What is an irrational fear that you have?

[princesss]

Date: 1/16/2010 4:34:37 PM
Author: tyty333
Having 18-wheelers passing me (or vice-versa). I get all paniky and I''m afriad I''ll just lose control of the car. I''ve never been in an

accident with one so I dont know why they are so upsetting. I also hate driving next to large dropoffs like on the side of a mountain.

That''s a totally rational fear! I work in shipping and after one of the meetings I was in I will NEVER drive near one of those trucks. Ever.

I''m with Miracles - my fears are all totally rational. Flying, snakes, spiders, driving near 18-wheelers - all totally understandable.

 

[pinkstars]

Oh gosh, I feel like I''m afraid of sooo many things. Though it doesn''t seem completely irrational to me.

Spiders, I''ve been afraid of them my whole life. They terrify me! I don''t think it helps that when I was little and would be visiting my grandparents out in the country, my cousins would chase me around with huge spiders in jars.

Bridges, I don''t know why but driving over a huge bridge freaks me out so much. It made things a little tense this summer when BF and I were driving around and we would come to a bridge that we didn''t know was coming up. The worst was the bridge that connects Washington and Oregon, it was like 4 miles long...ugh, terrible.

Car accidents, well I''m a lot more paranoid when BF is driving. But I feel like I can''t not watch the road in case he isn''t aware of something, but it would probably be a lot easier if I would just close my eyes.

Water at night, ugh it freaks me out. You can''t see anything! I''m not sure why this freaks me out.

 

[rierie26]

I have a fear of heights which in and of itself is not irrational (or maybe it is), but it''s pretty bad when I can''t even look over the second storey. I mean I can, but I have to peer over from about a foot away. I can''t make myself go to the ledge of anything. The irrational part of the fear is that anytime I''m up elevated, I''m afraid I''ll drop something over the edge. I always clutch on to my purse and try to make sure my shoes are on tight!

 

[Haven]

I have a very real fear of being falsely accused and convicted of a crime I did not commit.

 

[Maisie]

Date: 1/16/2010 7:53:05 PM
Author: Haven
I have a very real fear of being falsely accused and convicted of a crime I did not commit.

Me too. I couldn''t survive in prison.

 

[yssie]

I''m completely terrified of spider-webs.


I don''t remember any particularly traumatic episodes involving cobwebs. I don''t even mind the spiders themselves so much, it''s just the webs they make!

 

[Kaleigh]

Flying. I hate it, but have to fly... And Spiders.. I got a bad bite a few years ago and have been creeped out by them ever since.

I could also add rodents to the list..... Gah!!!

 

[Maisie]

Date: 1/16/2010 8:45:42 PM
Author: Kaleigh
Flying. I hate it, but have to fly... And Spiders.. I got a bad bite a few years ago and have been creeped out by them ever since.

I could also add rodents to the list..... Gah!!!

What kind of spider bit you?

 

[Kaleigh]

Date: 1/16/2010 8:48:40 PM
Author: Maisie

Date: 1/16/2010 8:45:42 PM
Author: Kaleigh
Flying. I hate it, but have to fly... And Spiders.. I got a bad bite a few years ago and have been creeped out by them ever since.

I could also add rodents to the list..... Gah!!!

What kind of spider bit you?

I will never know, the doc, said it was definitely a spider bite. We have an old house, it''s a clean house, but I have seen big ass spiders, and run!!! I have a great exterminator.... But those spiders can live through anything!!! That''s why I am a scared!!!!

 

[Maisie]

Date: 1/16/2010 8:52:40 PM
Author: Kaleigh

Date: 1/16/2010 8:48:40 PM
Author: Maisie

Date: 1/16/2010 8:45:42 PM
Author: Kaleigh
Flying. I hate it, but have to fly... And Spiders.. I got a bad bite a few years ago and have been creeped out by them ever since.

I could also add rodents to the list..... Gah!!!

What kind of spider bit you?

I will never know, the doc, said it was definitely a spider bite. We have an old house, it''s a clean house, but I have seen big ass spiders, and run!!! I have a great exterminator.... But those spiders can live through anything!!! That''s why I am a scared!!!!

Oh my! I would run a mile too if I had been bitten!

 

[So_In_Love]

I''m afraid of ALL insects. Big or small, I''m absolutely terrified if they get closer than 5 feet...oh, and i used to live in the suburbs and in the evenings bats would fly over our heads. scariest thing ever! they were flying so close i constantly had a feeling they would touch me

and dont laugh at this one...I''m afraid of water touching my face. I never dive. I always make sure my face doesnt get wet when I''m taking a shower. How do I wash it? I hold my palms under running water so that they would get wet, and then I touch my face creepy, huh?

 

[Maisie]

Date: 1/16/2010 9:14:58 PM
Author: So_In_Love
I''m afraid of ALL insects. Big or small, I''m absolutely terrified if they get closer than 5 feet...oh, and i used to live in the suburbs and in the evenings bats would fly over our heads. scariest thing ever! they were flying so close i constantly had a feeling they would touch me

and dont laugh at this one...I''m afraid of water touching my face. I never dive. I always make sure my face doesnt get wet when I''m taking a shower. How do I wash it? I hold my palms under running water so that they would get wet, and then I touch my face creepy, huh?

We have bats here but I only ever see them from the window

As for the water thing.. we each have something we are scared of. Nobody will laugh.

 

[Smurfysmiles]

I have an insane fear of mirrors in the dark, I had a really traumatizing childhood experience with the game Bloody Mary where some girls locked me out of their bedroom and one girl dressed in all black with fake blood and chased me around the house for about 40 minutes with a butcher knife, her parents came home from getting pizza and found me screaming under the kitchen table.

I'm also insanely afraid of heights and roller coasters. We went to the amusement park this summer and I almost had a heart attack riding on the huge boat water wave ride. I actually got a dirty look from a mother who had children and I told her to feel free to yell at me when we were back on solid ground but that "I would say whatever I pleased until that moment" in a near hysterical voice lol Needless to say, dh was a little embarrassed but at the time I really didn't care lol

I also have a friend who is afraid of squirrels because where she used to live they were HUGE and used to climb up her and her sister's legs when they went outside lol

 

[purrfectpear]

None. I''m totally missing the fear gene altogether.

I mean I have things I certainly don''t want to have happen to me, stroke, mugging, rape, etc. But I guess I don''t really fear them. I just hope I could cope if something awful did happen.

I definitely don''t worry about bugs, clowns, or heights

 

[Lilac]

Bugs, rodents, anything creepy or crawly.

The dark. I''ve always been afraid of the dark since I was little and the fear never went away. I worry about there being people waiting to attack me in a dark room or I worry that someone broke into the house. I check under my bed every night and in my closet to make sure nobody is inside.

Fire. I was never afraid of this until two years ago when I watched the beautiful house across the street from me burn to the ground in the middle of the night. 6 kids, 2 parents, and a babysitter were inside, but got out. It''s an absolute miracle that they got out alive because the fire started and completely consumed the entire house in a matter of about 10 minutes at 3:00 in the morning. PSA: CHECK YOUR SMOKE DETECTORS!!! That''s the only thing that saved their lives. Since then I''ve been totally paranoid and completely afraid of fires and anything that could start a fire.

Drowning. I love looking at the ocean but I get really nervous swimming in it. I worry about being swept away by a big wave and drowning. Same reason I don''t really like boats. I think of Titanic.

Flying. Since 9/11 I''ve developed a completely all-consuming fear of flying that seems to get worse with every passing year. I do fly, but I won''t fly alone and I feel like I can''t breathe and I cry during takeoff and landing (and any turbulence or even slight altitude changes of the plane). DH is really good at trying to calm me down, but it''s getting worse each time. I get so anxious I can''t even fully look forward to vacations if I know I''ll be flying because I''m so nervous about the flights.

Calling people on the phone and any form of public speaking. I hate this and I get scared for some reason. Don''t know why (I''ve always been shy, but you would think I might grow out of it at some point).

And then there''s the typical fears about the health of family members or something bad happening to them. I pretty much worry about everything all the time.

Writing all these out makes me realize just how many irrational fears I have...

 

[reader]

Bowling allies.

 

[Tuckins1]

I cannot sleep with the closet door open, or the bedroom door open. I don't know why, but the open blackness just gives me nightmares!

ETA- I too share the zombie fear... I LOVE zombie movies, but they scare the crap out of me! I actually read a great book called"The Complete Zombie Handbook" that prepares you for all zombie-apocalypse scenarios (it was so funny and well written, that at times you forget that it's fiction!) We also use zombie targets sometimes when we are at the gun range to brush up on my zombie head shot skills, just in case.

 

[Christiana]

An irrational fear...Mmm, that someone might steal my car maybe? I just love my car, that''s all...

lol

 

[whitby_2773]

Date: 1/17/2010 9:14:42 AM
Author: Tuckins1
I cannot sleep with the closet door open, or the bedroom door open. I don''t know why, but the open blackness just gives me nightmares!

ETA- I too share the zombie fear... I LOVE zombie movies, but they scare the crap out of me! I actually read a great book called''The Complete Zombie Handbook'' that prepares you for all zombie-apocalypse scenarios (it was so funny and well written, that at times you forget that it''s fiction!) We also use zombie targets sometimes when we are at the gun range to brush up on my zombie head shot skills, just in case.

tuckins! when i was a little girl, i watched a cops/robbers tv show which had a very spooky theme that week (someone was trying to drive someone else insane to take control of their money etc). well the climax of the show was this person tottering mentally, holed up in their room, and the perpetrator, dressed as said victim''s mother, coming out of the bedroom closet in the middle of the night, butcher knife in hand and (apparently) making moves to kill them. so of course, by the time the police arrived, the victim is talking gibberish - "my mother! it was my mother! she tried to kill me!"...and gets committed.

well. since then - for YEEEEEARS! - i was TERRIFIED of closets in bedrooms (this is when i was 7/8/9 etc). took YEARS for me to realize that some big beefy guy, dressed in a skirt and a wig as a middle aged woman wasn''t so much scary...as hilarious! but it took me YEARS to get over this one!

about the same time, i watched a horror movie (i know! where *were* my parents??!) - black and white - old hollywood, saturday afternoon kinda film - about a couple who moved into a mansion...which turned out to be haunted by evil spirits. the lady involved (after numerous twists and turns) ended up getting squashed to death in their massive 4 poster bed, which sort of closed shut on her, squishing her to death. since then, for a couple of years, i was always scared the roof of whatever room i was sleeping in was going to slowly descend and i''d be squished to death! after a couple of years i realized this would be extremely difficult to organize - to say nothing of very unlikely! - and would have to have been done YEARS in advance (hydraulicizing a ceiling is no mean feat, i gather!) and that somebody may well have picked it up in the building code inspections etcetc before then! so by age 10, i was over it. but from ages, say, 7-9 - i was always afraid the ceiling would squish me to death in my sleep! for some reason, the demons part never worried me to so much....

 

[elrohwen]

I'm afraid of swimming in the ocean. I don't know why! I like swimming in lakes, and I'm a very strong swimmer (took lessons for years), I just don't like getting into the ocean. It's like I'm afraid a fish is going to jump up and bite me

I think the waves also freak me out - I'm afraid I'll get too far away from the boat and not be able to swim back or something because the waves are too strong. I know this is crazy because if I were in a pool or a lake I wouldn't have a problem with the distance.

We went to the Bahamas a few years ago and everybody spent so much time in the water, but I just wasn't having it. I snorkled a few times, but I was afraid to stay in for very long or get very far away from the boat. I definitely feel like I missed out on some of the fun. Our friends even made cute tshirts for everyone when we got home and on the back mine said "I'll get in the water when the dolphins get in the boat." Lol.

eta: I want to add birds and lizards. I've always wanted a parrot, but I'm afraid to get one. I think they freak me out because you can't tell what they're thinking (the way you can with dogs and cats) and I'm afraid they're just going to lash out and bite me (and parrots can bite really hard!). I would need a course in bird handling before I got one.

I'm also a little freaked out by wild rats and mice in my house. Now, this isn't a strange fear, except that I've kept gerbils as pets for 15 years and I love rodents as pets! Totally not afraid of them in any way, so I'm not really sure why wild ones make me think twice. I also think squirrels and chipmunks are the cutest things ever (even think wild mice are adorable) I just don't like them in my home I guess. Outside, they're fine.

 

[Iowa Lizzy]

This might come out kind of cynical and mean, but this is one of the reasons I have no desire to have children any time soon. My mother is a perpetual worrier. Paranoid. We always used to joke that she watched too much Law & Order (and now CSI). But sometimes it just gets ridiculous. I mean, to this day if any of her kids are back home, she''ll get up in the middle of the night and check on us in our beds (and we''re all adults).

I have grown up with irrational fears being drilled into me. "Why would you want to take gymnastics? You''ll probably break your neck!" "Do you really think you want to live alone during college? What if you''re raped and murdered while bringing groceries into your apartment?" I really can''t even describe it. She acts like something terrible has already happened to her/our family. But nothing has. She''s lived in a state of fear for as long as I''ve been alive. She''s suspicious. She''s untrusting. She gets it from her mother. I really don''t want to do that to my children. I know some people say "I hope I don''t turn out like my mother." But what she did to her daughters sometimes almost seems like some kind of emotional abuse. One of our good family friends is an MD and he''s been trying to talk my mother into anti-anxiety medication for years.

Fears of spiders and zombies are one thing, but fear of living is completely different. There, rant over! Sorry if that came out just really negative. That wasn''t my intention. I just hope some people don''t show all their fears to their children. It can really mess them up!

And to keep this on topic (sorry!), I''m afraid of choking at home, alone. I remember watching a video in elementary school where they showed people running themselves into corners of tables to keep from dying. I hope I never experience that!

 

[Christiana]

Date: 1/17/2010 10:32:29 AM
Author: Travel Goddess
This might come out kind of cynical and mean, but this is one of the reasons I have no desire to have children any time soon. My mother is a perpetual worrier. Paranoid. We always used to joke that she watched too much Law & Order (and now CSI). But sometimes it just gets ridiculous. I mean, to this day if any of her kids are back home, she''ll get up in the middle of the night and check on us in our beds (and we''re all adults).

I have grown up with irrational fears being drilled into me. ''Why would you want to take gymnastics? You''ll probably break your neck!'' ''Do you really think you want to live alone during college? What if you''re raped and murdered while bringing groceries into your apartment?'' I really can''t even describe it. She acts like something terrible has already happened to her/our family. But nothing has. She''s lived in a state of fear for as long as I''ve been alive. She''s suspicious. She''s untrusting. She gets it from her mother. I really don''t want to do that to my children. I know some people say ''I hope I don''t turn out like my mother.'' But what she did to her daughters sometimes almost seems like some kind of emotional abuse. One of our good family friends is an MD and he''s been trying to talk my mother into anti-anxiety medication for years.

Fears of spiders and zombies are one thing, but fear of living is completely different. There, rant over! Sorry if that came out just really negative. That wasn''t my intention. I just hope some people don''t show all their fears to their children. It can really mess them up!

And to keep this on topic (sorry!), I''m afraid of choking at home, alone. I remember watching a video in elementary school where they showed people running themselves into corners of tables to keep from dying. I hope I never experience that!

Is your mother Greek, sweetie? Because the description above reminds me of something....

 

[Smurfysmiles]

Date: 1/17/2010 10:10:15 AM
Author: whitby_2773

Date: 1/17/2010 9:14:42 AM

Author: Tuckins1

I cannot sleep with the closet door open, or the bedroom door open. I don''t know why, but the open blackness just gives me nightmares!

ETA- I too share the zombie fear... I LOVE zombie movies, but they scare the crap out of me! I actually read a great book called''The Complete Zombie Handbook'' that prepares you for all zombie-apocalypse scenarios (it was so funny and well written, that at times you forget that it''s fiction!) We also use zombie targets sometimes when we are at the gun range to brush up on my zombie head shot skills, just in case.

tuckins! when i was a little girl, i watched a cops/robbers tv show which had a very spooky theme that week (someone was trying to drive someone else insane to take control of their money etc). well the climax of the show was this person tottering mentally, holed up in their room, and the perpetrator, dressed as said victim''s mother, coming out of the bedroom closet in the middle of the night, butcher knife in hand and (apparently) making moves to kill them. so of course, by the time the police arrived, the victim is talking gibberish - ''my mother! it was my mother! she tried to kill me!''...and gets committed.

Have you ever seen the movie Psycho? This seems eerily similar. I don''t blame you, I didn''t take a shower for weeks after seeing that lol and my mom took baths for a year as she saw it in the theaters when it originally came out!

 

[jewelz617]

When the movie Jaws came out my father wouldn''t even swim in my grandmother''s pool much less go to the beach. Now THAT''S irrational fear!

 

[packrat]

When I was little, I don''t remember if it was Sesame Street or Electric Company, there was a little cartoon segment about a boy who goes to bed at night and in the moonlight he sees a shadow of a big ole alligator w/a huge mouth and teeth dancing, and he finally realizes it''s his dog. Whatever-scared the bejesus out of me when I was little and I had nightmares for years about alligators under my bed. I never let any appendages hang over the side of my bed. Still don''t.

Closet doors..Well, the Boogeyman is in there, and he shuffles and says "So nice" and thank you very MUCH to Stephen King for that story when I was about 12.

There''s a couple 80''s movies on tv we watched, one about a house being alive, (the walls breathed and it turned up the heat in the pool so someone was roasted is pretty much all I remember) and one about a girl who dies in a car accident and comes back and kills part of her family and drives her mother to a padded room, and I still think about them now and again-they scared the crap out of me. Amazing how things like that can stay with you for years.

 

[jewelz617]

Date: 1/17/2010 11:56:26 AM
Author: packrat
When I was little, I don''t remember if it was Sesame Street or Electric Company, there was a little cartoon segment about a boy who goes to bed at night and in the moonlight he sees a shadow of a big ole alligator w/a huge mouth and teeth dancing, and he finally realizes it''s his dog. Whatever-scared the bejesus out of me when I was little and I had nightmares for years about alligators under my bed. I never let any appendages hang over the side of my bed. Still don''t.


Closet doors..Well, the Boogeyman is in there, and he shuffles and says ''So nice'' and thank you very MUCH to Stephen King for that story when I was about 12.


There''s a couple 80''s movies on tv we watched, one about a house being alive, (the walls breathed and it turned up the heat in the pool so someone was roasted is pretty much all I remember) and one about a girl who dies in a car accident and comes back and kills part of her family and drives her mother to a padded room, and I still think about them now and again-they scared the crap out of me. Amazing how things like that can stay with you for years.

I used to run by sewer grates in fear that Pennywise the clown would be there!!!

 

[packrat]

Date: 1/17/2010 12:02:13 PM
Author: PinkAsscher678

Date: 1/17/2010 11:56:26 AM

Author: packrat

When I was little, I don''t remember if it was Sesame Street or Electric Company, there was a little cartoon segment about a boy who goes to bed at night and in the moonlight he sees a shadow of a big ole alligator w/a huge mouth and teeth dancing, and he finally realizes it''s his dog. Whatever-scared the bejesus out of me when I was little and I had nightmares for years about alligators under my bed. I never let any appendages hang over the side of my bed. Still don''t.



Closet doors..Well, the Boogeyman is in there, and he shuffles and says ''So nice'' and thank you very MUCH to Stephen King for that story when I was about 12.



There''s a couple 80''s movies on tv we watched, one about a house being alive, (the walls breathed and it turned up the heat in the pool so someone was roasted is pretty much all I remember) and one about a girl who dies in a car accident and comes back and kills part of her family and drives her mother to a padded room, and I still think about them now and again-they scared the crap out of me. Amazing how things like that can stay with you for years.

I used to run by sewer grates in fear that Pennywise the clown would be there!!!

SSSSHHHHH! GAH! Oh that clown is the bane of my existence! (actually I tell JD HE''S the bane of my existence..I have a lot of them) Ha, I bought the movie years ago, and never watched it-gave it to Goodwill. I only watched part of it on tv back in the day and STILL have problems w/sheets hung out on a clothes line..the neighbors do this and I see in my head, flashes of him in between the fluttering sheets. I steer clear of the sewer openings in the gutters when I''m out walking too..They float Georgie..they all float..ARGH!

 

[anitabee]

i really don't like parking underground, you know, underground parking garages. i've got claustrophobia to begin with and we live in an earthquake zone (vancouver, bc) and i always get the willies as i approach those low roofed squishy areas.

i also fear crabs & lobsters. it's hard for me to swim at beaches without getting freaked out about things under the water pinching my toes, feet, etc.

you asked for irrational, you got mine!

 

[Prana]

I''m afraid of that chick in the attic from ''The Grudge.'' I am also afraid of the chick coming out of the TV screen in the other movie, was it called ''White Noise''? I don''t remember. I am also afraid that the characters from Rob Zombies'' movies, and the ''Hill''s have eyes'' movies exist in real life. Enough so that I actually think that these people are going to jump out at me from the doorways as I pass them on my way back from the bathroom late at night.

My real fears are the dark, and deep water.

 

[Tuckins1]

Date: 1/17/2010 2:13:54 PM
Author: girlface
I''m afraid of that chick in the attic from ''The Grudge.'' I am also afraid of the chick coming out of the TV screen in the other movie, was it called ''White Noise''? I don''t remember. I am also afraid that the characters from Rob Zombies'' movies, and the ''Hill''s have eyes'' movies exist in real life. Enough so that I actually think that these people are going to jump out at me from the doorways as I pass them on my way back from the bathroom late at night.


My real fears are the dark, and deep water.

The movie you are referring to with the little girl coming out of the tv set is "The Ring". Very creepy.