Weird phobias you had as a child

In My Humble Opinion
21

Blister-pack display racks. (You know, those peg-boards that you display Hot Wheels, Star Wars figures, and suchlike on.)

I was utterly convinced that I was going to trip and have my eyes put out by them. A trip to the toy store was exciting and terrifying – I would stand as far back from the rack as allowable, scan the rows for items of interest (as well as I could with my eyes screwed up in anticipation of a steel spike thrust into them,) and then do a little step-snatch-back dance to grab what I wanted to inspect closer. Then I’d try to put the thing back on the rack with my head turned the other way.

Very narrow aisles freaked the hell out of me; if I couldn’t be a “safe” distance back from the Spikes of Doom, I couldn’t go down the aisle at all.

I often wonder what the adults in the store made of that little display. :smiley:

Oh yeah: Velvet jewellery boxes. I used to think that they were covered in velvet to thwart thieves – handling them was torture – the single worst tactile memory I have from childhood. shudder

22

Bears. When I was about three, my parents took me to a circus where there were trained bears. There was also some jackass dressed in bear costume who came rampaging into the audience play attacking people. (What Einstein thought up that brilliant idea?!) For the next year or so, one of my parents had to come out and check that there were no bears in the yard before I would go outside and play. (I grew up outside Chicago so the chances were pretty slim that there would be a grizzly hanging out on the swingset but you never know…)

I still have bear nightmares. Damn those circus people to hell!

23

Ladders. Not heights–I actually liked perching in high places–just ladders. I would claw my way up trees or walls or hoist myself up onto high shelves, but it would take a supreme effort of will to climb a ladder to the same height. Getting onto the top of a ladder to climb back down was even worse. I was always sure that it was going to fall over somehow and fling me to my doom.

24

I was (and I guess still am) afraid of imaginary characters…

The “Magic Cookie”. That was a character in a grade one reader - a gingerbread cookie girl, who gets up one day (in a black and white world) and starts walking down the street. She sees things of various colours (a blue bird, an orange cat, a red snake…) and steals their colours so she could be colourful! Seriously, she leaves behind this poor white ghost of a bird just so she can have blue eyes! I think the orange was for her hair and the red… an umbrella maybe? Anyways, I hated it. And it was in this claymation type drawing style, which gave me the creeps. My mom taught grade one and used this reader for years and insists she’s never had a student tell her they were afraid of that cookie. I guess it’s just me!

I also didn’t like the type of puppetry used in the Thunderbirds. I still don’t. It’s just too creepy and unnatural. My mom said I never liked “fake” looking people, I always seemed creeped out by them.

Opération Beurre de Pinottes (“The peanut butter solution” in English). I hated that movie too - I couldn’t watch it at all. I’m not sure what part of it scared me the most but it still makes me feel queasy just thinking about it. I remember being about 6 and my parents decided to watch this movie with us kids. I had seen it before and knew I didn’t like it, and I was SO MAD at my parents for putting that tape in the VCR! And to make it worse, my older brother and younger sister had no problems with it. AND… AND! my parents had made popcorn, which, as a kid, I hated (I love it now) and there was no snack for ME! I was traumatised, I tell you!

Now, as an adult…

I hate knees. I don’t want to touch them, I don’t want anyone touching mine, and if I never ever have to see an anatomical/medical drawing of a knee ever again I’ll be very happy. Again, I have no idea why I hate knees, but I do.

Wicker makes me nauseous. I hate going into stores like Pier One because sooner or later you get to the Wall of Wicker, and it smells funny (or I associate a smell/taste to it) and makes me want to puke. I avoid sitting on wicker furniture whenever I can (I’m slightly better with rattan, and if it’s covered with a cushion I can cope). I hate touching the stuff. Again, no explanation I can think of.

One more: belly buttons. I have an irrational fear that things will enter (or exit!) me through my belly button (navel). Just thinking about it now is making me clench my stomach muscles and I’m going to go have to find something to distract me so I don’t think about it any more after posting this! I can’t watch that scene in the Matrix - makes me want to throw up.

25

No phobia related to a physical thing, although I thought some clowns look creepy, but I got over that when I saw some clowns running around at a circus. I had a temporary thing about showers after watching Psycho, but that also passed. My phobia (which is long gone) was a fear of failure. I remember nightmares in which I was confronted with an essentially impossible task to do but I had to do it. An example would like finding my way out of a house with a lot of doors. No matter what door I opened, a lot more would be in the next room! As I said, that was a long time ago. No nightmares anymore.

26

Snakes at the bottom of the bed. I had to sleep with the blanket or duvet tucked up under my feet so that nothing could sneak up and bite me when I was asleep. Actually, I still have to do that most of the time to feel comfortable and relaxed.

I had no idea where this came from but in my teens I found out that I had been to see a variety show as a child where a song was sung about snakes at the bottom of the bed. I remembered going to the show but not the song. Weird how it had such an effect.

27

when I was a kid it was sirens. for some reason that noise just scared the living hell out of me, and I can remember being about 5 and having a total breakdown at a St. Patrick’s Day parade because of all the fire trucks and police cars blaring away.

one fear that has gotten worse as I’ve gotten older is of falling down the stairs. up is no problem, but I actually go down one foot at a time like a little kid because I’m terrified of falling and breaking my neck.

28

Some others have mentioned fears of pool drains and sharks in pools, well I was convinced that Ursula from The Little Mermaid was going to come out of the pool drain and get me. Later on the drain monster switched to an alligator, but I live in Florida, so that one kind of made sense.

Velvet, or any soft, finely textured material. The worst are those blankets that most hotels have. To this day I have to have someone remove it for me before I can get in the bed. Just makes my skin crawl and always has.

Windchimes. I remember this one starting, and it’s kind of a spin off of another phobia. Outside of my childhood home my mom had a delicate-looking windchime made of glass and sea shells and I was afraid it would break. And therein lies the original phobia, that something would break. Because, you see, someone might be sad if something important to them broke. I was a very sensitive kid. Anyway, I no longer live in constant fear of something breaking, but I have to move far away if I hear windchimes.

29

When I was in forth grade, I had this friend named Richard. He had a twin sister and she was a little spooky but his single father was really spooky. He would come to events like a movie showing, sit right in with the kids and just cackle at the weirdest times while just sitting right among us kids. There was seriously something wrong even in retrospect. One day, Richard made me mad and I told him that I he was lucky that I didn’t put a “B” in front of his name (implying Bitch-ard). Richard told me that he was going to tell his father.

I was paralyzed in fear and imagined every possible scenario for a showdown with his father. My mother was a teacher and knew his father so I envisioned the nuclear fallout from what I had said would take down many, many people. Nothing happened right away and I need a way to figure out when this whole thing would be over. I set the date of the “all clear” as the first day of 6th grade. Again, we were in the 4th grade so I figured that would be enough time to let the dust settle and deal with any secondary situations. I worried about that incident every day faithfully up until the 6th grade when I concluded the statute of limitations had expired even for such a heinous crime.

30

I was afraid of stickers. It didn’t help that little kids love putting stickers on everything, so I had to deal with that surrounding me. I was able to deal with them well enough for daily life, but the worst was when they were torn, which would send me into screaming fits.

Speaking of vampires, whenever I read a book or saw a movie with one, I would pinch the front of my shirt shut, so that my collar was tight against my neck. It is a little known fact that vampires are scared of crosses, stakes, garlic, and a thin layer of cloth.

31

I was terrified of going over bridges, specifically the Verrazano. I’d close all the windows. clutch my stuffed animals, and lay down in the back seat because I was worried that we’d get sucked out the windows.

I still don’t love bridges, but I’ve over the fear of getting involuntarily sucked out of the window. Now, I just have this weird thing when I go over footbridges (and there are lots of them in Ithaca) that I’ll somehow spontaneously decide to jump off it for no reason. It’s not a suicidal urge, because I have no desire to fall from a great height onto rocks, it’s just a weird fear that something will come over me.

32

Please don’t watch the Seinfeld where George wishes the whole world could be draped in velvet. :eek:

I was scared of the upright spike that diners would impale the paid checks on. They still freak me out; how easy would it be for you to lean down and put your eye out?!?

33

Feathers. Completely irrational but I just couldn’t stand having feathers anywhere near me when I was very young. I remember once having a huge purple feather, I think it came from a kid’s calligraphy set - I hated the thing and eventually threw it under the bed so I couldn’t see it any more.

Trouble was, I still knew it was there. I used to go to bed and sleep right up against the wall, then line up an array of toys between me and the edge of the bed so the feather couldn’t get to me.

34

I was afraid of stepping on cracks in the sidwalk. oddly enough, i shared this phobia with Dr. Samuel Johnson!

35

When my brother and I were small, someone gave us a toy train that would run on the floor without tracks. It was also very noisy and had flashing lights. We were both terrified of that thing; I have a distinct memory of Mom switching it on and putting it down on the kitchen floor as my brother and I screamed and tried to climb the cabinets.

I never told anyone, but when we went to the beach I would not go in the water unless my brother went a little ahead of me, reasoning that any sharks or other marine monsters would get him first, giving me time to get back to shore.

36

I’ve seen it. I was a huge Seinfeld fan from the time I was about 7.

And those spikes? I’ve never seen an eye gouged by them, but my boss at the restaurant I worked at slammed his hand on one. The spike went all the way through and came out the top. He was a trooper though. He just pulled the spike out, wrapped his hand, stayed until the end of the night, and then finally went to the hospital.

37

> weep < I guess my fear wasn’t so irrational after all. > cringe <

38

Um…Yeah. Leaves.

I was TERRIFIED of leaves. I’m not sure why. My parents couldn’t take me into an Albertsons without me screaming “BIG LEAF!!!” at the top of my lungs in terror.

Note to those who aren’t in my locale: Albertsons is a grocery store kind of like Smiths, Redners, Krogers, HEB, etc. Their logo is a stylized leaf.

Also, orcas. I was so scared of orcas after watching Free Willy as a kid (that part where the lightning flashes and you see all of the killer whale’s teeth) that I was scared to go anywhere near water, even a bath, lest the mean scary orca get me.

Actually, I’m still kinda terrified of orcas. Things are evil, man.

~Tasha

39

The flushing never bothered me. It was the bomb in the toilet that scared me every time, and knowing that when the toilet made its final gurgle, the bomb would explode, killing whoever was closest to the toilet. I always left the bathroom very quickly, making sure another kid was closer to the toilet than I was by the time of the last gurgle. And of course I felt guilty, but c’mon, you gotta do what you gotta do.

Daniel

40

Cruise ships.

They’re big, and they move.

They still creep me out.