What is the fear of Fainting?

What is the fear of Fainting?

It’s a common fear in people who have instability sensations, dizziness or vertigo during their panic attacks. They fear that these sensations come before fainting or loss of consciousness. 

Physiologically, faints are produced by a sudden descent of arterial pressure. If the cardiac pace goes down, this descends the tension, and if the sufficient blood does not get to the brain, someone can faint. Nevertheless, when a person feels anxiety or panic, physiologically, the complete opposite happens. The heart beats fast and the arterial pressure increases, so it’s not very common for someone to faint in this situation. Dizziness, weakness or weak legs sensations are produced by the anxiety response and favored in many cases by hyperventilation. 

Some people that suffer this fear, are hypotensive that suffered faintings in the past. If you’re not one of them, it would be very interesting if you compared the sensations you felt in a hypotensive fainting and what you feel when you’re going through a panic attack. You’ll notice that the ones coming from real faintings feel like a progressive distancing, like a deceleration. The ones coming from panic attacks feel completely different: your body feels over-accelerated and you feel many more sensations. If adrenaline is swimming through your veins, the last thing you’ll do is faint!