Combatting Claustrophobia in Brazilian Jiu Jitsu Sparring

I read an interesting post over at Grapple Arts the other day and thought I would make a post about it since I have also experienced this problem when rolling. Here is a copy of the article.

"Someone, let's call him 'Bob', wrote me about extreme claustrophobia when trapped in a bad position:

"I am hoping that you can help me with problems of extreme claustrophobia while grappling. For some reason, I just become anxious and begin to panic if I feel like I can't escape. Being under side control and feeling like I can’t move or breathe is the worst."

My initial reaction upon reading this was that I was talking to a beginner, and that my counsel should go something like this: don't worry, many newbies get freaked out at first when they find themselves trapped. Just keep on concentrating on the following things and everything will work out in a month or two:

* keep breathing when you are on the bottom,
* get on your side a bit instead of being flat on your back,
* keep his weight off of you with your elbows and forearms (i.e. defensive posture)
* learn to survive the smother

But then I read on and found out that Bob was actually a 3 to 4 year grappling veteran at a reputable school and has had claustrophobia issues since day one on the mat. OK, he probably already knows the things I was going to tell him; what else can it be?

Aha - I thought - it has to be conditioning!!! He might be technically skilled but is grossly out of shape. He might be losing the will to fight as soon as he gets into a bad position simply because he is tired!

Wrong again! He went on to tell me is very fit and that he does extensive, intense conditioning sessions.

He closed by saying

"And I do know my escapes. It’s just that I’ll try a couple of times and if it doesn’t work the panic starts to rise. I try visualization, which helps. I try to consciously relax and breath (easier said than done) and this helps to a degree."

So all my easy answers seemingly didn't apply. What was worse, is that I had no intuition about what he should do, mainly because I have never experienced claustrophobia (on or off the mat). I know I'm supposedly an 'expert', but being at loss for answers prompted me to put out an appeal to the Grapplearts readership.


There were several interesting answers posted so if you are interested go over to grapple arts and check them out. I wouldn't consider myself claustrophobic but I have felt panicked being under much larger opponents after rolling for some time and becoming tired and hot. The feeling is quite dreadful and scary but I found the best way to work through it was to simply focus on breathing out not in. That simple shift in thought helped me to relax a little and keep from panicking and tapping for no real reason. Im sure it won't be that easy for someone that has serious Claustrophobia but if you have ever felt a little panicked when being smothered by a much larger opponent I would give this simple breathing technique a try and take a look at some of the other possible solutions on grapple arts.