Dealing With Doctor’s Trip Fears

The doctor’s office: usually thought of as a white room with a clinician in, sitting in the middle, an air of authority around them, and you as the patient they don’t want to see. However, this idea is entirely wrong, and realising this is the first step in making sure your next doctor’s trip isn’t as bad as the last one. Doctors are just people like the patients they see, and they don’t hold any kind of power over life and death; they’re there to help after all!

A fear of the doctor is extremely common to have, so you’re not alone in your mounting tension and anxiety when it comes to having to go and see one. Similarly, it can be quite scary for our children, and they often let us know what they’re feeling in both big and small ways. Here’s some tips on helping yourself to overcome a fear of the doctor, whether that be in a big or small way, and how to keep the fear from cropping back up again.

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Focus on the Positives

We are all afraid of hearing some bad news from the doctor, but there are some among us that have some big avoidance issues when it comes to going to the doctor just to avoid hearing the news. This is where we need to try and think logically, and do a bit of disputing for ourselves.

When it comes to putting yourself in a situation that makes you anxious, both the best and worst thing to do is to cancel whatever it is you don’t feel you can face up to. Whilst we feel relief in the short term, in the long term we’re just increasing our fear. Simply being aware of this can help us to face this particular demon, and realise we’re doing this for ourselves and the good of our health.

For a doctor’s trip in particular, we know we need to go to make sure any health issues we’re experiencing or think we might have don’t get worse. Whilst we’re there, we can even talk to them about the amount of anxiety we are living with, and whether that’s a cause for concern. Doctors can always help, and it’s this we need to remember in the hardest times.

Talk to the Receptionist

One of the worst things you can do when it comes to trying to battle doctor anxiety is to not let anyone know about it. When you try this method, and let’s face it most of us do, we don’t help our anxiety levels, and then anything we do that makes us feel a little more out of place lingers on our mind for ages afterwards, which doesn’t help us to make repeat visits or get out of the habit of missing an appointment either.

If you ring up to book an appointment, you can ask the person on the other end what they can do to help alleviate your fears. This can usually range from a variety of practices such as keeping your wait in the waiting room short, (helping you to avoid over thinking), checking on you every few minutes to make sure you feel okay and to make sure you have everything you need, and can even be just as simple as making sure you have a glass of water to keep on hand.

People who work at the doctor’s surgery are always there to help, so make sure you take them up on that offer. You’re not a nuisance, and you’re not going to be bothering them, as they love to make people’s experiences a lot better. Plus it means you’ll keep your appointment and no one else will miss out!

Order Prescriptions Online

When you’ve gotten a diagnosis, and you’re now clutching a prescription in your hand, you’re not going to want to spend any longer in the doctor’s office. However, you still need to put your prescription in and get your medicine. So take a quick trip down to the nearest pharmacy as soon as possible to get it over and done with. That way, we can relax, knowing we don’t have to do anything related to the healthcare sector for a while longer.

But what about when it comes to ordering your medicine again? Well, another good thing about the invention of the internet is that some pharmacies now offer online reordering of medicine, and have it directly delivered to your day. This way, you don’t have to have any more contact than necessary, and it also helps your schedule if you’re always a busy person who doesn’t have time to run around after some medicine!

When it Comes to Our Children

Kids pick up on a lot of things, and most of all they know when a situation is going to be scary or uncomfortable. They can sense when their parents are nervous, and that makes them nervous. So the first thing to do when it comes to helping our children get over fears is to have no fears of our own.

This way, we can focus solely on them and helping them overcome what they’re feeling. It should never be dismissed, and phrases like that of ‘It’s going to be okay!’ usually don’t give anyone long term relief. So we need to make sure we’re not lying to our kids, and give them the details of what they can expect. After all, when we know what’s going to happen, we can keep calm through it, and that works for pretty much everyone.

Having fear about something, whether it be the unknown or the authority of white coats, is a normal human reaction. We can overcome it however, and empower ourselves in those moments when we realise we’re doing this for ourselves and our family, and that anyone who gives you good or bad health news is really just like you. It also means we can be better there for our kids, and soothe their healthy journeys.