Erythrophobia: why does fear arise and how to cope with it?

Everyone can blush - from embarrassment, shame, from embarrassment or indignation. But there are people who can blush just like that, suddenly their face “flashes”, which leads people to bewilderment. This is a fairly common disorder called erythrophobia.

Erythrophobia is called pathological fear caused by the possible prospect of blushing in public, in public. Oddly enough, but this is what happens in the end. The fear of hyperemia of the face has other names, it is called blushing syndrome or idiopathic erythema. Fear cannot be called irrational, like most phobias, because erythrophobes have reason to fear redness of the face - they have such a predisposition.

There are people in whom the excitability of the sympathetic part of the autonomic nervous system is increased, and because of this, there is often an influx of blood to the skin of the face, hands, neck. But for the time being there is no fear, and only when a person (usually a teenager) begins to understand that his redness causes questions from others, he begins to fear repeated episodes, however, he can in no way affect the likelihood of their occurrence.

Alone, when no one sees the patient, attacks of fear usually do not occur. One way or another, fear is closely related to the social environment, the public, to the reluctance to become a laughing stock or to face uncomfortable questions from other people.

Redness of the face (hyperemia) can be uniform or uneven (spots).

Erythrophobia can significantly affect a person’s life - communication is difficult, the patient can hardly make contacts, and sometimes even decides to isolate himself from others. Erythrophobes cannot engage in public activities, speak in front of an audience, or teach. Many professions that are close to them in spirit, are desirable, become inaccessible - fear dictates its conditions.

One of the most famous erythrophobes of our time is the Hollywood actress, the owner of several Oscars, including for the role of Bridget Jones, Renee Zellweger. The actress often visits the psychotherapist, and her hyperemia, often asymmetrical, has already become part of her image. She learned to live with her quite peacefully. But this example is rather an exception. Most people with blushing syndrome fail to come to terms with their peculiarity, and yet pathological fear arises.

Erythrophobia is one of the phobic mental disorders officially recognized by medicine and is included in the International Classification of Diseases.

A person's face is supplied with blood more intensively than most other parts of the body. And this is not just conceived by nature. On the face there is an impressive amount of small facial muscles, which at one end are fixed directly in the layers of the skin. The facial muscles are almost constantly in motion, and therefore they need more blood for normal functioning. The network of facial blood vessels is very developed, despite the fact that the vessels themselves are quite small.

In order for the skin integuments on the face to not be red or lilac constantly, due to such a physiological peculiarity of this part of the body, there is a small layer of interstitial fluid in the subcutaneous fatty tissue, which reduces the color intensity if the vessels dilate. But she cannot completely disguise the blood flow, and therefore it is common for a person to blush when blood rushes to his face: during physical exertion, running, fast walking, during sexual discharge, during heat, cold, as well as with strong emotions, for example, when you are ashamed, when a person is very embarrassed, very worried, etc. This mechanism is common to all people, without exception.

Erythrophobes have a slightly different organization of the nervous system. The sympathetic department is excited more and faster, and it is not at all necessary for a person to be in the above circumstances. Face reddening with erythrophobia can just happen when a person is completely calm.

As soon as a teenager begins to realize that he is “not so” that he has such a feature, negative expectations intensify - he is in a state of almost constant tension, because he knows that treacherous redness can spread over his face at the most inopportune moment. There is a fear of this phenomenon, which is accompanied by an adrenaline rush. Adrenaline, in turn, excites the nervous system even more, and what erythrophobia was so afraid of is actually happening. Over time, episodes of hyperemia become more frequent, fear also grows.

Phobia manifests itself quite straightforwardly - frequent redness of the skin of the face. Some patients with blushing syndrome claim that all skin integuments are reddened to the same extent, others note the so-called geographical hyperemia - redness occurs with large and medium spots that resemble the geographical outlines of the continents. In some, hyperemia is limited only to the face, but there are those who have the neck and decollete zone drawn into the process. Erythrophobes often claim that in an attack they experience a clear sensation of flushing of heat to the face and this is completely justified - the blood flow can really cause a feeling of warmth.

Erythrophobes very quickly lose confidence in their abilities and adequate self-esteem. They turn into embarrassed, frightened personalities, fearful and anxious. Despite their desires and dreams, they have to choose professions in which they do not have to deal with people. It is difficult for them to make love and friendships.

The more everyday life suffers, the more its quality decreases, the more closed and anxious people who are prone to blushing syndrome become. Often the consequences arising from it are added to the original problem: the patient becomes a convinced sociophobe, begins to suffer from depression, each subsequent of which becomes more protracted and difficult than the previous one.

At home, it is impossible to cope with blushing syndrome. A person definitely needs professional help. To get it, you can contact a psychotherapist or psychiatrist. First you need to be examined by a gynecologist (if we are talking about a woman), to exclude early menopause and premenopausal changes, the opinions of a dermatologist, endocrinologist and therapist may also be required.

To date, surgical treatment is recognized as the most promising method of therapy. The operation is called sympathectomy. Its effectiveness is estimated in the range of 94-97%. Just so many patients after the intervention completely get rid of their problem.

But it should be noted that such a high efficiency is observed only in those for whom redness captures the entire area of ​​the face. If the face turns red with spots, then the effectiveness of the operation does not exceed 50%.

The operation is not performed for everyone. They will not do it for diseases of the respiratory system and heart failure. The task of surgeons is to get to the sympathetic trunk through two miniature incisions under the armpits. To do this, a small video camera is introduced into them and in such an endoscopic way, doctors manage to get an image on the screen. The sympathetic trunk is partially blocked or destroyed.

After interference in the nervous system during and after the operation, certain side effects may occur: sweating in the body and legs increases; when eating spicy foods, sweating also occurs, palms become drier, and the heart rate decreases slightly. However, most often these phenomena are not so significant and unpleasant for an erythrophobic than the problem that brought him to the operating table.

Psychotherapy for erythrophobia is necessarily combined with patient education relaxation methods, deep relaxation. The task of a psychotherapist is to make it clear to a person that he can remain calm, and this will certainly give a positive result. The patient is offered new settings that refute the shame or depravity of his features, in other words, he is taught to live with this feature. The therapist not only talks about how to properly treat the problem, but also teaches erythrophobia autotraining techniques, breathing exercises - this is what will help, if necessary, to quickly pull yourself together and prevent unrest.

Classes in groups have proven themselves very well, but in parallel with this, individual work with a specialist is also shown. Hypnotherapy is often used, as well as methods of gradual immersion in stressful situations, allowing the patient under the supervision of a psychotherapist to relive new situations in which, until recently, he experienced shame, nightmare and horror.

Among the medicines there is no universal cure for this phobia, there is no magic pill or injections that would help solve the problem. However, often the therapist considers it necessary to accompany classes with medicines. Antidepressants are used to help maintain a positive mood, as well as drugs from the beta-blocker group, which slightly reduce the heart rate. This gives an amazing effect - the connection between stress, palpitations and redness of the face and neck is broken.

It must be understood that antidepressants, and even more so beta-blockers, have a large list of serious side effects, they are generally contraindicated for many, and therefore they try to resort to drug therapy for erythrophobia only in the most extreme cases when psychotherapy fails to cope with the task, and surgical treatment is considered inappropriate.