How do people with agoraphobia support themselves financially?

They have a hard time. Much depends on the severity of their problem. Like many fearful people they have to come up with coping mechanisms, like going out when no one else is out, shopping in the small hours of the morning, or using an ATM in the middle of the night.

My late Father in Law could travel around the world, but found it painful to go out in public in his own town. When he died his 5 year old car had only 6,000 miles on it.

Not speaking from personal experience, but an online friend of mine worked from home and her mother also received compensation from the government. I think she did things online as often as possible to avoid going out, but would venture out for necessities (like perishable groceries.)

My aunt developed agoraphobia in her later adult years. She lived with her adult daughter for several years, whilst developing agoraphobia, after an ugly family “situation” that is still going on. Now she is on social security and lives very frugaly, and I would say rather un-healthily. Other family members that are not involved in the “situation” have helped her out several times over the years. Unfortunately she will not seek any kind of medical help for her problem, which is really ashame, because she was such a neat person, full of fun and life and good humor before “the situation.” She and her daughter moved far away from us, so now we never get to see either of them and my aunt just lives in her house and online, but ironically, even though she’s online all the time, she doesn’t use e-mail or Facebook,, nor does she use the phone or write letters (which she used to exchange regulaly) so she has virtually no contact with the family members not involved in the “situation.”

My son suffered a stroke several years and he is housebound. He gets disability and also makes web pages for income.

I know several house bound people who make crafts such as jewelry, but I suspect most live on disability payments. They are all on food visitation programs.

I’ve often wondered that. I don’t have agoraphobia, but I do have fairly severe social anxiety disorder, and I hate leaving my house. Thank goodness that my husband makes enough money for us to survive on one income, but… it would be nice to have more money to live comfortably. I keep wondering if there’s something I can do from home to supplement his income.

Well yes I would agree those who maintain lives in the normal social structure as in hold up a home, pay rent, pay bills etc would struggle with the process unlike previous years, just because the pressures magnitude most likely has risen.
Someone who is homeless with agoraphobia start taking their anxiety problems to the sky and curse out loud while developing other mental illness in the process.

I’ve suffered from this, and social anxiety disorder for a long time, and I still do. I had one of the worst cases of it, where I would take very odd types of jobs, only go outside at night, and avoid most people. I heard that a few in my family had this condition as well. I was able to cope once I acknowledged that something was wrong, and I finally received medication that actually helped me. I was ready to give up on the pills since the first few I’d tried didn’t seem to do anything, even after a few months.

Counseling didn’t do squat for me, and actually made me more anxious, and depressed as well. The pills, along with some help from my mom, aunt and brother were the only things that helped me. I will never get over this, but at least I can cope to a reasonable degree now. I’ve done many things that I would had never dreamt of doing before the medication.