There are many millions more bugs than humans on the planet, which is not really good news if you are someone who hates the very mention, let alone coming face-to-face with a hairy bug or insect.
Using the services of someone like nolapestcontrol.net can help you to deal with any particular issues that you have in and around your home, and there are also some things that can be done to help, if you or a loved one, hates bugs.
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The Fear of Bugs
If you have a definite fear of bugs or insects, it is likely that you suffer from entomophobia or acaraphobia.
Someone who suffers from what can be classed as an abnormal and persistent fear of insects is likely to be in a regular state of anxiety, despite understanding that the vast majority of insects that they are fearful of, pose no threat to them at all.
This general anxiety disorder is referred to as entomophobia, with other related phobias, such as acaraphobia and arachnophobia, often likely to be on the list as well.
If you suffer from acaraphobia, this can in some extreme cases, dictate your life completely. Some patients are so severely consumed by the fear of encountering insects that they can refuse to leave the house, and might even spend a lot of their time cleaning, in order to try and prevent these bugs from bothering them.
Classic Signs and Symptoms
There are some classic signs and symptoms that patients might display, if they are suffering from severe entomophobia or acaraphobia.
Some indications that there could be a phobia involved, include when someone complains constantly that they are being bitten by bugs or are seen to be cleaning their home and surrounding excessively.
Sufferers can also demonstrate varying degrees of self-mutilation, as they scratch and itch themselves to get rid of the bugs that they think are crawling over their skin.
Some of the physical signs that someone may be suffering from entomophobia can display, include shaking and trembling as well as nausea, and they can often cry or scream when they see a bug.
Getting Help
Many of the symptoms associated with a fear of bugs and insects are rather like the sort of behavioral and physical responses that you can see in other phobias too.
If you or someone close to you has a genuine fear of insects or bugs and displays some of the classic symptoms to suggest that help is needed to overcome the problem, it will often require the services of a healthcare professional to confirm a diagnosis and suggest a way forward.
As part of the help process and to clarify exactly what course of action is needed in order to help you overcome your fears and anxiety, someone like a psychologist or therapist, will expose the patient to a photograph of various insects, as a way of seeing the response and to identify what exactly is triggering the strong emotional and physical reaction.
It is often a complicated process and involves a process of elimination, so that it can be determined if the fear is triggered by crawling objects in general, or certain specific insects.
Getting to the Root of the Problem
If someone is diagnosed as suffering from entomophobia, their treatment will be in a similar vein to how other unrelated phobias are resolved.
A period of ongoing therapy and counseling may also be supplemented with certain medications, which will help you to hopefully cope better with the physical reactions to bugs that you are experiencing.
It often transpires that there is an underlying reason for the phobia. Once this is identified and addressed during therapy sessions, progress can normally be made, to the point where insects are introduced to the patient, and the fear is finally overcome.
If you suffer from a high level of anxiety when faced with bugs, there is a proven strategy that should help you to overcome these fears.
Robert Kunst is the president of Fischer Environmental Services, a full service pest control firm serving The Southeastern USA. He teaches a class in Integrated Pest Management (IPM) at Louisiana State University and has chaired over 60 committees on Pest Control topics.