Fear of Flying

MY WIFE IS AFRAID OF FLYING. Years ago she could jump on a plane and not bat an eyelash. Then she flew to Puerto Rico in a thunderstorm that was so bad the flight attendants gave everyone free champagne. My wife drank a lot of champagne.

This was the start of her aversion to flying.

Soon after the Puerto Rico trip we flew out to San Diego—2 layovers and over 4 hours in the air. (A double layover doesn’t make us cheap, does it?) It didn't help that during our layover in Burbank the flight attendant told us that our short hop to San Diego was delayed due to a problem that had developed with the landing gear, and that they were making sure that everything was OK before they could take off. That was the end of it for my wife. "Let's get off this plane and rent a car to San Diego!" she demanded. I pleaded with her, "Honey, it takes less than 30 minutes to fly to San Diego, but it will take over 2 1/2 hours to drive! Please, the pilot won't take off until he's sure it's safe. Besides, aren't we glad they told us? They could have kept it secret. So that shows that they won't take off until it's safe, right?" She just glared at me. We survived the short hop to San Diego and began our week's stay.

After a few days in San Diego she said that she would NEVER FLY, EVER, again. She was adamant about it. She wanted us to rent a car to drive back to Georgia from San Diego! After a lot of convincing she finally acquiesced. We were able to fly back home with her fingernails intermittently digging in my arm when she felt the need!

That was the start of her never flying again.

We had friends that lived out of state, 500 miles away, who would invite us time and again to come out and visit. Once in a blue moon we’d take them up on their offer, and we’d drive most of the day to get there and most of another day to get back. Fun.

Our adult sons lived some 1,000 miles away from us and 1,000 miles away from each other. We had a 1,000 mile equilateral triangle going on with all of us living at the vertices. Once a year we would take a trip to see our oldest son, driving our car for 12 to 13 hours to get to his vertex. Another time during the year we would see our other son, driving our car for 12 to 13 hours to his vertex. And after each visit we would drive the 12 to 13 hours to get back to the home vertex. Fun. It would take almost two weeks for my sciatica to return to normal.

While driving the 12 to 13 hours each way I would take the opportunity to comment to my wife about how much safer air travel was compared to driving a car, and then follow through with supporting facts that I had memorized. I’d finish with “and we could see our children more often, and be more refreshed when we get there and when we return home.” Her reply to my sound research? “Look, I don’t want to die. If you crash in a plane, that’s it!” So I’d try again in my beseeching manner, “But Honey, as the facts prove, way fewer people die from flying than driving. We’re at a bigger risk right now in this car than in a plane.” To which she’d reply “If the car runs out of gas, we can pull over. If a plane runs out of gas, that’s it!” That’s the way the conversation would go each trip the few times I would bring it up.

We would see our sons an additional 2 times a year when they would fly in to see us. As we drove home after picking them up at the airport they always commented on `how great it was that the flight took less than 2 hours, and how they can spend more time with us, and how we should consider flying when we see them,’ to which my wife would reply “That’s good for you, but we like driving.” I’d look at her in disbelief but she would never acknowledge my stare. She would just sit there smiling, eyes forward on the road.

One year I won a sales contest for a 4-day, all-expense-paid trip for two to Harrah’s Lake Tahoe! But she wouldn’t fly. So we didn’t go.

Eventually I gave up trying to convince her to `feel the fear and do it anyway.' I made that decision during one of the times our youngest son flew in to see us. As we were driving home from the airport, our son started the obligatory `how great it was that the flight took less than 2 hours. . .’ and my wife responded with the same “That’s good for you, but we like driving.” But this time she continued “We enjoy driving because we get to be together and we enjoy seeing the sites. Our trips to see you are good times that we’ll always remember.”

Wow. She was right. We did enjoy the trips in the car, seeing our friends, our sons, or just going away for a weekend together. Who cares if she won’t ever fly again, gosh darn it. Flying is overrated anyway.

Then one day out of the blue she said “Let’s go see both boys next month. Maybe we should fly.” Everything in the universe stopped at that moment. “You want to fly???” She ignored my amazement. “You want to fly???” “Of course, silly. It will take too long to DRIVE to see both of them. We can fly. It’ll be fun.” And that was it.

No fanfare. No fireworks. No parade.

NOW SHE FLIES. It still stresses her to the max, but it’s nothing that 2 xanax can’t handle. Better living through chemistry!

I wrote this post because flying 35,000 feet above the earth can be a scary experience for some. It’s estimated that 1 in 6 of the adult population in the United States is afraid of flying. For some it’s a phobia (aviophobia) that can lead to panic attacks.

IndependentTraveler.com offers some good tips to overcome your fear of flying.

And there are several websites that offer programs to help you overcome the fear, such as fearofflying.com and airsafe.com.

If you take advantage of these and other tools available to you, you could be well on the way to conquering your fear of flying!

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