Hello everyone
So I have a rather unusual fear of butterflies and a fear of darkness. The first one is definitely the fear that has confused lots of people in my life. I can’t explain it, for some reason I am just afraid of them. If one even comes near me, I completely freak out. The latter is a rather childish fear of mine. I don’t know why I’m afraid of the darkness specifically, but I know that I can’t stand it.
So what are your fears?
Just dying in general.
But hopefully before then I’ll have lived a long and fulfilling life.
I used to be afraid of looking at mirrors at night. Idk what it’s called, spectrophobia maybe? Well, anyway, one night I took acid and happened to look at a mirror while blasted off my mind. Staring at it felt so disappointingly mundane that I laughed at myself for expecting anything to go wrong. Lost my fear permanently.
I grew up in the country with an in-ground swimming pool that we heated with a solar cover. When the cover was retracted/rolled up Bullsnakes would hide inside. There were quite a few times when they’d hastily slither out unexpectedly, and I’ve been pretty freaked out by snakes ever since.
I’m afraid of drinking through a straw. I’m convinced (against all logic) that I’m going to inhale it and choke.
However, I recently started drinking through a straw again at my dentist’s recommendation, to protect my teeth from carbonation. I have a set of reusable metal ones. They don’t trigger my phobia at all. Maybe the texture makes all the difference.
Human brains have the strangest triggers.
‘This exact thing will definitely kill me, this nearly identical thing is fine.’
Existence is wild.
I’m horribly afraid of heights and can’t even stomach a normal wall climb (like with a harness and everything) without quivering like a leaf.
Also most BIG bugs, especially if they have a lot of legs… though I think I’d probably be fine with a tarantula, for some reason. No idea why. The small ones are usually fine, minus wasps and hornets.
I’m kind of afraid of the dark too, but it’s also not really about the darkness itself. I’ll find myself vividly envisioning things like a snarling wolf suddenly lunging from the darkness to tear my throat out, or a large, unhinged man sneaking up behind me, or some shit like that. It usually only happens outdoors in rural areas where nights are much darker, which allows my imagination to run more wildly than usual. Thankfully, I live in a city now.
I don’t know the official name of this fear, but seeing the world spin around me makes me shut down (say goodbye to driving around roundabout highway exits, carpark roundabout ramps, jet boat spins, etc.). Even typing this out is hard.
Ironically, I (think) I would be ok if the spin is counterclockwise.
Fear of right wing extremists taking over the world
Me too, thanks
Heights. There was some movie or show where people were hanging from a skyscraper window after an earthquake, and I regularly have vivid nightmares about it. It’s not to the point of a phobia but a really strong fear. I went up the Seattle space needle with my husband, and he was clowning against the glass while I was only able to stay in the middle. Had nightmares about him falling or me falling off it ever since.
There is a case of someone clowning against the glass and falling down with the glass and dying from it. So… Fear validated?
Edit: Gary Hoy was the dude. https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Death_of_Garry_Hoy
Yooo me too! Moths freak me out more, but butterflies are pretty close. I usually just hide under a big blanket whenever a moth makes it into my apartment and let my husband handle it, but he recently moved out for work. I only cry a little bit when I have to confront them myself 😎
I also can’t stand Jellyfish to such a degree that I refuse to go into any open water. Even stuff like lakes and Rivers, which probably don’t have Jellyfish, but the idea just freaks me out too much.
Bears, even though I think they’re really cool. It’s gotten worse over time. I’ve seen a lot of videos of idiots interacting with them, getting too close, leaving food out at campsites, etc.
Plus my ever-declining faith in humanity, it means the likelihood of a bear I would encounter being made more dangerous because of other people is high.
I used to want to go to the Adirondack mountains, but after reading reviews about one of the main camp areas being overrun with black bears (due to eating human food) that’s no longer on my bucket list.
Even on a fairly recent camping trip with a friend with equal knowledge about bear safety, they left a plate out with some meat grease overnight. We heard all sorts of sounds and the plate was far from the eating area in the morning. Like can you not leave a welcome present out for the apex predator, please?
What is great is listening to bros who try to say they could “totally take on a bear”. It’s normal to be fearful of any animal that could easily fuck a person up.
Someone’s gonna die. I’m gonna get injured and go broke with medical bills. Heights. Crosswalks. Riding a bike in traffic. Driving in the city. I’m gonna go blind. I’m gonna get dementia and alzheimers. Shit times will happen again. Our country will go full fascist. My fiance will leave me or be assaulted or be sick. A recession catches us at a bad time. Climate change is worse than we expected. A lone star tick will make me allergic to meat. My asshole will never heal. AI is going to replace me.
Knowing I’m dying as I actively die is probably my greatest fear. -Not everyone gets to be as lucky as those people on the OceanGate sub. -They really had to shove their privilege in our faces. -I say good riddance to bad rubbish!
Long loose hair for some reason
Work next to a lot of spinning machinery?
Nah, just the sight of it (Drains, the floor, etc.) makes me feel really disgusted
I weirdly have a fear of spiders, but only irl. And am relatively fascinated by them when viewing them on pictures/video.
An ex was afraid of butterflies but not moths. They could explain what their were afraid of but not why it applied to butterflies and not moths.
My SO loves butterflies but is afraid of moths.
I’m not afraid of either. I’m afraid of being incapacitated though, so things like ledges or working under a car makes me uneasy.