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Areas › Worry and anxiety › Facing it a step at a time
It makes the next step obvious instead of arbitrary. You are not being sent to the deep end, you are moving a bit further along the shallow end. It also survives being passed around. A teacher who has never met the therapist can be told where in the pool this child currently is and will know what that means.
Facing a fear in steps works, and it works best with someone guiding the ladder. Read this as an explanation of how it works, and take the steps themselves to a therapist.
God wants ease for you, not hardship (Quran 2:185). It is said about a demanding obligation, so plain language about what is being asked is in keeping rather than a softening of it.
البقرة
شَهۡرُ رَمَضَانَ ٱلَّذِيٓ أُنزِلَ فِيهِ ٱلۡقُرۡءَانُ هُدࣰ ى لِّلنَّاسِ وَبَيِّنَٰتࣲ مِّنَ ٱلۡهُدَىٰ وَٱلۡفُرۡقَانِۚ فَمَن شَهِدَ مِنكُمُ ٱلشَّهۡرَ فَلۡيَصُمۡهُۖ وَمَن كَانَ مَرِيضًا أَوۡ عَلَىٰ سَفَرࣲ فَعِدَّةࣱ مِّنۡ أَيَّامٍ أُخَرَۗ يُرِيدُ ٱللَّهُ بِكُمُ ٱلۡيُسۡرَ وَلَا يُرِيدُ بِكُمُ ٱلۡعُسۡرَ وَلِتُكۡمِلُواْ ٱلۡعِدَّةَ وَلِتُكَبِّرُواْ ٱللَّهَ عَلَىٰ مَا هَدَىٰكُمۡ وَلَعَلَّكُمۡ تَشۡكُرُونَ
It was in the month of Ramadan that the Quran was revealed as guidance for mankind, clear messages giving guidance and distinguishing between right and wrong. So any one of you who is present that month should fast, and anyone who is ill or on a journey should make up for the lost days by fasting on other days later. God wants ease for you, not hardship. He wants you to complete the prescribed period and to glorify Him for having guided you, so that you may be thankful
Qur’an 2:185read it in the library
Translation: M.A.S. Abdel Haleem, The Qur'an, Oxford University Press, 2004.
At long term follow up of an internet delivered graded exposure treatment, seventy five of the original eighty five participants had held onto their gains. Graded practice that people can describe and run themselves does seem to travel beyond the room where it was taught. That study was in adults with irritable bowel symptoms and says nothing about metaphors, so take it as a note on durability rather than proof about the pool.
Ljótsson B, Hedman E, Lindfors P, Hursti T, Lindefors N, Andersson G, Rück C. (2011). Long-term follow-up of internet-delivered exposure and mindfulness based treatment for irritable bowel syndrome.. Behaviour research and therapy doi
Strength of evidence: one line of research. A single study, or a theoretical account.
A shared picture lets everyone involved agree on the next step without needing it translated.
Nobody puts a child who cannot swim into the shallow end and calls it teaching. Before anyone goes near the thing they dread, they need something to do with their body and their head when the fear arrives.
The early rungs do not have to be the real thing. A photograph, a video, or picturing it carefully with your eyes shut is a proper step and not a cheat.
Ask which step they are willing to try, and then go with their answer. A smaller step they chose themselves tends to get attempted, and a bigger one you chose for them often does not.