You lived in Ohio and and you were afraid of earthquakes? Well, that’s certainly irrational. I’d say floods, or or locusts were more dangerous.
Somehow I got the idea that vampires would come get me at night and the only way to protect myself was if the blankets were pulled up over my ears (covering your neck is never enough to stop bloodsuckers). Of course, they were hiding under my bed so every night I would slam down on the light switch, run across the room and leap into my bed where the blankets had already been flipped over to the side so I could just pull them back over.
I wasn’t afraid of the toilet in my house just all others or, as I used to call them, “strange potties”. It stemmed from when I was 4 and visiting my aunt. She was soaking my younger cousin’s cloth diaper in the toilet bowl and I didn’t notice. I used the toilet, flushed and suddenly the toilet started overflowing!!! Water was running everywhere (along with a lot of other things) and I just stood there screaming. After that episode I refused to use any toilet I didn’t know. We went on a driving vacation out west when I was 7 and I seriously didn’t crap for 3 days (I would always make my dad stop the car so I could pee behind a bush). Finally my mother caught on to why I was feeling so lousy so she gave me prune juice and made me sit on the hotel room toilet until I went. I sat for two hours, crying, until I couldn’t hold it any longer. When my mom flushed I was sure the “strange potty” would explode. It didn’t to my immense relief and I was cured of my fear of hotel potties. The fear of school ones didn’t fade until I was almost 10.
I could not pass a mirror in a dark room because I was sure that my reflection would be an evil, demonic version of myself that would come out and kill me.
I also went through the stage when I was sure I would die in my sleep because I would stop breathing. My mother used to sit with me and keep repeating, “You’re OK, you’re still breathing.”
I was sure that if I shut off the light in a room at night before I opened the door that some monster would get me. I don’t know what it was going to be, but it would attack if my light was off.
Slight hijack: late one night I watched The Ring. I didn’t think it was overly scary (some slight jump moments). I went to the bathroom before going to bed. As I was about to open the door I was positive that the little girl would be on the other side. I laughed to myself at the notion, turned out the light and opened the door.
There, in front of me, stood a little girl, her hair hanging down over her face. I screamed at the top of my lungs, my heart stopped and almost wet my pants. My reaction immediately started my 6 year old daughter crying and screaming. Yes, that was my sweet little girl standing there. After we both calmed down she was able to tell me that she had a bad dream and wanted to come sleep in my bed. Naturally, I felt so terrible for how I scared her that I said yes. But I couldn’t fall asleep for a couple hours because I’d close my eyes and see her standing there. Shudder.
When I was a kid we lived in Japan for several years. In case anyone is unaware of this, Japanese bugs are really fucking HUGE and scary in general, but some of them are total nightmares. Anyway, my room had about a 2.5 foot long spur of hallway leading to my door from the wider main hallway, and the carpet along there was a deep royal purple. One morning my dad came down the hall and spotted what he assumed was a plastic Creepy Crawly bug (molds and plastic in a kit that we’d melt and cast our own bugs out of) on the floor outside my door, an eight inch long brown centipede with a bright red head and fluorescent yellow legs. He bent down to pick it up and it scurried off. He jumped back and stomped it (he was wearing his outside shoes in the house, SUCH a big no-no!) then left it there. I came out of my room to see this squished giant centipede, and all those legs scattered in a circle two feet in diameter, bright yellow legs against dark purple carpet and they were STILL TWITCHING! I had to jump over that spot in the rug for the next two years until we moved back to the US–never once did I step foot on the centipede rug, no matter how idiotic everyone else thought I was. Hell with them, I just knew there were still centipede legs in that carpet waiting to get all over me…
To this day I cannot stand going under a railway bridge on which a train is running. I get this horrible crepitation in my scalp and neck and I duck and shudder–I just KNOW that train is going to collapse the trestle on top of me JUST as I’m driving under it.
We are all aware of just how big they get. They keep showing the movie.
Hey, olivesmarch4th, you’re not alone on the mold thing… I’m a bit better now… but any mold on anything would cause me to gag uncontrollably at the sight of it (especially on yogurt, apple sauce, and bread).
When I was a kid we lived in California and my parents liked to go to this seafood joint in Newport Beach called the Crab Cooker. Part of the decor was a giant shark mount hung from the ceiling, complete with a little sign hanging off giving the details of the catch. I was freaking terrified of that shark. It was either going to come to life again and eat me, or fall on our table. We went there all the time and I just sat there in horror the whole time waiting for that sucker to make it’s move. Stupid shark.
When I was around 6-7 years old I stayed up late and watched a movie called The Gate on HBO. Relatively tame by today’s standards but there was one scene where a temporary “portal” opened up under a kid’s bed and demons grabbed his leg and pulled him underneath and away into whereever the gate went to. This created a three foot danger zone surrounding every bed for the next year. I could not simply go to bed, I had to JUMP into my bed so that my legs never got close enough to the underneath parts where the demons were waiting to grab me.
That was a good one erie774.
My phobia was everybody was starring at me. Oh wait! I guess they really were. I was a bit hard to ignore after first grade.
Bees and wasps. The first time I ever saw anyone get stung by anything was in 9th grade, where the G/T teacher got stung by a bee, and called us all over to look at the stinger.
But sometimes one would make its way into my room, and circle the light fixture and hang out in there. Sometimes a couple of wasps. I would just lay in my bed, terrified, until I worked up the courage to ROCKET out of the room and go get my mommy to kill them.
Monkeys and violins.
And if a monkey had ever played a violin, I would have been screwed.
In the sixth grade, I had a major phobia of missing the schoolbus. Since there was a considerable distance separating home from school, it wasn’t completely irrational.
I had this mean math teacher named Ms. Johnson. Math was my last class of the day, and my classmates were alll rowdy kids who would NEVER SHUT UP. Ms. Johnson wouldn’t dismiss us unless everyone was dead quiet. If we were talking when 3:30 rolled around, she’d sit at her desk and say “It’s your time now. I can be here all day”. And kids would KEEP on talking! I could never believe it!
Meanwhile, I’d be sweating bullets because the rest of the student body would be out in the schoolyard, the buses all revving up their engines, ready to go. Miraculously, she’d usually release us just in time. I’d have to run at the speed of light, loaded down with my bookbag and violin case, but I would usually make it to my bus just before the driver pulled off the curb.
One day, the class WOULD NOT SHUT UP and Ms. Johnson decided to hold us hostage again. Nervously, I watched as my bus driver, who’d been standing right outside out of the classroom window smoking a cigarette, headed towards the bus. I yelled at my classmates to shut up but they just kept talking. Ms. Johnson looked like she was prepared to camp out all night.
I felt a surge in my belly. The familiar, not-too-unpleasant flush of my adrenaline. I got out of my seat, rushed up to her desk, and yelled:
ImsorrybutIgottagoIcan’tmissmyschoolbus!!!
And you know what Ms. Johnson said as I flew out of the door?
“Go on, baby.”
The next day, a friend of mine told me that after I had left, she tried to do the same thing but Ms. Johnson wouldn’t let her. The whole class missed their schoolbuses (ha-ha!). I’m thinking Ms. Johnson saw how close I was to completely flipping out and gave me her only “get out of jail” card. I was the special one. :eek:
But after the sixth grade, once I learned how to ride public transit and learned how to live more adventurously, I lost the phobia.
For me, it was the basement. We had the big, creepy oil burner down there, and lots of space for ghosts and assorted monsters. I was certain that these creatures were eagerly awaiting the moment when mom sent little 6-year-old me downstairs with instructions to get a loaf of bread from the big freezer.
E.T. and the Mummenschanz still give me the heebie-jeebies to this day.
Oh, sweet Jeebus, that’s a hilarious image. Poor kid. And your poor parents – imagine trying to deal with a leaf-phobic kid.
“BIG LEAF!!!”
Man, I’m going to be laughing all day.