Spiders
When I was 10, I was at a beach house on vacation. I was sharing a room with a friend. We found spiders all over the place during the day and It didn't affect me much, but kind of creeped me out. The last night we were there, I got up in the middle of the night to go to the bathroom (a little nervous that I might step on a spider in the dark, I tip-toed carefully). When I got back to my room, I could "feel" a spider was lurking near by, so I turned on the light quickly. Sure enough, there on the wall, 1 inch from my pillow was the biggest spider I had ever seen in my 10- year-old life! I was sweaty, paralyzed and wondering what to do next. I grabbed the end of my sleeping bag, shook it out (to get rid of any spiders that could have crept in while I was out) and went out to the family room. I settled myself on the couch and tried to sleep. No use. Visions of giant spiders were spinning in my mind. If you know me, you know my imagination works overtime with even the slightest hint of a scary idea! I stayed awake ALL night (looking at "Where's Waldo" and glancing around every 30 seconds for creepy crawlies...). It has literally been 20 years (am I that old?) since that experience and I am not proud to say I have had this fear, strongly, ever since. Ask any friend/ family member.
As a newlywed, I stayed up late one night, waiting motionless, for Ryan to get home from work so he could kill a spider in our apartment. Pathetic, I know. The thing that gets me, is that I KNOW when there's a spider lurking somewhere. It's silly I know, but I swear I have a sixth sense about it! Since having children I have become SO much better! I can actually kill an unwelcome, house-dwelling spider now (unless it's really big and really black).
Large, Mean Dogs
Another fear (which has lessened over time as well) are dogs. Now, I wrote "large, mean dogs" but sad to say, I have actually climbed a tree to escape an angry wiener dog that was chasing me on a run. I have so many dog stories, it's ridiculous! But what triggered this fear was what happened when I was 6. Mom and I were going to be "friendly neighbors" and meet the new family up the street. After a knock on the door and a happy greeting from our new friend, out runs a big black dog ("Annie"...I'll never forget). I scream, it bites me in the rear and I cry. The rest is history.
This is where the sixth sense comes in. I swear I will be out for a run, happy as can be and then I will stop abruptly because I can "sense" the oncoming enemy. Sure enough, I will see a random, stray dog off in the distance. I will turn around and go the other direction and be done with my run. It happened just the other day, actually. To make this phobia worse (just when I thought it was getting better) I wen to see the movie "I Am Legend". When I got up the next morning to run it was super dark outside from the time change. In comes my crazy imagination again. Now, I KNEW hairless, vicious dogs were NOT going to jump out at me from behind the parked cars, or from the dark shadows of the street...but you never know! So, again, because of this silly phobia, I had to alter my running routine. oh dear.
Some day I hope to be phobia free...
I could fill this whole blog with crazy dog stories, but I 'll spare you.
anyone else have any phobias??
