I have no idea how to deal with this properly and would welcome any advice from someone with experience.

I used to be like that, it's not unusual. You can buy insect repellant sprays, they don't kill, just deter, also plug in things that do the same.

One day, as an adult, I was no longer afraid of crane flies. I don't like them flying around my face but am not scared. I don't know why my fear disappeared, it just did.

I think you will just have to accept it. However, there are YouTube videos which help with phobias.

Phobias are quite complicated, it might be good to see someone who specialises if you can find someone.

Sometimes the wrong approach can really set them back.

Why did you coax him out of the room instead of just removing the crane fly?

My worry, LBFseBrom is that the fears are increasing and that things he finds moderately upsetting now will develop into bigger phobias. Maybe that's too big of a leap by me?

I couldn't reach it, calmcoco and he was so terrified of it moving (at one stage it rubbed its legs together and he slammed and tried to lock the door) I didn't want to start flapping at it and causing it to move to a spot nearer the room I was trying to get him out of. I also didn't want to risk hurting or killing it. I'm not a fan of crane flies or spiders either but since having kids I've made a huge effort to deal with them practically and without fuss. Dh usually just catches crane flies and puts them out the window but he wasn't home.

What's the problem with him shutting the door though, I don't understand - I'm not trying to be difficult.

He shuts the door, you can catch it, he then opens the door.

You can't get rid of a phobia by forcing him to confront it, you'll entrench it more. He needs to have some control.

I don't like killing bees or spiders or anything really. But crane flies live for a day. And that life is nasty and brutish so I probably would kill it.

Phobias, and this sounds like one, are treatable. But read up. Because avoiding them is more simple than treating them, and unfortunately the treatment is really very like what you would do to make it worse, with a few tweaks.

I think learning about insects isn't a bad thing as long as he wants to. For example DD is better with bees after learning all about them and visiting a safe bee habitat.

Honestly, he was hyperventilating and crying hysterically so I didn't think to leave him alone in that state while I caught it. I don't by any means think I was right in all of how I handled today, I was very much blundering through trying to help him calm down and obviously not getting it right 😥

It's possible that your trying to help him calm down is actually preventing him thinking how to respond himself.

It might be worth staying quieter next time and say something like 'you tell me how you want to deal with this'.

The secret is not to rush I think.

Very hard not to try to 'help' but he's ok really, just panicking (not asthmatic is he? That's more difficult).

Do you have any resources you can recommend, MrsTerryPratchett? He's a big fan of bees too and even after the wasp sting isn't terrified of them but will sensibly avoid them. The enclosed space was the problem today and that he had to pass by it to get down the stairs to escape it. We will start researching all things bug-ish though.

He's not asthmatic. I was helping him control his breathing so he wasn't in just working on adrenaline and trying to come up with a solution together. Maybe he felt overwhelmed by my suggestions too. If we are in a similar situation again, I'll definitely bear that in mind.

Very hard when someone freaks out. You can get specialist counselling