About Me

By Dov Kaufmann, Founder

Who I am, and how I came up with the idea of an online community of fearful flyers.

First, the basics. My name is Dov Kaufmann and I’m 17. I really wasn’t sure whether I should let that fact be known, since I thought it might make people take the site less seriously. But after giving it considerable thought, I decided that it’s part of who I am – just like my fear of flying was – and hopefully everyone will judge the site on its merits. Plus, I’ve had plenty of chances to talk to adults about the whole fear of flying issue, and of course most of the content on the site is from “older folks.” As a child, I had almost always experienced flight uneasiness. However, this uneasiness was physical rather than psychological. Already at the age of 5, I was used to the nausea routine: take off, open the seat-pouch, take out a sickness bag and . . . you know the rest. Moreover, I have always had a fear of heights. As I got older, my fear grew. The mere thought of being thousands of feet up in the air would make me anxious. Nevertheless, I continued flying five or six times a year so that I could visit my family, which is scattered across the United States, Europe and Israel.

My story begins March of 1997. I, along with the rest of my family was flying from Charleston, SC to LaGuardia airport in NY. The flight started out well, but half an hour later the dreaded seat-belt sign popped on. We all know what this means: turbulence. It was not severe- yet too harsh for my liking. In any case, I panicked. When we landed (as planes always do- SAFELY), I vowed never to set foot on a plane for as long as I lived. Moments later I realized that this would be difficult, because I had to fly- a lot.

No one took my declarations seriously since I have a tendency to exaggerate, and so nothing happened for a few months. Then, as we were making plans for an obligatory visit to Israel, I reminded my family that I was scared of flying. In fact, I realized, I was terrified. Still, no one took me seriously and arrangements were made and finalized.

Finally, after days of trying to convince my family that I did indeed have a fear of flying, they realized that we were facing a big problem. They couldn’t fly without me (it was a Bar Mitzvah trip – MINE!) and I couldn’t fly. They still had hope, though. My father took me to the airport day after day to try to force me to fly, but I couldn’t. I would not board the plane. Once or twice I boarded, but no sooner was I on board than I insisted on getting off. Then they tried to drug me. They gave me sleeping pills strong enough to kill an elephant, but they had no effect on me whatsoever (bear in mind my tendency to exaggerate).

The third and final stage of my parents’ attempts was therapy. They first took me to see a child psychologist who specialized in breathing techniques. He would sit me down on a very big and comfortable sofa and tell me to close my eyes. Then he would give me a breathing exercise to carry out. This would involve breathing in through the nose and breathing out through the mouth. It worked, and I relaxed…and relaxed… and then I fell asleep. Every single time, without exception, I would fall asleep on the couch as he was teaching me proper breathing exercises. I imagine that he got fed up with me because he recommended I try group therapy.

The closest group to us was based in LaGuardia airport. It was (and still is) called Fly Without Fear, Inc. The decision to try group therapy was one of the most important and life changing decisions I’ve made. Nothing drove me closer to flight than the group discussions and guest lectures. Also, the whole experience helped me understand the influence that group support can have. Being the youngest group member by far, helped me get to know the instructors better than most. Their names were Carol and Herb Gross and they were (and still are) wonderful. I would go week after week, every Wednesday night to group sessions. Every week a different lecturer would come and give us facts about flying. I learned about the structure of planes, the reason they stay up in the air, qualifications of the pilots and so much more.

During the weeks that followed I would diligently attend meetings. In addition, I went once more to a psychologist. This time was as successful as the last. The psychologist himself didn’t actually help me, but he recommended someone who did. He suggested I talk to a former fearful flyer. He gave me the name and number of a former patient of his who he hoped would share her experiences and techniques with me. I set up a meeting between us and she told me that what helped her most was slowly and gradually doing fear-provoking things, until she finally got to flying. This is the idea that the 10 Step Plan is based upon. I took her advice and made a list of 10 things that scared me. Starting from the least frightening and advancing every week to a scarier task, I conquered each goal until I was no longer afraid of the thought of doing it.

The 10 Step Plan provided me with the desensitization I needed. That, combined with the group therapy that provided me with all the facts and information I could ever hope to learn about flying, helped me get over my fears- both of heights and of flying.

On December 15, 1998, I took my first “recovery flight.” It was a half-hour shuttle from New York to Boston. I flew along with the rest of the members from the group who felt up to it. Wonderfully, I wasn’t afraid. This was due partly to the genius of Carol and Herb, who decided to hand out jobs to everyone before and during the flight to keep their minds pre-occupied on something other than the flight.

The weeks after were fantastic. I was very proud of myself for finally conquering this debilitating fear. I continued flying regularly, to make sure that I fully conquered the fear. Not many are aware of this, but it’s not enough to fly once. The trick is to keep on flying after the first flight, so that you don’t become frightened all over again. Many conquer their fear, fly once and think their fear is gone forever. Then, months later, they try flying and are just as terrified as they were before they “got over” the fear.

During the process of conquering my fear, I had spent days searching online for information on fear of flying. I found nothing and so I assumed that not many people had this problem. I couldn’t have been more wrong. Hundreds of millions of people are scared of flying, and for some strange reason there is very little useful information to be found on-line. This, and my personal experience which showed me how important a “group” can be in helping to overcome the fear, led me to launch an on-line help and support site for fearful flyers.

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