Phobias
 

Ok, so we all know that there is a difference between a fear and a phobia; a fear is something relatively rational that doesn't necessarily disrupt everyday life, and a phobia is a somewhat irrational, sometimes inexplainable fear that causes the person to act AROUND their fear of this certain thing. My question here is: Has anyone had any peculiar phobias (or ANY phobias for that matter), or have they met anyone with any sort of severe phobia? Some of them are quite interesting (Aulophobia - a fear of flutes!), and you can see a list of many at http://www.phobialist.com.

Mine is emetophobia, a fear of vomit. It's not because I think it's gross (honestly, the gross-out factor doesn't get to me), I'm just terrified of it. I can't explain it, but whenever I hear or see anyone get sick, I hyperventalate and start to shake pretty badly. Other than that, however, I've not met anyone with any sort of peculiar phobia, just the more common ones like acrophobia (fear of heights) or arachnophobia (fear of spiders).

Aeroacrophobia- Fear of open high places.
Agoraphobia- Fear of open spaces or of being in crowded, public places like markets. Fear of leaving a safe place.
Anemophobia- Fear of air drafts or wind.(Ancraophobia)
Bathmophobia- Fear of stairs or steep slopes.
Chiraptophobia- Fear of being touched.
Cleithrophobia or Cleisiophobia- Fear of being locked in an enclosed place.
Dishabiliophobia- Fear of undressing in front of someone.
Eisoptrophobia- Fear of mirrors or of seeing oneself in a mirror.
Glossophobia- Fear of speaking in public or of trying to speak.
Hylophobia- Fear of forests.
Kenophobia- Fear of voids or empty spaces.
Mnemophobia- Fear of memories.
Ophthalmophobia- Fear of being stared at.
Sociophobia- Fear of society or people in general.

Optophobia- Fear of opening one's eyes.
Duchess? :D
Also Dutchphobia is coool. ;)

I fortunately don't have any phobias, though I am pretty scared of lightning and high winds. Roughing out a Category 4 hurricane, alone, can do that to you.

I do know a LOT of people, especially among our supposedly-educated teaching staff here at school, who are severely phobic of cats, though, moreso than of snakes, spiders, large dogs, or just about any other animal I can think of. There is also one teacher who is a general Zoophobe-she's phobic of ALL non-human animals.

The oddest phobia I've heard of was told to me a couple of years ago by one of my fifth graders, who told me that her then-16-year-old cousin, who lives in NYC, has a phobia of cheerleader pom-poms. The cousin and her family came down to South Carolina to visit over the Christmas holidays a couple of years ago, and it just so happened that my student, a girl, had gotten a cheerleader outfit for Christmas. The cousin walked in and saw the pom-poms sitting in a chair, and became hysterical, to the point that a neighbor called the police, fearing that someone in the house was being brutalized after hearing all the screams!

The bad thing about phobias is that most of the people who suffer from them do not realize that this is a very real mental illness, and a potentially harmful one at that, and that phobias can be treated and even cured. The people who have them, though, make excuses for them, and do not seem to want to get rid of the phobias, for some reason. THAT is the aspect that I cannot understand.

pitbulllady

I've started becoming really scared of mosquitoes recently, though I'm not sure if it's a phobia or not. I wasn't too bad last night with two in the house but usually I just cannot be in the same room as a mosquito and I can't put my mind at rest until it's either dead or I know it's gone from the house. I often get quite paranoid about it at night to the point where I can't sleep for fear that there is mosquito in my room. I also keep thinking that I hear the sound they make when there's nothing there.

There was one time a while ago where I seriously thought a mosquito was trying to land on my ear (ie. really loud buzzing) even though I don't think there was anything there. I practically jumped off the bed and ran out of the room and actually found it really hard to breath. I've had a panic attack before and it really felt like I was on the brink of one then!

That IS a peculiar one.

I wouldn't say that mine is potentially harmful because it HAS gotten better (whenever I was little it was so bad I'd worry about it so much that I'd give myself stomachaches, thus making my worrying worse!) But regardless I WOULD like to know how to get rid of it completely. I don't know why anyone want one, either!

:-[ Whenever I was little and my phobia was worse, I'd not be scared of the boogeyman, but the thought that whenever I'd go to sleep I'd somehow get sick.

Now that I think about it, I HAVE met someone with a relatively severe phobia. My friend in high school had coulrophobia (fear of clowns) pretty bad. While I know a lot of people are creeped out by clowns, he actually had a strong fear of them. I remember once while he was at a friend's house, he saw a glass clown on one of the shelves, and he ran out and wouldn't even go back in the room until his friend hid it under the sink. After that, he'd go in the room, but he still wouldn't go near the sink.

I totally sympathise. There's a lot of insects around this year especially the Craneflies (daddy long-legs) that are totally harmless but do make angry little noises when then get stuck behind things.

Does like you're getting a bit phobic there and you'd best find a way of dealing with it before you get more panic attacks, which are deeply unpleasant to experience. It's not a rational thing so it won't help to tell you that dangerous Mosquitos are very rare in Britain. You may get bitten by gnats or horseflies but your body's immune system can easily deal with their little toxins.

There are ways to overcome any phobia with help but specifically with your mosquito thing you could find out a lot about these tiny pests to convince your brain that you're actually way more powerful than them or get some allies to reassure you like a carnivourous plant that eats bugs (like a venus fly-trap or a sundew) or even cultivate the friendship of spiders.

When I was a kid I was scared of spiders, that old thing of imagining them crawling over your face when you sleep. One night it actually happened and it was a bit of anticlimax after all that worry, it just crawled off without causing me any harm or discomfort whatsoever. Since then i've always welcomed them in my home and helped them out the bath so they can continue the good fight against those annoying buzzing flying jerks.

The oddest phobia I've heard is the phobia of furnature, olives, and bathrooms. I'm serious, I really did read these somewhere. About the phobia of pom poms? Hmmm.....odd.

Um...is there a phobia of doing what everyone else does, because if there is, I probably have it.

Hey that's some interesting stuff! I definitely have
chronophobia -- fear of time
Dysmorphophobia- Fear of deformity (lately I've been having that too :()
Epistemophobia- fear of knowledge (the more I learn that more i realise i don't know and that it's a cruel world out there)

Now that's funny!! Hexakosioihexekontahexaphobia- Fear of the number 666 8D

I don't think I have any phobias... not more than the usual, at least. And I don't like doign what everyone else does... but who does? (don't answer that)

i dont have many, but i have some odd ones. first, and i dont know why, but i change my socks about 3 or 4 times a day, fear of having sweaty feet i gess. and the big one, i really hate getting wet [with my cloths on] if you sprayed water on me i'd freak out. i usally just woulden go to school when it rains. i gess it's cus when i was a little kid, my dad tryed to "intend great harm" to me by holding my head under water. [my mom has 10 brothers that took care of him.]

Forgive me for answering that question, but I couldn't resist.
EVERYBODY SEEMS TO DO WHAT EVERYBODY ELSE DOES. It annoys me to no end.

I know... Conformist people bother me!

Honestly!
Everybody wears converse or the laceless vans.
All the fourteen-year-old girls start wearing makeup.
All the highschool girls are afraid to get their hair wet when it's time for the swimming unit in P.E.
All the girls find it necessary to dye their hair different colors.
All the girls find it necessary to shop at two and only two stores: Hollister and American Eagle.
All the girls find it necessary to have fifty shirts and fifty pants so that they might not have to re-wear their clothes throughout the course of the school year.
Everybody watches anime because everybody else does it.
I could go on and on...

My hair is tooty-fruity-super-special-just-for-you-just-today brown.

But I kinda wish it was blue.

besides the make-up part, it kinda sounds like me. but i rock vans and DC's with the biggest laces money can buy.

I don't really have any like famous "clinical" phobias like from spiders or snakes or anything like that. I do generally steer away from snakes and stuff like that, but it's more out of general dislike then "phobia" based fears.

However there is one thing that does scare me to wits end: tornados. I can't stand them, the way they make the sky look and just imagining them tearing up everything around me just creeps me out. I've been through about 4 of em.

My house has never suffered any real damage but it still scares me to this day, and it's something I really can't get over.

That's a totally sensible fear then rather than a phobia isn't it if you've actually experienced 4 of them! Wow!

... lesee.... no, no, kinda (it take FOREVER and a half to dry), no, no, NO, no...

Yep, there's me for ya. Though I've always wanted to dye my hair bright blue and use gel to make it into one of those crazy anime haircuts, just for fun. But honestly, I like my hair as is.

Back to phobias, I have this thing about being in tight spaces with people, and human contact. I think it's prolly more than most people have.

I live in IL and it's fairly common that we get them, like i said we have had damages but never like our whole house destroyed or anything like that. Which I thank god for and have been scared enough to pray during some tornados.

The worst damage we had wasn't really a tornado per say. Our fence got blown apart by a microburst, it shattered the thing in two and blew some of the debris down by our across the street neighbors.

Oh, tornadoes scare me too! I've never actually seen one, but they still freak me out, but not as much as they used to, now that I know they can't do as much damage as a severe hurricane. It's just so funny, but I love hurricanes! You can't do anything!!! XD

I would love to see both, but I live in Connecticut, where the weather is as boring as everything else. :P

Back to phobias... I can't say I have any, although I avoid the number 19 as much as possible. And I hate bees.

same here, as a matter of a fact that's probably my only phobia, probably because of an event from my childhood... *shuddders*

Well, you're a guy. And guys do their own thing.
Bright blue is a different thing. I mean people who feel that they NEED to dye their hair blonde to be attractive and stuff like that. But blue is cool.

I know what you mean. everyone's like, "you should straighten your hair!" and do all this other crazy stuff to it... but I don't wanna...

I hate being around bees, also, although they are very important. :P

Achluophobia- Fear of darkness.

I hate the darkness it scares me to bits. My fear when it comes to darkness is being alone in my house and the power goes out. I have a vivid imagination so I start imagining things. And I sleep with three lights on in my room. :'( I hate darkness...

Climacophobia- Fear of stairs, climbing, or of falling downstairs.

I have a fear for moveing stairs. Especially in malls. Cuz the hight compared to the moveing of the stairs. I start feeling dizzy and sick. I nearly fell down on once beacuse of my fear. But i'm trying to overcome it.

Bee's I really don't mind, wasps and hornets on the other hand, I get very antsy when they are aound.

I can understand fear of wasps and hornets. Bees die after they sting something, but wasps seem to go on for-EVER!

We have so much to discuss. That is another good topic to PM about.

i know what you mean. i used to have a girlfriend that was into the goth thing and she always wanted me to have a mohawk and die my hair colors. i'd never do that. i think it looks stupid.

Hey! I'm not goth!
Wait. I think goth is extremely non-conformist. Conformists are people who do what everybody else does. So they're the other extreme. So I guess I'm somewhere in between. AND I'M COOL LIKE THAT. (Yeah, I stole your little phrase, Italianglowstix.)

you wanted my hair in a mohawk BC? lol i know italianglowstix, she's cool. i dont know if she on this new forum, i dont thing i'v seen her yet.

I know! I swatted a wasp with my shoe once and it was really scary because I got its upper body but not its lower body, and its lower body swung around and stung my shoe six times!

I wouldn't really say I have a phobia of them, though... just vomit. I can't even watch vomit-related movie scenes without making a jerk of myself in the theater. I almost started crying in the movie Hostel because some of those scenes are pretty intense for an emetophobe!

Hey! I never said that! Don't assume things that aren't true!

As I've clearly stated before, to me, dying your hair funky colors is...wierd. I do not care about wearing things that are "in fashion" and I do not care about being popular and trying to fit in. However, I do not support gangster-ism, gothic-ism, mohawks, and those types of things. I do not want to do what everbody else does, but I want to be decent and normal.

This is how I think it works. I could be wrong, but as far as I know, this is how it goes.
Goth = people who dress in black and who have no hope for the world.
Conformists = people who do what society tells them to do, whether or not there's rhyme or reason, or people who do what everybody else does just to "fit in"
People with Mohawks = I don't know. They're neither here nor there.

Well, i htink this should be moved to a PM discussion or a separate thread...

Phobias? well...

Really fast-moving bugs, and hoppping bugs! becuase you can't smack'em!

I found another person with a weird phobia... this girl that I work with has a phobia of soggy bread! She seriously freaks out when she sees/touches/thinks about it.

I don't have any phobea's persay. Heights make me uncomfortable and I am afraid of bees because of some events from my youth. About the worst thing I have is a form of anxiety that I have to take medication for.

does that mean your afaird of breathing everyone does it XDD

sorry I couldn't help it please don't kill me