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 THE
ANIMAL PLANET PROJECT: BAT PHOBIA
By Louise Hose
“I
understand you work in caves and have a phobia of bats. Would
you be interested in going through therapy to overcome the phobia
while we film you?”
The strange message
appeared on my internet café screen while caving in Oman.
An intriguing proposal, but it would have to wait until I returned
to California.
THE IDEA
Throughout the spring
of 2002, I chatted with Producer, Helga Eike, about the project.
Animal Planet and National Geographic Television had contracted
Arcwelder Films in Los Angeles for a 13-part series on animal phobias.
They wanted me as a participant for the segment on bats. They
would pay for the therapy and a trip to Mexico. If successful,
I would be cured of my only phobia, one that has generated much
stress in my career as a speleologist...a strong, irrational fear
of bats.
I set a couple of
conditions: 1. We must have a bat biologist involved with the filming
in Mexico; 2. If the biologist or I felt that the crew wanted us
to do something contrary to good conservation practices, we could
veto the proposed scene. During the spring, I “passed” a screen
test. We needed an international site to “test” my therapy,
but wanted the minimum expense and time. A colleague, John
Pint, suggested a cave and his nephew-in-law and former Canadian
caver, Chris Lloyd, as the local “fixer” in Guadalajara.
THE THERAPY
In late May, Allen
Sargent, a Malibu-based Neuro-Linguistic Programming (NLP) therapist,
put me through about an hour long session using “Hemispheric Brain”
therapy. The lights, microphone and camera covered every aspect
of the technique, which essentially transferred the benevolent,
positive, rational images of bats that I held in one hemisphere
of my brain to the other, emotional side of my brain. (In
most people, this would involve taking images from the left hemisphere
and implanting them in the right side.) I was very skeptical.
THE FIRST TEST
Helga arranged a
small test of the therapy about two weeks later, on June 7th,
at a barn in Encinitas. While we waited for dusk, Allen worked
with me to ensure that the positive images had control in my brain.
When several hundred Mexican Freetails began their nightly flight
by swooping around the barn, I was completely calm. The anxiety
and enormous energy I would have used in the past to stay in the
environment were absent. A successful first test.
GUADALAJARA
Two days later, I
flew to Guadalajara with Helga and the film crew. Chris Lloyd
met us and whisked us to our caver field house, the Hilton-Guadalajara.
That evening, we met Yunuhen Rodreguez, a local biology student
and caver who had just begun a thesis study of the bats in our target
cave. She was accompanied by PPCM bat educator, Letitia Reyes.
PPCM is a sister organization to Bats Conservation International.
John Pint and the
PCMM folks had recommended Cueva del Chapuzon for its easy access,
relatively easy-to-traverse passage (necessary, due to my recent
foot surgery), and abundance of bats, particularly vampire bats.
This last feature was particularly compelling. While I had
feared all bats, I (and the audience) found the vampire particularly
repulsive. In addition, vampire bats have thrived since the
Europeans introduced cattle to the New World. Disruption to
this species did not present the conservation concerns as with other
types of bats. Yunuhen’s good news was that 30 vampires currently
resided in the cave.
Vampires do not comprise
the much larger bat colony in the cave, however. The bad news
was that Yunuhen had discovered two days earlier that it was a maternity
colony with very young babies. Helga held true to her word
and never challenged the recommendation that we not enter the passage
with the large maternity colony. It meant losing the opportunity
to fully test my ability to remain calm while swarmed by bats.
A major disappointment for me and the crew, but the right decision
for the bats.
THE SECOND TEST
After the usual amount
of production tomfoolery, including various interviews at the cave
entrance, Chris, Yunuhen, PCMM Educator Patricia Ramos and I moved
slowly through the relatively small cave passages while the crew
shot video. Perhaps 100 meters into the cave, we reached the
vampire roost.
The vampires swooped
around us while the camera recorded my reaction. With seven
people plus equipment filling the small, stoop-to-crawl passage,
the bats were frantic - flying, crawling and hopping along the passage.
When the activity calmed, Yunuhen captured the last remaining bat
in the passage and held it for the camera. We touched the
wings and Helga interviewed Yunuhen and me. Test two was successful.
Although I was occasionally startled by the sudden appearance of
a bat jumping or flying around, I never experienced any desire or
need to run out of the cave as I always have before.
SUMMARY
Arcwelder Films offered
me a special opportunity to overcome a somewhat crippling phobia
while, hopefully, contributing to a positive understanding of bats.
To my delight, it also provided an opportunity to examine an extremely
unusual cave. I also learned about the important work of the
dedicated bat educators with PCMM. Now, I can only hope that
the product, scheduled to show in the U.S. in late October on Animal
Planet, gives the message we have tried to present.
(Louise Hose is
a geology professor at Chapman University in California. Her research
interests focus on caves, where she commonly has to share her natural
laboratory with bats.)
© 2002 Louise Hose,
All Rights Reserved
STOP LETTING PHOBIAS RUN YOUR LIFE!
CALL: (949) 713-4936
E-mail: mail@nlpla.com
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