How to Treat Tokophobia
What is tokophobia? Tokophobia is a tremendous fear that occurs in women to conceive and give birth. Tokophobia can occur in women who have never been pregnant or in women who have previously experienced a traumatic event while pregnant or facing childbirth. Then how to treat tokophobia? Check out the explanation in this article.
For most women, pregnancy and childbirth can be both a happy and thrilling experience. Therefore, it is natural that many women are afraid of getting pregnant or giving birth. However, this fear is usually manageable and will go away on its own after giving birth.
This is different from women who suffer from tokophobia. Because a woman who has tokophobia will tend to think of pregnancy and the process of giving birth as something dangerous so that it makes herself become afraid. This very strong fear of getting pregnant and giving birth can make the sufferer not want to get pregnant at all.
Signs of Tokophobia
The signs and symptoms of tokophobia are if a woman feels anxious, afraid, and tends to avoid thoughts or talks related to pregnancy and childbirth. A person who suffers from tokophobia when seeing someone pregnant or giving birth, even just thinking about these two things can experience:
- Chest fluttering
- Anxious and restless
- Panic attack
- Hard to sleep
- Nightmare
- Depression
Types of Tokophobia
Tokophobia is divided into 2 types, namely primary tokophobia and secondary tokophobia. The explanation is as follows:
- Primary tokophobia is an unnatural fear of pregnancy and childbirth that occurs in women who have never been pregnant or have never given birth at all. This condition can occur because the woman has seen a difficult labor process, such as bleeding after giving birth.
- Secondary tokophobia is a phobia to pregnancy or childbirth experienced by women who have previously already given birth. This can occur in women who have had bad experiences during childbirth, such as miscarriages or babies born in a state of death, thus becoming afraid to conceive and give birth again.
How to Deal With Tokophobia
If the fear of getting pregnant and giving birth has interfered with your relationship with your partner or hindered you and your partner's desire to have children, then you can consult a gynecologist. If needed, the obstetrician may also refer you to a psychologist or psychiatrist.
To overcome the problem of tokophobia, there are several efforts that can be done, including:
1. Counseling and Psychotherapy
To find out the reason why you are afraid to get pregnant, a psychologist or psychiatrist will conduct a psychiatric examination on you first. After that, you will undergo counseling and psychotherapy with a psychologist or psychiatrist. By undergoing this therapy, it can help you deal with the fears you feel so that the tokophobia you experience can be overcome.
2. Use of medicines
How to cope with tokophobia for patients who have very severe anxiety, depression, or fear, the psychiatrist may prescribe medication, such as sedatives or antidepressants. Usually these drugs medicines only given in the short term and must be under the supervision of a doctor.
3. Share stories or vent
So that the tokophobia you suffer from does not get worse, you can try to share stories or vent about what you feel with people you trust, for example to your partner, family or best friend. By expressing what you feel to people you trust, you will get moral support from these people, so that feelings of fear of pregnancy and anxiety that arise due to tokophobia can be reduced.
4. Take Pregnancy Class
If the source of your phobia is pain during pregnancy or childbirth, then try taking a pregnancy class. By taking a pregnancy class, you will get accurate information about what happens during pregnancy and also about what you can do to deal with pain during childbirth. That way you will feel calmer and can more easily fight the fear of getting pregnant or giving birth due to tokophobia.
Tokophobia or the phobia of pregnancy and childbirth can be overcome with proper care and support from a partner or the closest people. However, dealing with tokophobia requires time and patience. If you experience tokophobia, you can apply how to treat tokophobia above, hopefully it can be useful.
