Extreme Phobia

[Lisa]

Does anybody here have a phobia?

I have been told by my housemates that there is a huge spider in our kitchen, right by the washing machine (where my washing is). I am now deep breathing as I write this because I am only just about keeping inches away from pure terror... and it is always the same level of terror as my highest terror point when in PTSD meltdown...

Here, I don't mean on the level of something that scares you that you avoid... I mean something that terrifies you to the point that if you were trapped in a room with your phobia, you would actually willingly kill yourself in your terror. Now if I was in Australia and had had a life threatening experience with a spider, I would say I have PTSD in relation to spiders... but in England, spiders can't kill and I have no memory of any traumatic incident with any spider.... like the fear was always there, so spiders have always, by default, been a traumatic thing to me in general. But I know this is just an irrational phobia. In a way, I don't understand why I get terrified to the level that I do, I know it's silly... but it's damn real to me.

I know it is unreasonable in a way, but I am livid that my housemate who is my usual protector when it comes to this, actually saw this spider days ago and did not just get rid of it for me. Because I now cannot eat. I cannot go into that kitchen... and I am in hypervigilance mode with the whole house. I am also livid, because this housemate knows that another housemate who I don't get on with actually PUT a spider in my room last year and laughed at me... naturally, I am worried she will do the same with this spider. If that happens, she'll have done it to the wrong person because I am only just about in check with my anger towards her... but anyway...

Until I know that spider is found, and dead or put out of this house... I don't know what I am going to do. And god forbid should I see another spider...

SO to any of you who suffer a phobia or fear to such extreme, debilitating extent... how do you cope? Have you ever overcome your phobia, and how?

Needing some advice should I come face to face with this thing...

Thanks.

[2quilt]

I am phobic of spiders too. Sleep with a flyswatter where you can reach it while you sleep. Ask your roomate to go through the kitchen and around the house and find the spider and kill it or haul it outside far away from the house. If it has been a few days, the spider is no longer in the kitchen. My home is larger than yours I'll bet ( I live in the US) and the last tiny spider I saw walked from one end to the other overnight. The spider is outside by now looking for water to drink and a meal. There are no bugs inside.

I would just love to see Australia, but then I watched this show on the animal planet station about how 3 of the top ten venomous spiders live there. And then there are the snakes...

[cypher]

aaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaahhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhh hhhhhh!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! :mad::mad::mad: I saw the word spider and did'nt read furthur. nor will i, sorry! no offence!!

[Claire]

Hello Lisa, I used to be really bad with spiders but I'm a bit better now. My Dad and brother used to tease me with them when I was younger. I dont think they realised the damage they were doing! :rolleyes:

I once removed my whole bed, including mattress trying to find a spider in my bedroom. I am now much better with them though. My weapon of choice is the hoover! If you extend it to the max length and then aim and fire! Its not kind on the spiders but hell at least it means I can go back in the room. I have been known to then put the hoover outside just in case it could then crawl out of the hoover but so far I've never seen one do that! I also put a glass or other container over them and carefully slid a piece of paper under and then put the whole lot outside.

I think you would feel best by tackling this yourself rather than expecting your housemate to do it for you. You will feel a lot more in control if you do. I also try and think of the good things that spiders do, eg. great bird food, they eat flies, ants etc. so they do have a role to play. They are horrible but they wont hurt you and you can remove them. Just little by little, like exposure therapy in a way.

[cactus_jack]

I am afraid of nothing. Literally. Not even spiders. Except for Black Widows. I am terrified of Black Widows. Any other spider doesn't phase me in the least. But Black Widows..... yikes!

[cypher]

Did everything turn out ok? I hope everything did and it's gone!
Take Care!

[Lisa]

Thanks guys

2quilt... I hope to god it's gone out of the house because they always seem to turn up in my bedroom otherwise!! Usually my housemates would get rid of it but they've all said it's so big they didn't want to touch it.... uuuuugggh.... but thank you for the reassuring post, it helped a little! I know spiders roam... im just dreading their mating season... more of them!

Cypher - They think it lives under the washing machine so I've sprayed fly killer under there. I know trying to kill it is not nice, but it's trespassing in my house! Nobody's seen it since, so here's to hoping...

Claire...cheers for the advice... I am going to try to tackle spiders myself...You're right, it would help if I could tackle them myself then I wouldn't need to rely on someone being in the house who is willing to help me. But I cannot get close to them. The best I might be able to do and have done before is throw a book at it, or spray it with fly killer. But that would be a good start I suppose.

Sounds like you are similar to me! I have refrained from using a hoover before for fear of it crawling out again. But I will try that as a last resort...though the hoover may have to live in the garden after for a while!

Using a glass.... have tried that before and I managed to get the glass over it but couldn't bring myself to slide paper under... I can't look at them easily, see... and when they move I freak!

But I know I need to try to confront this phobia more, so I can at least deal with spiders as it seriously affects my life. I nearly moved out last year because we had an influx of spiders with the summer rain... I sat up from 2am waiting for the university to open at 9am on the day of an exam because I had seen a spider in the toilet and I couldn't it use with it in there...! I swore if I saw another spider, I'd move out... luckily it's been 10 months since I've seen one though so I've managed to stay here. People often laugh at my phobia's... this is the only 'common, reasonable' one I have but it's the worst... but I have some strange other phobias. I think people don't realise I'm serious...! So it doesn't help when at first people are like "oooh look I have a spider"... but they soon realise Im serious... though I am ashamed to admit such extreme reaction, I have before, when cornered with my phobia, reacted with violence...

For now, I have reloaded my defences in my room... ant killer around the skirting boards, a deterrent spray on windows, holes and door frame, an infrared 'siren' that apparently irritates them so they don't come near, a plug in 'fumigator' that lets off a chemical, a spider catcher by my bed (but the suction isn't strong enough for anything more than a money spider), and every room I enter I do a spider check before I walk in... at worst I have a small bomb thing (it's not a bomb but it's called that) and if I use that I have to stay out of my room for 12 hours and kills any insect or bug alive in the room... but it covers the room in dust so I don't use that unless it's an emergency.

So I feel a little safer now.

Cactus jack... I wish I was like you in regards to spiders... we don't get many poisenous spiders here... if any...

[Cecilia]

My phobia is closed in spaces. I would gladly go hunt down or even sit by a spider, just don't close the door on me when I am in the laundry closet!

[2quilt]

I once stayed at a Bed & Breakfast in Vermont with a host pair who were on the edge of crazy. One tried to heal me. Laying on hands healing. I told her not to heal me because i get a federal disability check!
At breakfast on the third day, after we had all been laughing real hard, the husband brought out his "pet" surprize and asked me to hold my hand out.

No, it was not a spider.

I warned him seriously not to put a spider in my hand unless he wanted me to throw it against the wall and kill it, and sh*t my pants in the process. He promised me that his pet was not a spider.

So I held my hand out. With a mouthful of blueberry muffin and the coffee cup in my right hand, he placed the pet in my left hand, and I opened my eyes. It was a Madagascar cockroach as big as my whole hand and it weighed about half a pound! You should have heard the screams of laughter when they all saw my face. He did this at the breakfast table with everyone eating. I laughed so hard I cried.

Memorable, to say the least.

[Cecilia]

2quilt:

I'm glad you could laugh about that! I'm not sure I would have lived to tell that story....or the poor roach may not have survived that story.

I bet you are a lot of fun to travel with; you seem fun-loving.

[2quilt]

Some tell me that I need to write a book about my adventures with my husband.
1. How the pillow caught fire the first time we had sex.
2. I mooned my new fatherinlaw on my wedding day
3. The four disasters of Dia de las Bromas in the Yucatan (practical joke day)
4. Kostas Cats (that story in in my blog on this website)

Husband calls me an entertainment value.

[Cecilia]

Ok, the pillow catching on fire really grabbed my attention.

When you have time maybe you can blog some of your.....adventures. :smile:

[cactus_jack]

Did you know that a can of OFF and a butane lighter works wonders against Black Widows? :occasion:

[2quilt]

...Just as long as it doesn't catch the foliage on fire, then the house itself.

[Cecilia]

2quilt knows what she is talking about. She caught her pillow on fire. Hopefully not trying to kill a spider. LOL

[2quilt]

I posted the pillow fire story on my blog.

[Lucky Laser]

Thunder and lightning during the night has been one of mine. When I was a child the chance of a thunderstorm at night would keep me up for most of the night worrying and at the smallest rumble I would go running into my parents room. The fear has decreased a lot but when I wake up to a thunderstorm I still get a scared feeling inside and sometimes get up and do something. The odd thing is, if I am not alone or its daylight then I love thunderstorms.

As a kid I also used to be terrified of flushing toilets. I remember my parents making me flush one of the toilets in our house many times until I could do it without being scared!

[fragile_4_life]

I also have a terrible phobia of spiders. Like you I have no idea where it came from but I've always been terrified of them. It's crazy and I know it's totally irrational, but I can't control it. It's so bad that I tired to jump out of a moving car once that was going about 60 miles per hour because there was a spider. Luckily the other person in the car grabbed me before I jumped.

Last summer it was horrible. I worked at a camp all summer so I lived with spiders. It was really hard for me. I had to work really hard to not think about how many spiders were around and when I had to face one I had to concentrate on my breathing and talk myself into calming down. I always had a can of spider spray with me so I could kill them. I can't get close enough to squish them without having a complete panic attack so spraying them is the only way I can kill them. So I made it for 2 months living and working at camp with spiders and I was pretty proud of myself. But once I got back home things got crazy bad. I saw one spider in the house and completely freaked out. Then I saw another one a few hours later and I was convinced that the house was infested. I was in complete panic and very hypervigilent. I would search each room before I would feel comfortable to stay in there for a long period of time. I would scan the ceiling to make sure that there were no spiders and then I'd look in the cornors. If I found a spider I would have to leave the room and I couldn't go back in there untill it was killed. I would have a "safe place" where I felt like there was no spiders and I felt safe there. I was almost paranoid. At one point I seriously started to think that the spiders where out to get me because everytime I found a "safe place" a spider would show up there and it was no longer "safe". I couldn't sleep because I would think that I felt spiders crawling on me. When trying to go to bed I wouldn't be able to cover up with blankets even if I was really cold because whenever I covered up I felt the spiders. Then I thought that spiders had contaminated my bed so I couldn't sleep there. So I went to sleep on the couch in the livingroom, but then I saw a spider on the ceiling. I would sit on the couch and stare at the tv all night trying to distract myself because I couldn't sleep. I went for almost a week without sleeping at all. I was always in a state of panic, I was exhausted, but I couldn't sleep. I knew it was rediculous but I couldn't stop it. The terror was so real for me. It lasted for a little over a month. Luckily after I went back to college for the school year it ended. I still have a horrible phobia but it's not as psychotic as it got last summer.

I'm going back to work at camp in 2 weeks and I'm really nervous. I'm so afraid the psychotic episode or whatever it was that happened will happen again especailly since I really will be around a lot of spiders at camp.

-Mandy

[rob4444]

M phobia is meeting new people...more people to think im nuts!....as for spiders and snakes,i pay them respect,but dont fear them...even after being bitten by the male Sydney Funnel Web last year...the worlds deadliest spider..i survived..barely..without medical attention(would definately go for help/antivenom next time)...its deadly nuero toxins actualy improved a problem with my nervous system...go figure..im more worried about why i didnt go for help(he only got 1 fang in temporarily..which i quickly removed,and i thought i should be sweet)the pain and massive panic attack,similar to a heart attack..followed by days of feeling like id fought Mike Tyson...ouch!..i cut firewood in the bush for a crust,and see hundreds of spiders and a few snakes..i used to kill them,but now i pick them up and move them(not funnel webs!)

[Lisa]

rob4444 - I just couldn't live anywhere with those deadly spiders. I'm glad you survived the bite!

The funny thing is, I suppose most would think I fear spiders biting? But I don't think any in England do, or if they do they don't have teeth! I'm just scared of them getting on me! How crazy is that? I should *flick* it off... but I can't describe it, the terror.

fragile 4 life, I have actually been like that, always do when in a panic, though the worst lasts maybe 3 or so days, but the leftover hypervigilance, difficultly sleeping, thinking they're on me, that lasts usually about a month after seeing a spider in my house. I swear some of that you wrote was word for word me! AND...it's much worse if a spider's in my room as that's where I sleep and I won't sleep if I think there's a spider in my room. The thoughts about being infested, thinking they're trying to get you- I have believed that kind of paranoia too. In fact, every time... when I'm in that panic all I can think is "They're everywhere, there must be a nest, AND THEY ALWAYS COME FIND ME!!!". Seriously man, it's not even funny.

I am glad to say the spider in the kitchen has not been seen or spoken of since, so I am assuming it's dead/gone. And so my panic is lower... until next time...

[sunnydaze]

Lisa,
I have had many phobias. I was deathly scared of birds, large snakes, small garden snakes, horses, going into basements alone and heights. Over time, I overcame some of them. I went to Aruba, the Caymen Islands and the Bahamas. I finally allowed myself to have a pic taken with a big bird on my shoulder. Than, I went to Canada to Bird World and actually walked around w/ birds flying around me and all of a sudden, I noticed I was not fearful.

One day, I went to a festival and a man was walking around w/ a boa snake and I ran immediately. I disassociated w/o realizing and found myself petting the snake. I have no memory of walking towards it.
As a child, I was always chased home from school by a boy with a garden snake and am still quite fearful of them even worms.

When, I went through my 2nd divorce, i went to Canada and hired a open bottom helicoptor and flew around the falls. I am still very scared of heights but I did overcome the initial fear.

As far as horses, never ever get near one again. In the past on many occasions being close to a horse they have tried to bite me and kick me.

My point is one day, I made out a list of all my phobias and could not believe how afraid of living life I really led. I made a determination to overcome some so I would not be afraid of the world in general.
sunnydaze