Do you have an irrational fear? Did you know that the number one fear in a America under spiders is speaking in public? Death is like number four or something. What makes your spine shiver?

-- Anonymous, June 04, 1999

Answers

I don't think a fear of spiders is irrational-- just think about it. What do they need all of those legs for? Nothing, that's what. It's all very suspicious, if you ask me.

I'm not at all surprised that people are more afraid of public speaking than they are of death, because that's my big fear. I just can't handle it... I'm afraid that I'm going to make an ass out of myself. More often than not, it ends up being a self-fulfilling prophecy, because the more worried I am about looking like a doofus, the more nervous and doofy I become. It's not as bad if I'm with people that I've known for a while, but I tend to get anxious no matter what.

-- Anonymous, June 04, 1999

Bugs scare me. Mostly roaches. Especially the big ones - the waterbugs. I'm not sure if I'm more scared or disgusted by them, but just seeing one will traumatize me for days.

Being homeless is another fear because one day you can have a great job, a great apartment and a great life and the next day, it can all be gone. I never want to be one of those people who have to sleep in the street (because there are those big bugs out in the street).

And I'm scared of diseases such as cancer and AIDS. I don't think I'd ever be strong enough to survive through something as painful as that. I don't know how people do it.

-- Anonymous, June 04, 1999

I have this irrational fear that there are trolls that live under my bed. I fear that if I sleep with an arm or leg hanging over the edge of the bed, the trolls will bite me. I have no idea where this comes from. For as long as I can remember, I have always had this fear. I won't even sleep without covers on because I'm afraid they will get me. Childish - yes, but hey, it's a fear.

I also fear disease.....a little bit. I fear more that there won't ever be a cure for them. That's scary in today's technology and intelligence.

-- Anonymous, June 04, 1999

To everything Maggie said: WORD

There is nothing worse than bugs (in any way, shape or form), being homeless or terminal illness. OK, maybe not in that order but you guys know what I mean...

-- Anonymous, June 04, 1999

I'm just going to have to go with spiders. Not very original, but next to burning to death, I can't think of anything worse than being touched by a spider. The legs, the eyes, the fangs... The hairy ones are bad, the smooth ones are worse, because that's just unnatural. There are NO good spiders. Don't give me that crap about spiders being the natural predators of even more destructive bugs, so they're a benefit to humans, blah blah blah. It's bulls***. They're evil, plain and simple. And as for tarantulas making good pets? If one came into my apartment and immediately started doing tricks -- like vacuuming or balancing my checkbook -- I'd still have to drop something heavy on it. Because it's a cheap ploy to gain your confidence, and then you wake up the next day with a straw poking out of a major artery and the spider on the end of it, sucking away, and he just gives you a little wave like "How ya doin'?" with one of his too numerous legs.

Evil. That's all I'm saying.

-- Anonymous, June 04, 1999

Dust Bunnies. Behind the couch. Under the bed. I don't even want to think about behind the fridge. They're so frightening. I can't stand dust bunnies.

-- Anonymous, June 04, 1999

After I snarfed Diet Coke laughing at Brian's entry, I decided drowning, burning alive, and having a spider crawl/snake slither on me were the 3 top fears. Yuck. I'm gonna go cringe and whimper now.

-- Anonymous, June 04, 1999

It annoys me that spiders are so maligned just because they "look creepy". They don't want to attack people and will bite only if they are frightened or cornered. That's more than you can say about most yappy little dogs. You can let a spider crawl onto your hand and it will mind it's own business until you start poking at it. It will bite a large object only as a last-ditch defense mechanism, since the venom is normally used to digest small prey from the inside and it doesn't want to waste valuable digestive secretions on something that is obviously not small enough to eat. I would rather have spiders roaming around my house than be plagued with filthy flies or bloodsucking mosquitos.

I have an irrational dislike for chimpanzee heads. Something about chimp faces drives me nuts. Gorillas and every other primate species are ok, just the stupid chimps. Maybe it's just the weird combination of 'withered old man' and 'hyperactive mutant 7 year-old' that they remind me of.

I just remembered an irrational fear (sort of). When I pull apart (or even think about it now) a piece of cotton I get a case of the willies. Pulling a piece apart with my teeth is a dozen times worse.

-- Anonymous, June 04, 1999

Spiders are fine. Rodents are fine. Snakes, ok. Chimp heads aren't particularly attractive, but they're ok. I have a fear of having no brakes in the car I'm driving. I suppose that's not an irrational fear, but it leads to the irrational fear of being unable to avoid driving into water because of failed brakes, being submerged in my car and unable to escape. I will therefore not buy a car with electric windows. When I'm particularly harried and stressed and feeling my life has spun out of control, I begin to have vivid dreams of driving various cars, usually my VWs, and their brakes fail and I hurtle into various bodies of water. I wake distressed and upset and the feeling lingers all day. I have an irrational aversion, not really a fear, to large buttons on clothing. I especially hate the ones with four holes, with the stitching done to form an "x". I hate the big ones with two holes, two. Small functional buttons on a garment are tolerable, though I don't find them attractive. I think this stems from my very young childhood when I had pneumonia and was hospitalized with a very high fever. The drugs I was given caused me to hallucinate (I still remember the glowing pink and lime green elephants and rhinoceri that marched in a parade along the baseboards....) and I guess I had some pretty bad trips. When I began working at a lab (as an adult), I gagged at having to wear a lab coat and particulary hated touching those nasty buttons. I gradually began to realize I was remembering the buttons of the lab coats flapping in my face as doctors and nurses attended to me during an unpleasant stay in the hospital when I was 3 years old, and 30 years later was still affected by a subconscious aversion to buttons. The worst are items of clothing with buttons sewn on randomly as decoration. Metal buttons are ok. Buttons in the shapes of carrots and roses and cats are ok. Irregular buttons made of antler are ok. But those round, shiny, white and/or pearlescent two- or four-holed buttons... NOOOOOoooooooo..... After living in east Texas for 23 years, I've finally gotten accustomed to the large 2 to 3-inch roaches....but it still freaks me out when they fly because I can't predict their intended direction once they take off, and that's invariably in my hair or on my shoulder or back where I can't see them until I later feel those tickly little filthy legs on my cheek or arm or feel my hair being moved. Another fear: being blamed of doing something and being unable to prove that I'm innocent. Irrational? I suppose not. Plaguing? Yes. I'm a little afraid of calling strangers on the phone. I try to rehearse how our conversation might go, carefully preventing myself from looking like an idiot dork. I procrastinate as long as possible to call to find a doctor, a dentist, a car mechanic. I don't want to choose the wrong one. I don't want to make a mistake. Wait. Maybe THAT'S the irrational fear: Making a mistake. Ah, ha! We won't charge for your therapy, Pamie, if you won't charge for ours.

-- Anonymous, June 04, 1999

SHARK!!! I saw "Jaws" at a formative stage in my development. For years after that, my sister and brother would call my name and when I looked at them, they would flash me this full-page picture of a shark attacking (it was in Life magazine), then run away laughing hysterically. I read in "Gift of Fear" that there was a study done in the '60's to determine what single word had the "greatest psychological impact" on people.... yep, it was shark. It made me feel less like a freak... or maybe there are a lot of freaks out there....at least there were in the '60's.

-- Anonymous, June 04, 1999

I'd like to say I don't have a lot of fears, but I guess I do. I start thinking about various things and getting the creepy crawlies and wishing I hadn't even started reading this particular topic in the forum. Oh well.

I can go along with the sharks fear. I saw Jaws when I was pretty young too, and I guess it stuck with me. I like to play in the ocean, and body surf and stuff like that, but every now and then I just get the most serious heebie jeebies. What's even worse is when I step on, or feel something slimy when I'm in the water. That freaks me out.

I was also told about jellyfish when I was a kid, and I have a real problem going into warm water because of it. If I ever go swimming in Texas or something like that, I'm going to be moving very slow and carefully, I know that!

Up until I was 13, I had a recurrent nightmare of being crushed alive by a large box. Actually, it was several boxes that were being thrown at me. Each one kept getting larger and larger until I woke up crying. I don't really know if I ever picked up an irrational fear from that or not though. Not a permanent one that I know of anyhow.

About the only other thing I can think of that makes my flesh crawl is Eternity. I know, that's kind of weird, but when I think about the idea of Forever, I just start to get very nervous and uncomfortable. This applies, obviously, to death though I don't particularly fear death itself. It's just the idea that it's forever. Whether it's an eternity of nothingness, or an eternity of heaven, it just scares the bejesus out of me.

Okay, now I feel like a freak..

-- Anonymous, June 04, 1999

Heights are my worst fear. Almost every night just as I drift off, I have this dream about standing on the edge of a rooftop, right on the gutter, and knowing that I'm about to fall. I also know I'm dreaming, but I always have to open my eyes to get rid of the whole thing. I used to paint houses, too, and had no problem with ladders.

Second to my fear of heights is my completely irrational fear of slugs. I get that shaky feeling when I see one and then I get short of breath and have to back away slowly. The worst experience I ever had was stepping barefoot into a whole pile of them outside my dormitory during a fire drill one night. Centipedes creep me out, too.

Although this isn't a fear, the sound of someone using an emery board on their nails makes me want to gag. It's that SSHHHHK SHHHK SSHHHK....it just grabs my spine and vibrates.

-- Anonymous, June 04, 1999

I have a completely unreasonable fear of crickets. I just hate them. In fact, when I see them in my house, I throw things at them in hopes of crushing them. (books are best) I think it's that they move unpredictably-they can jump right on me when I sneak up to squash them. And those long legs and the crunching sound that they make when you do crush them. I will get someone else to kill them for me or I will shut the door with the cricket behind it and go away and hope it's gone when I come back. I have nightmares about crickets on me. Now I have to go get my blankey and suck my thumb.

-- Anonymous, June 04, 1999

One day, I opened the door to get the newspaper, and there was this giant blue and yellow spider just standing there on the Dallas Morning News like he was there to sell me something.

I screamed and slammed the door, and waited a couple of minutes figuring the door slamming would run him off.

Thinking it was safe, I opened the door again. He was STILL THERE, and he was DANCING! He was doing this little up and down number, like maybe if he impressed me enough I would let him come in. I screamed and slammed the door again.

I tried explaining to my boyfriend that there was a dancing spider at the door and it was his duty to rid us of the thing, only he didn't believe me that there was a spider outside doing soft-shoe on the newspaper. So he opened the door.

I swear, there was music playing this time, and he had a little top hat. You know, like the frog in that cartoon?

He screamed and slammed the door. "I don't know whether to kill it or charge it rent," he said.

The spider held us captive for an hour. I don't know if he was out there that long, we were too afraid to open the door again. When we did finally open the door, it was gone, and we used fireplace tools to carry the newspaper out to the dumpster. I don't know, maybe we thought the spider was trying the old Trojan Newspaper trick.

Personally, I was afraid he was going to come inside and eat my cats. Spiders aren't just leggy and fangy and creepy, they're evil. And sneaky.

I still have nightmares about it.

-- Anonymous, June 04, 1999

I have an intense hatred/fear of birds. How stupid is that? I have never even seen the Hitchcock movie "The Birds", but I am terrified that they will swoop down and either peck my eyes out or perch on my head. Or poop on me.

Here's an example. This week my family and I were at the beach. Seagulls were everywhere, and for some reason they usually don't bother me. I was sitting in a chair, reading, and they started to circle, very close to my head. I threw some sand at them, hoping to chase them away, but that movement only attracted more of them. They started to swoop down closer to me. I screamed. My parents both laughed at me. The birds came closer. I ran from my chair. Turns out they were after one lonely Cheez-it that had fallen and landed next to my chair. After they grabbed it, they flew away and left me alone. But it only reinforces my fear. The birds have some secret plan and are out to get me.

-- Anonymous, June 04, 1999

I have a completely irrational fear of all things bug - spiders, bees, wasps, roaches, crickets, junebugs, ants, flies. And on and on. You name it, I'm scared of it. Last week there was a spider in my bathroom, on the wall near the towel rack. I couldn't go in the bathroom, I was so terrified. I was shaking. I stood in the doorway and watched it until I finally realized there was bug spray in my bedroom - the kind that shoots a stream instead of a mist. I squirted the spider into the bathtub and then washed him down the drain. Once, there was a wasp on my bedroom ceiling and I tried to knock him down with a broom so I could step on him but he landed on my bed. I let out this bloodcurdling scream like you've never heard and my mom came running in my room and she had to kill the wasp because I was too busy standing in the hallway, hyperventilating and in tears. Another time not long after that experience, there was a wasp on the ceiling in my office. Now, mind you, I get to work about an hour early every morning. So there was no one else around, and no one else in any of the other offices to come and help me. I ended up knocking the thing down, and it landed in this little 1/2-inch crack between my computer desk and my printer stand. Before it could climb back up, I hopped over to the side of the desk and pushed it against the printer stand and squished the wasp. To this day, its carcass is still down there. And there it will remain until someday when we have to move the desks for some as-yet-unknown reason.

P.S. Just for the record, I hyperventilated that day, too. I've never been so terrified in my life. Of anything.

-- Anonymous, June 04, 1999

spiders... spiders... YUCK!!! I don't know how you people deal with them so well even when you're scared. I can't touch them at all. my boyfriend is highly amused when there's a spider in the room because I will jump onto a chair and scream for him to kill it. he'll take his time, and I'll start doing this little dance like I have to pee, but I just want that spider out of my house.

I'm also scared of public speaking, getting my shoe caught in the escalators, and drowning. yay.

-- Anonymous, June 04, 1999

Spiders, snakes, sharks. In no particular order.

Growing up in a small South Western Australian coastal town, I heard shark stories from the time I was way small.

Like a jetty near by, where a local fishing fleet pulled in (fleet=3 or 4 boats), and they were gutting their catch, and the sharks were in a blood frenzy, like they do. One of the children of one of the fishermen, jumped off the jetty, and went to swim out to his Dad. He got bitten in half, lost most of his lower body, and bled to death in the back of the car on the way to the nearest hospital, which was an hour away. Lots of stories like that.

In fairness to the sharks, shark attacks don't happen very often, but when they do, you're pretty much fucked. There was a windsurfer in SA recently, gone missing, all they found was a half of a board, bitten in two with bloody great teeth marks, and a chewed up wetsuit.

I love living by the sea, but I'm not that keen on swimming out far.

Also, the waters in another place I lived as a teenager, were filled with poisonous fish; blue ringed octopus and stone-fish were too. The blue-ringed octopus usually travel in swarms, and you die from the stings. The stone fish lives just under the sand, has a spike coming out of it's head. The spike is tough enough to pierce through rubber thongs (flipflops), and generally you're dead in a matter of minutes.

Ocean swimming is not that appealing to me.

Then there's the fact that some huge number out of the top ten most deadly poisonous snakes, and the top ten most deadly poisonous spiders live in Australia. I take spiders and snakes seriously. Even now that I live in Southern NJ, and there's nothing like that really, I still freaked and had to phone a rel when my cats bought a snake into my back room. Turned out to be a garter snake, but I have a lifetime of being wary to get over.

A. not from the Australian Tourism Board..

-- Anonymous, June 05, 1999

I have a horrible fear of strobe lighting. Remember that show Twin Peaks? While very good, it also gave me nightmares, and still does. In the final episode when Kyle McLachlan goes into the Black Lodge, he's chased by little midgets, screaming Laura Palmers and BOBs with no pupils through these creepy rooms with flashing lights. One night the fleuro light in my kitchen was starting to run out or whatever, as it started flashing, much like a strobe light. I laughed and told my mother how much it reminded me of that Twin Peaks episode, at which point she got on her knees and started to hobble over to me with outstretched arms, laughing and groaning "I'm cooming for yooou, Lauraaa Palmerrr", and I just ran out screaming.

Sharks are pretty freaky, but I always found sting rays even more disturbing. I always hated going near them at my local aquariums, because they'd cling onto the top of the roof, trying to play tonsil hockey with the glass, and it's evil looking face looked like it were trying to tell me to run for my life, that it would eat me with it's toothless little mouth.

OK, and my last weird thing.. mirrors. Ok, I'm not all that frightened of them, but when my imagination runs away with me, I'd picture that the mirror in my bathroom is a two way mirror, and the person on the other side is video taping me doing my bathroom things, or if I went into a dark roonm with a mirror, that Candyman dude would try and pull me through or whatever.

Ok, I'm done. =)

-- Anonymous, June 05, 1999

I am afraid of dolls. Some dolls are okay and not frightening to me, but not many. I am afraid they are really alive and watching me. I know exactly where this comes from. My mother is a devout believer in demons and demons possessing people and such things. When I was little I heard her explaining to my aunt why she would not let me have a Cabbage Patch doll. This was when they first came out with Cabbage Patch. She said because they come with "birth certificates" and if they get broken you send them to a "hospital" to be "healed" that this was an open door for Satan. And they were possessed. Also, Raggedy Ann was possessed too because the story is she comes to life at night when the little girl(Marcella? Marcia?) is asleep.
My mom said her friend's little girl kept complaining that she was unable to sleep because her Raggedy Ann made too much noise dancing, and the parents stayed up and saw the doll get up at midnight and start dencing and laughing. Can you blame me for being scared of dolls?
I am scared of clowns too, and also people who wag their fingers and say "Redrum! Redrum!" I am scared of roaches. I will kill a scurrying roach, but if it starts flying, I start screaming and run outside until someone else gets it. I refuse to pick up their bodies, either.
I am afraid of that feeling you get when you are walking down a dark hallway and you KNOW something is behind you. You can feel it. But you can't run; you have to pretend everything is normal and walk down the hallway. If you run...IT WILL GET YOU.
I never go to carnivals, circuses, or fairs. There is nothing fun about them to me. They feel sinister. All the fair people are weird. The atmosphere is weird, all dark...the smells are weird..so many people, all around. And the fair people, who spend their whole life moving from place to place, setting up and taking down the same tents hundreds of times. Why do they do that? Scary.

-- Anonymous, June 05, 1999

i've always had a real fear of having all the teeth smashed out of my mouth.. i used to have a re-occuring nightmare about falling flat on my face and having my teeth smashed into jagged little bits... scary.. my brother is terified of clowns.. hates them... he's a wreck at parades...

-- Anonymous, June 05, 1999

Speaking of speaking in public, my best friend is an avid "Pamie" person who thinks the world of you and your public. She posted to this question and realized one of her worst fears, being embarrassed in public. I thought her answer was fun and beautiful, but she wrote me " I keep obsessing about that damn huge paragraph in Pamie's Forum. I wish I could just push it out of my mind until tomorrow. Relax. It's not the end of the world. They'll forgive you. Maybe you can erase it and start over after you find out the magic formula for creating breaks between thoughts. Sigh."

-- Anonymous, June 05, 1999

First, I want to thank the scared-of-dolls and scared-of-things-under-the-bed people. I don't feel like I'm alone in the world anymore, an adult with the irrational fears of a child! WHEW.

Next, I want to say that spiders are NOT harmless, mind-their-own-business creatures! Many times, I have watched a spider SPECIFICALLY cross an entire room to come torment me. I'm not kidding. They seek me out. I'm serious.

Now, it's not unusual for me to have nightmares about spiders, but last night was really weird. I had three or four short, little, falling-off-a-cliff-making-you-wake-up-abruptly dreams about spiders! THAT was weird. I'd dream that a spider was next to me on the bed or that I'd suddenly come across one in a drawer, and I'd bolt up in bed and start dusting off the sheet next to me! Three or four times, this happened! Not a pleasant sleeping experience for me, last night. :(

-- Anonymous, June 05, 1999

Wow, I didn't realize so many others shared my fear of clowns. It really isn't so bad these days - I actually enjoy watching Cirque du Soleil (those people who can contort themselves down to the size of a tuna can will never cease to amaze me - welcome to my land o' tangents).

Anyway, quick story. When I was younger, my mother and my aunt took us kids to the Bozo show in Chicago. How exciting, right? I used to be glued to that show; I watched it religiously. To make a long story longer, the ever-popular (you have to say this to yourself like the announcer guy on the Bozo show says it, otherwise it just doesn't work) Grand Prize Game (!!!) surfaced, and guess who was the lucky little girl picked to go down there to win her very own (insert voice here again) crisp new fifty dollar bill?! Well, I don't know if it was performance anxiety or what, but all of a sudden, I just couldn't do it. All that practice with the trash cans and ping pong balls at home was about to be flushed down the toilet.

You can see which direction this is going.

My paranoia just got the crowd that much more excited and made them cheer louder, which in turn made me that much more panicky (and for a 5-year old, panicky isn't pretty). And then, to add insult to injury, I looked down the bleachers and saw this clown guy with freakish red hair wildly gesturing directly at me while standing there in his enormous floppy shoes... UGH. I wussed out. It was awful. I think I just managed to make myself break out in hives.

Sidenote: Reading Steven King's _It_ years later didn't help, by the way. I guess I should consider myself fortunate, though - at least that clown wasn't waving crisp new $50 bills.

-- Anonymous, June 05, 1999

Slugs. Eurrrggghhh. The way they move in such a slo-oo-oow motion weirds me out. I keep imagining that a small one would get into my Coke and I would drink it in without looking. And it would grow in my stomach and barge out of my a**hole (I think there was a scene like this in a movie called Exorcist or something) like a subway out of the underground tunnel. Then there're mirrors. Stare into a mirror for a long time and you get a feeling of mental dislocation, like 'that person in the mirror is not me!' Then suddenly the face in the mirror would smile Joker-esque. I would reach up to touch my face and realize I was the one smiling. Ok, that was stupid. It's like looking into the face of another person. And there's the hair in the bathroom drains. I keep imagining them in my food and I would absentmindedly chew on them or something. Then I would see a real hair strand in my food. Yech. And I keep having recurring nightmares of these black and white old photographs where a headshot of the moonfaced girl on it would smile at me. I would spare you and myself the trouble by not mentioning those slimy underwater creatures, snakes slithering on top of each other, and clambering hairy spiders. Evil... just pure evil.

-- Anonymous, June 05, 1999

People who confuse tolerance with morality.

-- Anonymous, June 05, 1999

I have a fear of going over a friends house for a get together and having to use the bathroom , and shit----they stop up the commode with 2 much toliet paper and it overflow and everyone there at the party would see my dodo. aaaagaggggghhhhhhhhhh

-- Anonymous, June 06, 1999

Spiders, I love 'em. Snakes great. I just can't handle buzzing insects. What's funny is it is not the insects themselves that bother me, it is the buzzing. I have had this fear ever since I was climbing a pile of bricks, and kicked a wasps nest in one of the holes (it was a very big nest, I still have it at home). Predictably enough I got stung quite a bit. To this day I duck when I hear one.

Just to freak out those of you with fears of spiders. Do you know that the average american eats six spiders every year while they sleep.

-- Anonymous, June 07, 1999

To start with the spiders... there's one climbing up my bookcase as I type this, and I'm hoping it goes away, 'cause I'm not going to be able to sleep until it goes, but I'm too much of a wimp to actually smash it. Brrr.

With that having been said, my #1 fear would have to be bees. I was stung on three separate occasions when I was growing up, and I have absolutely no desire to repeat the experience. I have walked out of classes when a bee flew into the room, and that's one of my milder reactions.

-- Anonymous, June 07, 1999

I have no irrational fears, but I have lots of rational ones. I'm not afraid of spiders, or bugs, or public speaking. I'm concerned about death, and I'd prefer that it not occur anytime soon, but at present I do not harbor an irrational fear of it.

I've had some things that have scared the crap out of me, but I would consider those rational fears: getting shot at, falling, unexplainable intense pain, and confrontations with wild animals bent on causing me injury are items that top the

-- Anonymous, June 07, 1999

I have a fear of having someone walk up the stairs behind me. When I was around seven years old, my brother chased me up the stairs holding a steak knife.... screaming "I'm gonna get you!!!"... I ran up the stairs and locked myself in the bathroom for hours. To this day I get that panic feeling whenever there is someone behind me on the stairs, and if there is someone behind me and he says anything remotely about chasing me, my knees buckle and I hyperventilate.

-- Anonymous, June 07, 1999

To "Chris" who posted back on the 4th (and anyone else who's still reading this):

I hear you about the cotton balls. I hadn't even thought about it before you mentioned it, but I'm with you there. I don't know if it's a fear or not -- to me, it's more like the old fingernails on the chalkboard thing -- but the shredded/pulled apart cotton thing gives me the willies, too. I had this old mattress pad when I was younger, and it got so old it started to just... disintegrate, I guess... to the point where it looked like Freddy Krueger's skin. Ick. Just looking at something of that sort of texture makes me nauseus. Even down to some stucco walls.

How's that for irrational? Stucco walls give me the willies. So I'm a freak, but a basically harmless freak.

-- Anonymous, June 07, 1999

I'm another anti-spider person. When I was little, in an effort to make sure I wouldn't have a lot of irrational fears, my parents used to let me watch all these creepy info shows about spiders and snakes and stuff. I can handle snakes - I used to want one as a pet - but I just can not handle spiders. My brother used to get his jollies by chasing me around with close-up photos of them in magazines.

To the guy who said something about people eating spiders in their sleep: They have a special hell reserved for people like you, buddy! :-)

I have some rational fears, like stinging insects.

And I have an irrational disgust (but not fear) to match the cottonball guys: Hair. It's obnoxious, because my husband and I both have hair down to the small of our backs, but I hate the feel of hair when I have to pull it out of the shower or off the comb. And cleaning out the vaccuum brush? ::shudder::

Let's all say it in unison, now: Liz, you're a freak.

-- Anonymous, June 08, 1999

I don't think the fear of insects is irrational. I mean, what are they DOING? You have to wonder what all that clicking and chirping is about.

I have an irrational fear of monkeys - any monkey. I don't like them. They are too close to being human, and yet they are still purely animalistic. And smelly. They always seem to be on the verge of doing something nasty.

I have a very irrational fear that I am going to be attacked on the street or in my home. Probably all women have this fear. I like to think that with my Tae-Bo prowess, I could at least get a few kicks in.

I can't stand shows on television where people are humiliated. I HATE Candid Camera type shows. I don't know if that's really a fear - but it definitely makes me shiver.

http://www.geocities.com/Athens/Atrium/2958

-- Anonymous, June 08, 1999

Brian, I also have a texture fear like yours. Mine is with cracking though. I had a windowsill in my playhouse when I was little that had totally cracked paint and I couldn't look at it. I would get all grossed out. Most recently, I was driving to San Antonio at night and noticed these vertical grooves on the road, going on and on and on, fast(I was speeding). I had to pull over and let mt boyfriend drive, because I was shaking.
Has anyone seen that new Cover Girl Crackling polish? *SHUDDER*

-- Anonymous, June 08, 1999

Here are the list of things that make pamie's back shudder, arch up and turn cold: the sound of a knife cutting on a ceramic plate.
the sound of a fork scraping across teeth.
watching someone bite down on aluminum foil.
stepping on bugs-- this used to happen when we lived in California. There would be crickets all along the pool and if you wanted to swim you had to step on so many crickets.
The sound of someone's head hitting the corner of a large object.
Putting my hand inside a chicken to clean it out.
The feeding vein inside shrimp and lobster.
Oh, I can't do anymore. I'm getting all shivery. Ick. Ick!

-- Anonymous, June 08, 1999

Oh, is that why my wife almost gave me a fat lip when I grabbed the ball of aluminum foil and; Chomp*tching*Chomp*tching*Chomp*tching*? Yes, I was the #%*hole in school who ran his fingernails down the chalkboard. SKRRRREEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEE

-- Anonymous, June 09, 1999

I'm not really afraid of very much, but boy, do I have a link for you guys who are scared of clowns! All your worst nightmares are here!

I'm not scared of spiders, roaches, etc., but I do have horrible paranoia attacks that mean people or little kids are going to do something terrible to my cat. I really start obsessing about this, and get very upset. I guess I think people are scarier and more malevolent than animals could ever be.

-- Anonymous, June 11, 1999

People who haggle over semantics. Lighten up. Geez.

-- Anonymous, July 01, 1999

Blood makes my butt hurt. Serious, I am.

-- Anonymous, July 27, 1999

Sumo wrestlers have always kind of freaked me out. I just don't trust anyone willing to eat enough rice and nothing but rice until they weigh just about as much as a semi- Truck. that and they're practically worshipped as Gods in Japan, so think what someone that large, probably mentally unstable, and not lacking in Political Power could do.

Sock puppets, too. People think I'm joking when I say this, but it's true. I just don't like the blank, evil, stares that emanate from those butto

-- Anonymous, August 24, 1999

Spiders.

Women.

-- Anonymous, August 26, 1999

The future. Mine is filled with such uncertainty, I'm about to have a panic attack now. So on to something that doesn't really bother me...

Spiders. FACT: 80% of the time you sleep a spider crawls on you. Over 50% of those times, it crawls over an orafice (mouth, nose, eyes, etc...)

Sleep well.

-- Anonymous, December 12, 1999

Dennis, you are me!!!!! My biggest fear, and one I've been re-living in recurrent dreams for years, is of suddenly losing all my teeth! I hate it! Except in my dreams, instead of being smashed out by something, I'll just eat or grind my teeth together or something, and they'll start falling out and crumbling away, till I have a mouth full of teeth! ICK! And every time I have the dream, I tell myself in the dream, "oh, this isn't another dream, this is the real thing!" And then I wake up. I'm so gullible.

I've always liked spiders. They're mostly harmless, and they get rid of the other nasty bugs, right? But I'll take down their webs anyway if they're in the house. I'm too clean. And I'm such a bleeding heart, if I ever find a bug in the house, I'll always carry it outside (on a piece of paper or something, never on my hand!) instead of squishing it. Except flies and ants. I hate ants.

No, my irrational bug fear is with those hymenopterans: ants (big ants rather), bees, and wasps. I got stung by a fire ant once, and I've heard so many stories about how much bee and wasp stings hurt, I'm rather terrified of them. If I encounter a bee or wasp I will cut a wide circle around them or jump up and down nervously. They really get the best of me.

Did you know that ants (as well as all insects) have wings for a brief period of life? One night a few months ago, a hive of flying ants came to visit me, or so I thought. They really looked like ants with wings. At first they were just outside on the porch (I work in a converted house on campus). Then they started CRAWLING IN THROUGH THE LEAKY WINDOW! Pretty soon, there were a couple dozen flying around the fluorescent ceiling lights, and I knew I had to get out. So I started to leave. I opened the front door and there were DOZENS of them crawling around on the screen door and hundreds more swarming around on the porch! Before this point I was in control of myself, but at that point I just broke down. I was petrified. I turned the light off in the foyer and lay down on the floor (because the bugs were flying around my office light) and pulled the phone to me and whimpered. I called my advisor--MY GRADUATE THESIS ADVISOR--at 4 AM in the morning and begged him to help me, I was that irrational. He suggested I call the campus cops. By the time they could help me, it was dawn, and most of the bugs had flown away. I haven't seen them since.

Since then it has been suggested to me that they were actually termites. I feel really stupid now.

-- Anonymous, January 12, 2000

WORMS!!!

-- Anonymous, April 27, 2000

Here's how you make me tell you the secret password (in case I ever get one):

You take an old woolly glove. You dunk it in snow so it's all wet and frosty. You sort of suck on it and drag it through your teeth, so it makes a high squeaky gniss-gniss-gniss noise.

(Insert sound of me going into convulsions.)

I don't freak out from the sound of a knife on a plate, or fingernails on a blackboard, or squeaking balloons. But wet wool on teeth kills me. I'm actually trembling just thinking about it.

Also, spiders make me go Willow. ('...and what do they need all those legs for, anyway?') For some reason dead spiders are more terrifying to me than live ones. I think it comes from this book of horror stories I read when I was little, where this kid would torture spiders by frying them and pulling their legs off and stuff, and then one day baby spiders started to come out of his mouth. (I think it was called "Ghostly Tales for Ghastly Kids". If you get the chance, read it and make a fresh start on all those complexes you never got to acquire as a kid.) The image of a huge dead pregnant spider slowly frying in its own fat, legs curled up under its body, splitting open and revealing dozens of tiny skittering baby foetus spiders, has kind of stayed with me.

Hold me.

-- Anonymous, June 05, 2000