Agraphobia
Encyclopedia
Agraphobia is the abnormal fear of sexual abuse
Sexual abuse
Sexual abuse, also referred to as molestation, is the forcing of undesired sexual behavior by one person upon another. When that force is immediate, of short duration, or infrequent, it is called sexual assault. The offender is referred to as a sexual abuser or molester...

. The condition is common but not widely known.

Cause

Sufferers of agraphobia may have had a past experience linking emotional trauma with sexual abuse. Such experiences do not have to happen to the sufferer: watching sexual abuse occur (even in movies or on television) can act as a trigger
Trigger
-Technology:* Trigger , a mechanism that actuates the firing of firearms* Image trigger, a device used in highspeed cameras* Schmitt trigger, an electronic circuit* Trigger circuit, IBM's name for a flip-flop...

 to the condition. The body then develops a fear of the experience occurring again as a way of 'ensuring' that the event does not occur.

In some cases sex abuse hysteria
Hysteria
Hysteria, in its colloquial use, describes unmanageable emotional excesses. People who are "hysterical" often lose self-control due to an overwhelming fear that may be caused by multiple events in one's past that involved some sort of severe conflict; the fear can be centered on a body part, or,...

, caused by misinformation, overzealous or careless investigation practices, or sensationalist news coverage, can cause agraphobia as well: This being different than the PTSD-driven agraphobia that comes from real situations of sexual abuse. Day care sex abuse hysteria is one example of this erroneously caused agraphobia. Many people who were originally accused or even found guilty were later found to be innocent of sexual abuse, their ordeal having been caused by hysteria and misinformation-driven agraphobia.

Both real sexual abuse
Sexual abuse
Sexual abuse, also referred to as molestation, is the forcing of undesired sexual behavior by one person upon another. When that force is immediate, of short duration, or infrequent, it is called sexual assault. The offender is referred to as a sexual abuser or molester...

 and also false accusations of sexual abuse are prevalent (Statistics?), making a professional and carefully done investigation necessary to determine which type of agraphobia may be occurring in any particular case. Newer standards for sexual abuse investigation have been developed in some states (and are mandated by courts) in order to prevent such hysteria-driven agraphobia from causing prosecution of the innocent. These new standards are not uniformly applied or followed in all states, however.

Malicious intent can also sometimes cause hysteria
Hysteria
Hysteria, in its colloquial use, describes unmanageable emotional excesses. People who are "hysterical" often lose self-control due to an overwhelming fear that may be caused by multiple events in one's past that involved some sort of severe conflict; the fear can be centered on a body part, or,...

-driven agraphobia in children. For example, a vindictive or abusive parent may purposely try to instill agraphobic hysteria in a child in order to manipulate a false accusation by a child against the other parent in a divorce child-custody case, or to trigger a damaging police investigation in order to abuse an innocent parent (Citations?). This sometimes results in the prosecution of the parent who tried to cause the false accusation. Courts are increasingly viewing proven cases of intentionally-induced agraphobia in children as a form of child abuse, as well as being a crime against the falsely accused target adult.

It is important to take the claims made by children about possible sexual abuse seriously. Although the original intent of the parents' rights group was to protect falsely accused parents, there are parental rights groups that have succeeded in negating the claims of children. Both false memories and real abuse are very damaging to the family unit.
(I will add a citation for the above statements briefly.)

Symptoms

Symptoms include breathlessness, abnormal sweating, nausea, dryness of the mouth, anxiety attacks, heart palpitation
Palpitation
A palpitation is an abnormality of heartbeat that causes a conscious awareness of its beating, whether it is too slow, too fast, irregular, or at its normal frequency. The word may also refer to this sensation itself...

s and excessive shaking.

Some sufferers are afraid at all times, while some react to different stimuli
Stimulus (physiology)
In physiology, a stimulus is a detectable change in the internal or external environment. The ability of an organism or organ to respond to external stimuli is called sensitivity....

, including a reminder of a traumatic event that occurred in the past which triggered the development of the agraphobia.

Treatment

Treatments can include counselling, hypnosis
Hypnosis
Hypnosis is "a trance state characterized by extreme suggestibility, relaxation and heightened imagination."It is a mental state or imaginative role-enactment . It is usually induced by a procedure known as a hypnotic induction, which is commonly composed of a long series of preliminary...

, desensitization
Desensitization (psychology)
In psychology, desensitization is a process for mitigating the harmful effects of phobias or other disorders. It also occurs when an emotional response is repeatedly evoked in situations in which the action tendency that is associated with the emotion proves irrelevant or unnecessary...

, and medication.
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