I'm not sure if it's a fear or a phobia - how can I tell?

Fear is not just a natural in certain situations, it's valuable as well.  It's part of our "fight, flight, or freeze" response, and it's what prompts us to avoid or overcome danger. Phobias, in contrast, are generally learned responses to events and objects that aren't themselves threatening.  In that sense phobias are irrational and exaggerated fears.

The definitions might be important but a much more useful question is "How is this affecting my life?".  Is your anxiety, whether it's a fear or a phobia, preventing you from achieving or enjoying certain things?  Ask how much it is affecting your quality of life - that's the best test of whether to do something about it.

Is it normal to feel like this?

As a practicing hypnotherapist I make it a rule never to use the word 'normal'.  Instead I'd say that phobias are very typical behaviours and ways of thinking.  Estimates of the proportion of the population that have phobias range to as high as 60%.

As learned responses to particular stimuli, phobias are an unwanted by-product of how our brains work and learn.  In that sense phobias are 'normal' - they are part of the normal working of our brains.

I know it's irrational, so why can't I stop it?

Some people are disappointed with themselves, because they can't use their intellect to overcome their phobia.  In fact that's yet another by-product of how our brains work.  All of our sensory inputs to the brain travel first through the limbic system, where we attach emotional responses to them.

These emotions are already present when we start to use our frontal lobes to think rationally about the situation.  If we bear in mind that phobias are learned emotional reactions we can see that they need to be resolved emotionally rather than through reasoning.

I don't know why it's started - will that stop the hypnotherapy from working?

It certainly isn't necessary for you to know why or when your phobia started or worsened.  As we will see, there are techniques that don't need you to look back at all. Instead they focus on how you are now, and how you want to be in the future.

Now that you've chosen your specialist hypnotherapist, and your questions have been answered, what can you expect in the session?  Broadly there are three techniques that tend to be used when dealing with phobias.

• Regression
• Exposure
• Rewind technique