How to - fear of traveling. Part 5 - siderodromofobia (fear of traveling by train)

I have already covered many issues related to the fear of traveling. An airplane, a ship or a car can cause stress to many people who experience areophobia, i.e. fear of flying by plane, nautophobia – fear of swimming or cruising by ship, or amaxophobia – fear of driving and driving a car.

Siderodromophobia

Siderodromophobia or the fear of trains, railways and train travel can get people suffering from this phobia every time they are about to travel. You are afraid at the very thought and the day before you think about it, unable to fall asleep at night, you feel weak and even sick. But you have no choice, you have to do it, you have to get on the train to go to work, to university, to visit your family. You are trying to calmly prepare for the journey and even though you have packed your luggage and bought a ticket beforehand, you are stressed on the day of departure. You keep asking yourself. Will everything work out? Will I get to the station on time or will I get stuck in a traffic jam? Will I take the right train? Will there be no platform changes? Will the train derail?

You finally arrive at the station. You still have some time, you know you’ll make it, but you still feel insecure. Every now and then you check on the board to make sure nothing has changed or there have been any delays. You feel worse and worse. The train is coming, people jump up and run towards the door, but you check the signs several times if it’s the right train and you ask people to make sure it’s the right one. Inside, you ask again and finally find your place. What a relief, the train starts and suddenly the conductor comes and you don’t know where you hid the ticket. The conductor stands and watches and you search and search and for nothing in the world you can’t find a ticket. You know you had it. The fight with the backpack, books, purse, sweaty palms, hands are shaking, it’s finally here. The conductor checks and leaves. But this is not the end of the journey. The worst is yet to come. It’s dark, so you don’t know when your station will be (unfortunately, not every train has a system for informing about the name of the approaching station), keep looking out the window, you count down the stations you pass, soon. Well, yes, but this door is so heavy that you can’t open it. You look around the train in panic and suddenly you see that some man on the other side of the corridor is also getting off at the same station. You follow him. The train stops and finally, relieved, you get off, the journey is over.

How to cope?

There are several ways to deal with travel related problems. First of all, it’s worth going with someone. If it’s not a problem, you need to tell your travel companion about your nervous problems, fears and possible irrational behavior or motion sickness.

Some ways to deal with your medicine while traveling: