BS: irrational fear

Subject: BS: irrational fear
From: Morticia
Date: 07 Jul 09 - 05:40 PM

Do you have one? What is it? I don't like leaving the shower curtain pulled across the bath to dry because I think there is someone hiding behind it waiting to pull a psycho on me.

Don't even get me started on moths.

Subject: RE: BS: irrational fear
From: Amos
Date: 07 Jul 09 - 05:43 PM

Why would anyone want to get you started on moths? Surely, a nice Chiantio would better serve...



A

Subject: RE: BS: irrational fear
From: Art Thieme
Date: 07 Jul 09 - 06:27 PM

I've mentioned before that I have a fear of Christmas.
Yep, I am a noel coward.

I guess I'm a psychoceramic crackpot of some kind. I fear pottery.

Art

Subject: RE: BS: irrational fear
From: bubblyrat
Date: 07 Jul 09 - 06:36 PM

I ,too,have a dread of Christmas ----I suffer from Santa Claustrophobia.

Subject: RE: BS: irrational fear
From: Skivee
Date: 07 Jul 09 - 06:47 PM

I'm afraid of falling asleep on Christmas eve. The the doc says that I have St. Nickolepsy.
I also have an unreasonable fear of house centipedes. Ick.

Subject: RE: BS: irrational fear
From: Melissa
Date: 07 Jul 09 - 07:16 PM

Chickens..with those creepy swivel-heads and beady eyes and awful birdsmell.

I found Disney World mildly terrifying..I worried about what would happen if someone thought I wasn't being cheery enough (and I worried that I was a nut for feeling threatened by the insistent, unnatural force-happy)

Subject: RE: BS: irrational fear
From: jacqui.c
Date: 07 Jul 09 - 07:31 PM

Spiders - a lot less than I used to be but the fear is still there.

Subject: RE: BS: irrational fear
From: gnu
Date: 07 Jul 09 - 07:46 PM

jac... thank goodness you live where there are no poisonous spiders... just snakes. Of course, few, and they seldom get in the house, except in the cellar in late fall....

Subject: RE: BS: irrational fear
From: Peace
Date: 07 Jul 09 - 07:46 PM

I think I have an irrational fear of being eaten by an alligator.

Subject: RE: BS: irrational fear
From: Peace
Date: 07 Jul 09 - 07:50 PM

This is the guy that worries me. That's what makes it irrational.

Subject: RE: BS: irrational fear
From: gnu
Date: 07 Jul 09 - 07:56 PM

Mmmmm... pan size.

Subject: RE: BS: irrational fear
From: gnu
Date: 07 Jul 09 - 07:58 PM

Oh... BEING eaten. I had that butter ready.

Subject: RE: BS: irrational fear
From: jacqui.c
Date: 07 Jul 09 - 07:58 PM

gnu - I like snakes!

Subject: RE: BS: irrational fear
From: Art Thieme
Date: 07 Jul 09 - 08:01 PM

The thing about alligators is they're always making allegations . If they ever lose their jobs, I suspect they'll all go on Gator-aid. If I ever was alone with onwe, I'd probably be in fear of it...

That's no crock!

Art

Subject: RE: BS: irrational fear
From: Peace
Date: 07 Jul 09 - 08:05 PM

Oy vay-iz meer. THAT was BAD, Art. Good one.

Subject: RE: BS: irrational fear
From: Jeri
Date: 07 Jul 09 - 08:05 PM

Peace, them little ones take longer and prolong the agony.

I used to be scared of spiders, but I got over it. I like reptiles, worm, and most critters. I don't love spiders, but I'm not afraid anymore. Had one in my apartment in Korea that I pretty much left alone because it got rid of some less stationary bugs.

I do have a problem with noises in my house. I don't know why, other than a problem I had with an attic squirrel. Of course I'm mostly past the critter-eating-my-house thing and I'm into the furnace-is-gonna-blow-up thing.

Subject: RE: BS: irrational fear
From: Neil D
Date: 07 Jul 09 - 09:02 PM

I have an irrational fear of bad puns, and you all have just scared the hell out of me!

Subject: RE: BS: irrational fear
From: Art Thieme
Date: 07 Jul 09 - 09:02 PM

Being a July kid, I was born a Cancer. Well, THAT scared me.

So I had a sign-change operation --- and all is well now.

Art

Subject: RE: BS: irrational fear
From: Peace
Date: 07 Jul 09 - 09:24 PM

Art, you are on a roll today.

Subject: RE: BS: irrational fear
From: Jeri
Date: 07 Jul 09 - 09:29 PM

'Art on a roll'--I knew a deli that did what could be called that.

Subject: RE: BS: irrational fear
From: Janie
Date: 07 Jul 09 - 09:38 PM

Morty,

I have an irrational fear in certain situations of heights, but all heights don't bother me.   Airplanes, tall buildings, or overlooks with sturdy rails don't bother me - it is more like fear of walking across things like swinging bridges, railroad trestles where there are those big gaps between the ties, or walking on a wall or path with a little height to it that is exposed on both sides. There has got to be some somewhat realistic, even though remote possibility of falling off, (or getting run over by a train), but my reaction is phobic and out of proportion to the danger. I'll swim or wade a creek in winter before I will cross it on a fallen log, even if the drop is only 4 feet. (On the occasions I have actually fallen of the log or slipped off rocks while jumping from stone to stone across a creek, the fear completely dissolves for the rest of the hike, but is there just a strong on the morrow.

Climbing trees, back when I was strong and agile enough to do so, didn't bother me a bit.

Go figure.

Subject: RE: BS: irrational fear
From: Bee-dubya-ell
Date: 07 Jul 09 - 09:42 PM

Someone once told me that fearing something only serves to attract it to you.

Ever since then, I've lived in mortal fear of hundred-dollar bills.

Subject: RE: BS: irrational fear
From: Jeri
Date: 07 Jul 09 - 09:54 PM

I think you sure notice a thing more if you're afraid of it. The noises here are like that. I freak out because something's rustling on the floor, and it's my feet on a piece of paper. Some low noise turns out to be my stomach, but before I figure them out, they get the adrenaline pumping.

Of course, I don't think I can work up a fear of money. I can try, but I don't think it's going to work, and if it does, the money will turn out to really be toilet paper or something.

Subject: RE: BS: irrational fear
From: Rapparee
Date: 07 Jul 09 - 10:00 PM

I think all of my fears are rational, even the one about Prince Charles falling in love with me and carrying me off to his castle in the Orkneys where he has his way with me and then abandons me, unpaid, in the snow as bait for the local Sasquatches.

Subject: RE: BS: irrational fear
From: Peace
Date: 07 Jul 09 - 10:10 PM

Sounds rational to me, Rap, other than the Sussquach/Suscuatsch/Sasquatsch Yeti reference.

Subject: RE: BS: irrational fear
From: wysiwyg
Date: 07 Jul 09 - 10:12 PM

All my "irrational" fears have turned out, with a little memory-recovering work, to have been based on actual, real-bad incidents. What has been irrational has been not the fear, but the response. Once the prior event has remembered, it's been pretty easy to dispose of the no-longer-accurate response. And the feeling of fear.

~S~

Subject: RE: BS: irrational fear
From: Rapparee
Date: 07 Jul 09 - 10:15 PM

Sometimes that's easier said than done. I'm dealing with that sort of thing right now; I have an appointment tomorrow, in fact.

Subject: RE: BS: irrational fear
From: Peace
Date: 07 Jul 09 - 10:18 PM

Dogs. I am terrified of dogs. I went to pet one that looked much like THIS and the s-o-b actually lunged at me.

From now on, I just won't go near dogs.

Subject: RE: BS: irrational fear
From: TRUBRIT
Date: 07 Jul 09 - 10:40 PM

I will vouch for the fact that Jacqui likes snakes -- when my younger daughter lived at home she had about 4 snakes and multiple reptiles living here (Peace - you would have hated it) -- Jacqui used to take the snakes out and play with them....

Subject: RE: BS: irrational fear
From: Janie
Date: 07 Jul 09 - 10:49 PM

I luvs ya Peace, but go to hell anyways;>)

Subject: RE: BS: irrational fear
From: Peace
Date: 07 Jul 09 - 11:03 PM

That's not a fear. THAT'S where I expect to end up.

Subject: RE: BS: irrational fear
From: Bee-dubya-ell
Date: 07 Jul 09 - 11:09 PM

I'm a bit fearful of helicopters flying over at night. They don't bother me in the daytime 'cause I can look up and see that they are, in fact, helicopters. But at night, I wonder if they're real helicopters or alien spaceships. Yeah, I know alien spaceships are supposed to only emit a low hum, but don't ya think a critter smart enough to fly here from light-years away might be smart enough to disguise his spaceship by making it sound like a helicopter?

And even if they are real helicopters, how do I know they aren't out looking for an alien spaceship that may have crash-landed in a neighbor's cow pasture or peanut field?

And even if they aren't looking for crash-landed aliens, how do I know the pilot isn't some hot dog who's gonna use my house for target practice?

Subject: RE: BS: irrational fear
From: Neil D
Date: 07 Jul 09 - 11:18 PM

Helicopters flew over my house so low they shook my bed. Followed shortly by military jets. It was the night of September 11, 2001.
I damn near ended up under the bed.

Subject: RE: BS: irrational fear
From: Amos
Date: 07 Jul 09 - 11:22 PM

Art:

You could have had one of your parents cosine for you -- maybe that would have made you a Gemini with a hypotenuse rising? There's always an angle.


A

Subject: RE: BS: irrational fear
From: Art Thieme
Date: 08 Jul 09 - 01:13 AM

Now that I am mostly confined to a wheel chair, I AM on a proverbial roll. Thanks for noticing, Amos.

Geminis are schizoid and 2-faced.

Subject: RE: BS: irrational fear
From: Peace
Date: 08 Jul 09 - 08:36 PM

Amos, I just got it. The Cosine thingy. Only took a day.

Subject: RE: BS: irrational fear
From: olddude
Date: 08 Jul 09 - 09:04 PM

a swimming pool of Jell-o and a doctor saying you can go home after you eat it all

Subject: RE: BS: irrational fear
From: Rapparee
Date: 08 Jul 09 - 09:41 PM

I'm going to create a program for Bee-Dubya. He'll be using it on night and suddenly his computer screen will go black. There will be the sounds of helicopters and suddenly the words "We're Coming For You!" will appear.

Subject: RE: BS: irrational fear
From: Bill D
Date: 08 Jul 09 - 11:22 PM

hmmm...only thing I can think of is that I have for many years dreaded having a traffic accident in cold, wet weather, and being injured and lying, semi-concious, on icy pavement.
I don't dwell on this, and I drive in Winter just fine. I just now & then get this 'image' and shudder.

I'm designated bee remover...I climb things....I fly in aircraft...I will handle non-poisonous snakes....I will *gasp* install new software!....but please, if you find me sprawled on the road in icy weather...HELP!

Subject: RE: BS: irrational fear
From: Tangledwood
Date: 08 Jul 09 - 11:29 PM

Just don't know about you mob - having an irrational fear makes no sense at all.

Subject: RE: BS: irrational fear
From: Peace
Date: 08 Jul 09 - 11:36 PM

"having an irrational fear makes no sense at all."

Yer right.

Subject: RE: BS: irrational fear
From: Peace
Date: 09 Jul 09 - 12:24 AM

Irrational fears scare me. Don't know why.

Subject: RE: BS: irrational fear
From: Little Hawk
Date: 09 Jul 09 - 01:14 AM

I find really large women rather terrifying. ;-) I don't mean tall women. Tall women are fine with me. I mean LARGE women! I think it stems from my childhood experiences when my Czech grandmother used to descend on me like a giant squid, holler "Schveetie!" and crush me against her stupendous bosom! ARGH! There I would be like a helpless fly trapped in a spider's web, drowning in cheap perfume and embarrassment. It was horrifying.

Subject: RE: BS: irrational fear
From: GUEST,leeneia
Date: 09 Jul 09 - 11:18 AM

Like many other people, I have a terrible fear of open, high places like fire-watch towers. I cannot climb those steps, even though I know they are built as safely as another other structure. (I don't consider this fear irrational. Falling from a great height is horrible!)

Even a picture of a person on a dangerous height will cause my internal organs to clench.

Airplanes are no problem, however, because I can't see down to the ground.

Subject: RE: BS: irrational fear
From: Bill D
Date: 09 Jul 09 - 11:54 AM

"I find really large women rather terrifying. ;-)"

An early picture of Little Hawk, bravely trying a new therapy.

I guess it failed.

Subject: RE: BS: irrational fear
From: MMario
Date: 09 Jul 09 - 11:59 AM

I don't consider my fear of falling and heights irrational; unjustified, perhaps, but not irrational. My fear of new situations is irrational. Something as minor as going into a store I've never been into before can make me quake.

Subject: RE: BS: irrational fear
From: RangerSteve
Date: 09 Jul 09 - 02:31 PM

Vines. And some large plants. This is mostly from old B-movies about man eating plants. As a park ranger, I managed to overcome my fear, but I still have a healthy respect for vines and don't like turning my back on them.
There was an old movie where Christopher Lee plays a mysterious man on a railroad train who tells the futures of some of the passengers. One vignette involves a man returning home from a business trip to find his house is being taken over by man eating vines. The next day, I noticed a vine peeking up through my back deck. I figured I'd take care of it over the weekend. Within two days, it had completely covered the deck. Just like in the movie. I decided to use the front door for the rest of the summer. Fortunately, my landlord has no fears of plants, and he removed it.

This is the first time in my 59 years that I have used the word "Vignette". I must be getting cultured.

Subject: RE: BS: irrational fear
From: Penny S.
Date: 09 Jul 09 - 04:58 PM

I have one that is really hampering me. I had vexatious neighbours who sent me obnoxious letters. "Not aggressive, assertive, in order to get things done in a reasonable time". Things that had no legal requirement to be done. (Their point of view is that they did nothing bullying or harassing - banging, parking to make it hard for me to use my garage, other things were not that, and that I drove them from their home by not acceding to their demands.) I have a cramping stomach feel when white window envelopes turn up. They have moved, but remain in ownership and sharers in the management company, so I have to deal with them at times. I was Company Secretary, but they would not communicate at all in the end - they told Companies House something to suggest I was a threat to them. (CH has no record) As if I went around driving cars at them or cutting off their water. I find it really hard to do anything that leads to dealing with them, even when that thing is leading to my liberation. Or anything when having to deal with them has a higher priority than what I need to do for myself. I have to use work rounds such as going into school with my letters to work where others are about.
It is totally ridiculous to let this control persist, but it does.
And, weirdly and irritatingly, my subconscious does its own work rounds, making me drop off to sleep in the day, or feel ill, anything to "protect" me from the damage which was happening when I had to deal with them in the past.
Penny

Subject: RE: BS: irrational fear
From: Rapparee
Date: 10 Jul 09 - 09:30 AM

I have this irrational fear of being caught in a shootout between rival gangs or terrorists or drunken slobs on the opening day of deer season. It's not the shooting that bothers me, it's the idea of my perfect body being perforated by nasty old bullets and being left
a messy corpse.

I also have a fear of being hung, drawn, and quartered and that's why I haven't spent as much time in England as in Ireland. Many people don't know it, but I knocked up Elizabeth I and she swore to "get me" for knocking her up at 5 a.m.

Subject: RE: BS: irrational fear
From: MMario
Date: 10 Jul 09 - 09:45 AM

Bess is one to hold a grudgee, too. And face it, she's only been dead 406 years....

Subject: RE: BS: irrational fear
From: Becca72
Date: 10 Jul 09 - 12:36 PM

I have a fear of spiders so strong I can't even get near them to kill them. I just leave the room and let them have it.

I also, at 37 years old, still can't hang any extremities over the edge of the bed at night or sleep with the closet door open. But I read a lot of Stephen King.


Hey Little Hawk...c'mere. :-)

Subject: RE: BS: irrational fear
From: GUEST,Emily S
Date: 10 Jul 09 - 02:20 PM

I have tons of irrational fears. Many are fairly common, you know, the woods-at-night-monster, the privy-monster, the under-the-bed-monster, etc. When I was little I used to insist that the window close to my bed be closed at night, didn't matter how hot it was. Finally I confessed that I thought my mother was a witch and would fly in at night at get me. Outwardly I seem to be fairly well adjusted but...

the most irrational fear I have is for large round haybales. Who knows why. First saw them in England in the mid-70's and it was like some deep primeval fear welling up inside. It was the weirdest dread. I even get this looking at photos. It's bad enough when they are out in the field but so much worse when they are massed together by the road...like they are getting ready for an attack.

And everything scares me in the dark. I can barely cross a room to turn on the light...especially if the light is by the bed with you-know-what lurking beneath.

Can you tell you touched one of my buttons?
Thanks for all the puns! Humor is a great way to offset fear.
Emily

Subject: RE: BS: irrational fear
From: John P
Date: 10 Jul 09 - 03:26 PM

I'm afraid of large dogs that I don't know. I was attacked by a Great Dane when I was four years old. Oddly, I'm a doggy person, and once I get to know a dog I'm completely fine.

Subject: RE: BS: irrational fear
From: Peace
Date: 11 Jul 09 - 05:20 AM

"There was an old movie where Christopher Lee plays a mysterious man on a railroad train who tells the futures of some of the passengers."

Dr
Terror's
House
of
Horrors"

Great--flick.

Subject: RE: BS: irrational fear
From: Rapparee
Date: 11 Jul 09 - 10:28 AM

I'm going to cut the grass today and squarely face my fear that I'll be run over by a locomotive while doing so.

Subject: RE: BS: irrational fear
From: Peace
Date: 11 Jul 09 - 10:33 AM

Tough job, but someone's . . . .

Subject: RE: BS: irrational fear
From: Bill D
Date: 11 Jul 09 - 01:15 PM

loco-motive....isn't that almost like an 'irrational fear'?

Subject: RE: BS: irrational fear
From: Rapparee
Date: 11 Jul 09 - 01:51 PM

Never mind...I took a nap instead.

NOW I'll get ready to cut the grass while wearing complete body armor. The golfers are out.

Subject: RE: BS: irrational fear
From: Peace
Date: 11 Jul 09 - 01:56 PM

You'll look fetchin' Rap.

Subject: RE: BS: irrational fear
From: Rapparee
Date: 11 Jul 09 - 08:12 PM

I went to cut the back yard fist and...flooded the engine on the mower. So I trimmed some roses and did stuff like that and still couldn't get it started. So I said, "Screw it, there's always tomorrow" and went to the front of the house.

The neighbors two doors down were cutting my front yard! Not because it was unsightly, but it is small, they'd seen me in the back, and decided to cut it so I could figure out what had happened. Just a nice neighborly gesture.

Like the guy across the street who took our stump to the dump -- after three weeks he admitted what he'd done. Ever spend three weeks wondering what happened to a four foot long tree stump?

Subject: RE: BS: irrational fear
From: Peace
Date: 11 Jul 09 - 08:17 PM

Maybe ya got a fouled spark plug.

Subject: RE: BS: irrational fear
From: Rapparee
Date: 11 Jul 09 - 08:51 PM

Nah, after I let it sit long enough it fired right up. Besides, it's a new plug and correctly gapped (I didn't gap it, someone who knows what they're doing did).