I'm Terrified Of Bridges...?

Candygirl

Alot of people have phobias. And some are more extreme. If this fear is causing you to drive hours out of your way to avoid bridges then you need to tackle this problem. There is a technique that can ease you into overcoming this fear. Start with small things to do with bridges. Buy a documentary on bridges. Then sit outside a bridge and watch all the cars and people make it across safely. Then get closer and closer until you can finally make it across the bridge. A psychologist can help you better with this problem.

UPESKYMO

No you are not weird. There are a lot of people that have the same problem that you do. And it does not help that they keep showing the same pictures over and over of the Minnesota bridge falling. Not to much you can do about the fear except just face it. But just to try to help the chances of that bridge falling with you on it are so very very very slim. Almost as slim as getting hit by an asteroid. Take care my dear. I hope you fear gets much better.

Hello

sometimes I get freaked out too, especially what happened in Minnestota. So your not alone, but when your on a bridge just think I will be ok. It always helps me. If that doesn't help just research the bridge and see how old it is and stuff that always helps with my fears. If you know something more about what your scared of it helps ease the fear. hope i helped

jim bo

. Nop, you are NOT weird. That's 'gephyrophobia'.
Just ADMIT that you have the fear, and also admit there's nothing you can do about the bridges. Try to relax. You have a better chance of getting hit by lightning then going into the water in your car. .

eldude

you should probably try to find statistics on how safe bridges are, or, you can sit sometime and watch all the cars going over the bridge and try to figure out how many more will go by before anything bad happens. bridges are safe, especially safe now that we had a disaster nobody is going to sit by and watch a bridge fall apart without getting it repaired

midnightsky*

Well, you can't avoid them forever, just face your fears. :)

professor_pugsley

It very common, the real name is gephyrophobia. Find someone who practices cognitive behavioral therapy (CBT) in your area or get a referral from your doctorâ€¦..I treat many cases and usually cure someone in about 2 months

Scott H

There are a million other things in this world that are far more dangerous than bridges. How do you deal with them?

Jennifer O

Don't read or listen to anything about the bridge that collapsed in Minnesota- it will serve to reinforce your phobia and make matters worse.

PhoenixRising

You have a phobia, dear...and the only way to get over it is to conquer it yourself or go see a therapist.

Ð„)izabeâ€ hh~[goodbye]

I used to be until I found out how tough they make them
it only happened one in history so far
theres so much steal and cement it's almost impossible
don't worry
theres others scared of them to

The Mr. Pine

Stay out of Portland. They are high and long. I think they are cool.

barrin

my wife is scared of driving over them to my kids take the mikeu out of her each time we do

Lori_blue_cat

That is not weird, and its not insulting
your fear is understandable, there have been
bridges and overpass collapses. I think there was one
in Minnesota where cars were plunged.
The one in Laval Quebec collapsed because of too much salt
last September.

wisernow

Everyone thinks twice about travelling across something that has no obvious means of support, be it a bridge, or those suspended stairways that stick out of brickwork with no visible supports. Take my word for it, as an engineer, that no structure incapable of standing at least a 100% overload, would not be allowed to be constructed. If in doubt, try jumping on the smallest bridge you can find, even a bridge over a brook in a farmers field, see if you can break it. You cannot, no matter how hard you try, its been properly engineered and constructed. I once saw a model bridge constructed using matchsticks that stood an incredible 112 pounds, yet weighed less than 4 ounces. Its all in the mind as they say, fear not, they will not collapse or fall down, we are too proud to build them that way.

ragingreb

DOWN HERE IN GEORGIA WE JUST JUMP THE CREEKS AND RIVERS. YEE HAA

Frank

You just have to think, there are thousands (literally) of bridges, all around the world, from the smallest creek crossing to the widest bays, which are used by millions (literally) of people,

every

day.

It's the same thing with flying in planes. You never hear about the thousands and thousands of flights which go smoothly, you only hear about the once in a very great while that something goes wrong.

You have nothing to worry about. There are more bridges than you can count, crossed by more people than you can count, every day. They are very, VERY safe! Try looking up pictures of bridges online and look at the wide variety of styles and structures- it's amazing what human engineering has accomplished! Good luck to you overcoming your fear.

Oli B

Firstly, its ok to have a phobia of bridges. Some people have far more bizzare phobias!

From an structural point of view, bridges are normally engineered with a 30% safety margin in them.
This means they are designed to take an extra 30% more load than they should ever see.

It is very rare for a bridge to fail, and if it ever did you would normally notice the warning signs long before the bridge ever collapsed.

Because bridges are so carefully over-engineered even if a component did fail then the other components would be able to take the load until a maintenance team was able to repair it.

If this still doesn't make you feel safer then consider the fact that bridges cars travel on are designed to take all kinds of road traffic, including lorries and buses. As your car is unlikely to weigh the same as either of these there is very little chance that you driving over a bridge will cause it to fail.

As for driving under bridges...well, the same principles apply. Road and rail bridges that cross other roads are carefully maintained to make sure there is no risk of failure. As are footbridges that cross roads.

In short...they're engineered not to fall down, and regularly checked and maintained...so you should be safe.

Hope this helps

stan j

I sympathise, I don't like being under a railway bridges.
I find it helps knowing most of the structure of a bridge is just to make it look sturdy, it needs much less to actually do the job. As for holding your breath, that is not that daft, one cure for hyper ventilation a symptom of panic attacks is to get the patient to re breath from a paper bag, it ups the co2 in the blood and makes you breath slower.Holding your breath would have the same effect. But QE2 Humber Severn crossing etc are too long for that, use second lane you cant then see the water it looks like any other road then. Tacoma narrows was a fluke bad design, the wind blew down the valley and set up a harmonic wave in the suspension cable, engineers learnt loads from that, and watch that clip, it shows just how much a bridge can move before it breaks.

Mr Quiet

The only way to be totaly sure they are safe is to research the engineer who designed the bridge and make sure he was qualified. Not that I want to scare you but that bridge disaster in the U.S recently reminded me of that bridge disaster along time ago called the Tacoma narrow bridge disaster do a search for it on the internet and you can watch a real movie on u-tube of what happens to a bridge when it collapses. So you have good reason to be concerned about bridges. I never used to be scared but now I am.

Enter Your Message or Comment

User Name:
User Email:
Post a comment: