Initial rush of adrenaline

[Insert Clever Name Here]

Hey guys, I'm about to go up in a Cessna again for a spin around the regional block - but I wanted to ask your opinions on a particular thing that gets me every time (it seems).

I am fine when I'm at altitude it seems - but when I first take off, my body has a rush of panic every time that sends the message "you can fall from up here! You shouldn't be up here!" and I have to fight it back.

The rush comes from feeling out of place, usually shortly after rotation when I clear the trees and see the tops of buildings the first time. Then I usually handle it, via stubborness and getting used to being up there, and it goes away. After that height doesn't seem to be a problem.

Any ideas on how I can stop or avoid the initial rush all together?

The most bothersome thing I've found, is the more I try to AVOID it, the more the thoughts come! Same with most things - if I look up at a plane and tell myself it looks cool, no reason to fear, it is as if my brain taunts me and MAKES the fear.

I'm tired of self-generating thoughts before I can prevent them... it's very much like my mind doesn't want me to not have fear (double negative, I know) - the more I am happier, the worst the intrusions become - the more I get comfortable with flying, the more violent the "I can't do this! I don't want to go" relapses seem to hit, although much more rare and easier to control - I assume this is a self-protection mechanism the phobia has created, but any thoughts on how to get past this?

[Barb-SAN]

Hey Todd, Couple ideas....can you change the way you percieve the rush of adrenaline from panic to excitement? I always feel an adrenaline rush on take-off, whether it's on a commercial plane or in a Cessna (especially if I have MY hand on the throttle! ;) ). I think there's a fine line between fear/panic and thrill/excitement, so it might not take that much to push you in the direction of "Whee, this is exciting....!" Part of what makes life interesting is to have emotional responses to events....as long as they don't become paralyzing!:cool:

Another thought is to take your camera, have your instructor handle the plane, and you take pictures of the take-off...either a video or individual pictures that you can enlarge later. Take pictures of the views you find most alarming, enlarge ( 12 X 18 or so) and frame the photos, and look at them every day. Eventually I think you will desensitize yourself to that view...at least that's how it's worked for me. I found the first few flights to be very visually disorienting...so I primarily did sight-seeing/photography and worked on getting comfortable with that aerial perspective. Of course my flight training is going very slowly, but I am in no particular rush...it isn't going to be my career, so I want to enjoy the lessons when I have time to take them.

You might also try telling yourself as you take off..."The plane wants to fly...feel it leap into the air...it's happier here than on the ground, etc.":thumbsup:

[WillFlyToDisney]

Barb took the words out of my mouth.

I remember how Debbie tells the story of how she used to be terrified of takeoff until one trip she was sitting next to a little boy who was yelling WHEE! and telling her to do the same. It is all in your mental perception of what is going on.

So many people hate takeoff but for me it is the BEST part of flying. It is exhilirating - the speed, the power, the lifting into the air watching the buildings get smaller.

Tell yourself it is FUN and exciting over and over and over and over and over!

Kelley

[Rebecca]

You've described feelings very similar to what I have on takeoff in a Cessna, Todd. I have dealt with them by mentally "shouting" the physics principles I'm relying on in those moments ... "Lift! Lift! Angle of Attack!" and such. As if doing so will help the plane keep rising properly so that we're "safely" higher.

... it's very much like my mind doesn't want me to not have fear ... I believe that the air is an extremely foreign place for humans, and therefore our brains do just that--turn on the fear mechanism--and we are left with distraction (as with taking photos), trickery and sheer mental discipline to override the hardwired fear.

That said, and in spite of the discomfort it gives me, the moment when the plane leaves the ground is still the most exciting moment of the whole flight. "Slipping the surly bonds of earth," and all, I suppose!

:airplane:

[aerobat]

I think that part of this thing with takeoff --on any plane but more dramatically on the bigger ones--is that it presents a very powerful visual and auditory assault, combining the speed and the noise and the rumble and vibration and then the ground falling away. One can't not react to it, although one can certainly get used to the reaction. I have been observing my response to it as an airline passenger over the last six weeks, having had 16 opportunities in short order on basically the same model of aircraft (all 737s). The only other period in which I flew commercially so often was right at the beginning of my return to air travel, when I was still dealing with a lot of adrenaline and a lot of entrenched FoF habits.

It does sometimes still flicker across my mind during the initial liftoff that we "could lose control and fall"...but the thought stops right there--not because I have to make an effort to stop it there, but because it is now a habit for it to stop there. I have discussed this with various people who are not fearful fliers, and they also sometimes have those fleeting thoughts which stop there. So I am going to put this in the "normal" category. It's not something to be banished utterly, but something which becomes a shadow of its former self--a blip of no consequence.

The sensory input of takeoff is a rush--that's the word for it! But as with any drug, one builds a tolerance. I sometimes glance around to see what the other pax are doing during takeoff. Today the girl next to me from ELP to AUS, who through all the rest of the flight was totally immersed in her mystery novel, put her book down and closed her eyes during the takeoff...interesting. So it was necessary for her to ride it out as she did. She did not seem afraid, but if she ever once looked out the window from her middle seat I did not see it. That's what I have heard a number of people here say they do--sit back, close eyes, and ride it out, perhaps counting. Other pax I observe are glued to the window like I am. Today the man in front of me and the woman behind me and I were all nose to the window taking off from LAX; it's simply so beautiful to fly out over the ocean and then, via a series of left turns, climb out eastbound with the shoreline stretched out in sumptuous detail. It's a rush, and I hope it will never cease to be! It's what we do with that adrenaline that matters...as Deb discovered, a little wheee! can change everything.

Todd, I think the answer is going to be repetition, plus taking to heart the suggestions of others here. Use those moments in the grip of that power to reprogram the focus and the expectations and the what-ifs, but let the rush be what it is. As seldom as you have flown in Cessnas, you cannot expect a lot of changes yet. Maybe on the flight after the next one, have your CFI do a dozen touch-and-goes, and make some mental notes about the effect of repetition.

Barb