What are your innate phobias? *non-gender related*

[riccirules]

I have trypanophobia (aka belonephobia), fear of hypodermic needles (or, more specifically, medical procedures involving hypodermic needles).
It's actually a real, recognized phobia... as is phobophobia (fear of fear), mottephobia (fear of butterflies and moths), acrophobia (fear of heights), coulrophobia (fear of clowns), etc.
**Edit: Not that I have any of the phobias following trypanophobia, just giving examples...**

When I had my fillings done and my wisdom teeth removed, I had them done at the same time (to save time and money), and I ended up having a horrific panic attack at the mere sight of the hypodermic needle coming at me.
I hyperventilated, cried, screamed, and passed out.

I don't think when I'm on T, I'll ever be able to do injections because of my phobia.

-Richie

[Anatta]

Kia Ora,

A phobia is "irrational" fear...

So Phobophobia= "irrational" fear of "irrational" fears. Not "rational" fear of "irrational" fears...

Metta Zenda

[riccirules]

Didn't really know that.
Thanks for clearing that up.
The thing I was reading just said fear of fear.

I guess you really do learn something new every day!
Thanks, Zenda!

-Richie

[piers816]

I'm scared of becoming old and senile. I never want to get to the point where I can't even get up to go to the bathroom by myself and have to wear one of those adult diapers and have someone take care of me.

[Silas]

I'm terrified of becoming completely deaf. I wear hearing aids, and each year I tend to have to get them programmed to be "louder". I figure I'll probably be too deaf for hearing aids to help very much by the time I'm in my 50's. It still scares the crap out of me.

Ghosts kinda scare me. I believe in them (in a half-agnostic way), and I do like them, I'm just pretty scared of them. Clowns as well, they creep me the hell out. I saw a poster of this killer clown horror movie when I was a little kid, and the poster alone gave me nightmares for 2 weeks. I still really can't stand clowns now.

Senility scares me, too. I'm mostly just scared of getting to the point where I can't remember who's real and who's just a character from one of my stories.

Not sure if this is a phobia, but most social situations scare me. If I'm expected to interact, it's worse. I'm fine in crowded classrooms if I can read or ignore everyone, but at a friend's dinner table, if they want me to speak with the other people seated, I will panic internally.

[Sera]

Fear of spiders. Now, this is not unusual, but mine is a bit more specific.  I am afraid of web building spiders with large bodies and long skinny legs.  But I think hunter spiders such as wolf, jumping spiders, and tarantulas are just plain adorable!

That is the only phobia I have that I can not attribute to trauma.  I have a fear of roads too, like, being a pedestrian, treading where cars tread, no event I can think of cause this, but I am sure there is one.  Cars are scary, though...

[ChloeDharma]

Spiders.....i can't sleep in the dark as i have a paranoid fear as soon as i turn off the light one might come and walk on me. Wasps....i jumped out of a moving car to escape a wasp once. Mirrors, heights, the dark, fog really scares me, clowns, windows at night. It's not a phobia as such but drunk people tend to scare me.

[grrl1nside]

Wasps, heights, needles, and guns... Hmmm... Most of those can hurt...

[Janet_Girl]

Innate.  That which I don't know, so I try to understand it.  I do have claustrophobia, which came on the day I could not breath.  That was when I found out I had COPD.  Since then I can not even stand to watch something on TV, that is remotely about being buried alive or in a small tunnel.

[Lily]

Heights
Rapid movements
Crowds
Becoming mentally disabled

[tekla]

But how do you feel about Endives or Arugula?

[Eleanor]

I'm pretty afraid of needles, big crowds, most creepy crawlies, and a whole host of other things. I only have one fear that I'd class as a phobia, though, and it's a bit of an unusual one: I'm utterly terrified of crabs. The beach type, as opposed to the type you can get from sleeping around. ^_~ My older brother threw one at me when I was about four years old, and ever since they've provoked real horror in me. Images of them cause my heartbeat to race and my body to start shaking involuntarily, and knowing that there's even a piece of one of their shells near me usually sends me into panic and tears. I'm fortunate in that it's not something you're really thrown into contact with every day, but I absolutely can't go near beaches, fish markets or certain sections of aquariums and museums.

[varelse]

I have a fear of confrontation, couple that with paranoia and I fear crowds and meeting new people, I'm afraid of going blind, Im afraid of being alone in the dark, (i sleep with a lamp on), needles dont really scare me, per se, but they do make me very uncomfortable. I'm also afraid of heights, elevators, enclosed places, being underground, and anything poisonous(animal or chemical).

[heatherrose]

Sleeping alone in the dark.
There must be some sort illumination, no  matter how dim.
I can not relax, to be able to go to sleep,
unless I know I can see what's going on around me.

[~RoadToTrista~]

Falling into the ocean and being eaten by a megalodon.

[varelse]

Logan, never play silent hill 4.

[JungianZoe]

I also despise and fear vents.  I watched an X-Files episode when I was little and yeah I don't want to talk about it.  Something being in the walls...

Eugene Victor Tooms!!   Sorry... huge X-Files fan.

While I don't have that fear of vents, I had a moderate fear of storm drains when I was kid, after reading Stephen King's It.  "We all float down here."

[Pinkfluff]

I wouldn't say I really have any phobias, defined as irrational fears. I don't like insects much, especially flying ones, though I think this has alot to do with being attacked by a wasp as a small child. I was dumb enough to follow my brother's urging and look into a hole in the wooden bird feeder post without knowing why he wanted me to look in there. The wasp inside flew out and attacked... And of course my luck it went for me and not him lol. Always been afraid of tornadoes too, though I think that is a very rational thing to be afraid of

[nogoodnik]

My main phobia is pholcid spiders — i.e. daddy long legs, but several different arthropods are referred to by that name, and my phobia is specifically of pholcids. I don't mind other spiders that much, not wild about them walking on or near me but it's nothing like how I feel about pholcids.

I don't usually tell people IRL because people then seem to think it's absolutely hilarious to capture one and surprise me with it and then laugh while I start hyperventilating. I don't know why so many people are horrible about phobias like that... most people wouldn't, say, lock a claustrophobic in a cupboard*, and yet so many people think other phobias are less serious and therefore it's acceptable and funny to exploit them. The same thing used to happen to a friend of mine who had a phobia of mould — people would always chase her around with mouldy food until she started crying and everyone would laugh because "it's only mould".

I'm also very afraid of heights. Oh, and I'm unreasonably nervous around horses. I know why, it's because my first experiences of them when I was very young involved adults repeatedly telling me "Don't go near its legs, it will kick you and you'll be killed!" so I have this strong subconscious idea of horses as UNPREDICTABLE DEATH BEASTS and prefer to keep a fence between them and me at all times.


*_{I know some people are really nasty, but I'm talking about the average person}

[SarahLynn]

I'm afraid of spiders. Once I came within inches of a dead tarantula the size of my hand (outstretched) before I noticed it was there. It scared the hell outta me.

I'm not afraid of heights but I am afraid of falling. I get VERY vivid death images in my head when I am up high.

Last but not least I'm afraid of (or at least was) clown dolls in the dark. I had one in my room when I was a child and I swear that thing would turn it's head and look at me when the lights were off.....Creepy!