Panic attacks on dual carriage/motorways

[Lizbiz89]

I was wondering whether I might need some form of therapy. Basically 2 years ago I drove with my young children down to Devon and after a long trip down with loads of traffic I had a dizzy moment in the fast lane of motorway. It was like I wasn't in control of body and it petrified the life out of me. Since then I have been too scared to drive on motorways or dual carriage ways. I'm so sick of this and really want to be able to drive properly again. Can anyone advise how I can go about overcoming this? I also feel like I'm keeping this secret from my family as I'm too ashamed to admit I'm scared to drive to them. Any advice would be really appreciated.

No I still haven’t conquered it unfortunately. The silly thing is I know if push came to shove I could do it but the fear of it stops me completely. Something about being trapped on a motorway petrifies me. I do think I suffer from agoraphobia as I sometimes get the same feeling in queues. But driving is even more frightening because you’re in a potentially dangerous situation. So difficult and I find it even more difficult because I haven’t told anyone, even my husband doesn’t know. It’s horrible.

I would book some specific motorway lessons with a qualified instructor until you get your confidence back. Then try it with another, supportive, adult, but no children. Only introduce the children once you feel totally ok with it.

Problem is I can't even imagine going back on a dual carriage way, even with an instructor. Sometimes I have nightmares about it. I wonder if hypnosis or emdr could help. Although I have tried hypnosis in the past, for a different issue, and found it ineffective on me
@Lizbiz89 have you considered telling your husband about it? Must be hard carrying this big secret

This happened to me, not on motorway but a very fast price of road with no exits (round an airport) I had to drive it though, I had CBT therapy but what also helped was playing my favourite song and singing along to it with the volume turned up. Whatever it was has resolved itself I can now do without stressing, took a while though.