Childhood Fears

chic said:
I was scared of death because I was sent to Catholic school where the nuns taught us in the first grade to say an act of contrition prayer in case we died while we slept! WTF! I was SIX! I ran home screaming and my parents really did not know how to cope with this so I've been scared my whole life but learned how to hide it. I'm thinking of suing the Catholic church for this. :cry:
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There's a lot to be afraid of in Catholicism, especially for children. I never met a nun or priest who explained things in a way that didn't give me nightmares. I was scared to death of the thing they called the holy ghost. I saw that thing everywhere. It's meaning wasn't even explained to me until I was 10.

And for a long time I thought the holy spirit was a separate thing, and that that one could be friendly as long as you stayed on its good side. But there was no escaping the holy ghost. That thing wouldn't rest until it got you....from the insides out!

I was raised with 2 faiths. Dad's people were Catholic, Mom's were Jewish. I much preferred being dragged to synagogue. It was my paternal grandma who took me to church. Dad only attended a special mass once in a while.
 
Pepper said:
I was afraid of bugs. "MA, a BUG!" I'd scream. Now I smash those invaders with the side of my fist.
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I've always picked them up and taken them outside.

Except for common house spiders. I don't mind sharing my house with them. Unless they web a lot. Little web hammocks are ok, but anything more extensive is better used outside.
 

Dreams, I didn't know till I was 15, that my father committed suicide. So my dreams were of monsters taking my mother away. Being chased by them also.

I liked the little black and white spiders who would skitter across a desk, then jump if you hit the desk. It was more of tarantulas, the slow walk of doom and larger ones.
 
In an irrational way, as a young child, I was fearful of certain aspects of our family home, particularly around the top of the stairs. Where in my mind there was hidden passageways and evil hidden within. Passageways that as a young child I would soon be able to discover. The same evil that haunted me at night in my dreams.

I used to have to go to bed with the light on at the top of the stairs. Not because I was afraid of the dark, I wasn’t, but to kept the light on so I could keep an eye on the top of the stairs from my dark bedroom through an open door. It felt as though there was something very real there.

As a child just a little bit older, I had a fear that I might not ever be able to make sense of the world, and the world wouldn’t be able to make sense of me.
 
Remy said:
Besides my mother.

Owls. The owl that would hoot by the house where we lived before my mother left my bio-dad. The sound scared me. Now I love them but they sound very sorrowful to me.
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I love them too, but they do sound a bit solitary, don't they?
 
Remy said:
Besides my mother.

Owls. The owl that would hoot by the house where we lived before my mother left my bio-dad. The sound scared me. Now I love them but they sound very sorrowful to me.
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It's interesting how people see things differently. I’ve always liked owls, & their sound. Right from the point I realised they existed. As a young child I thought they know far more about the world than everyone else in it.
 
Elevators...(Lifts to our British cousins)....when the doors closed I was afraid they might not open again and if they did, I would be on the wrong floor and who knew what might be waiting there? It was all about not being in control and having to trust that the world wasn't actually out to get me.
 
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Repondering said:
Elevators...(Lifts to our British cousins)....when the doors closed I was afraid they might not open again and if they did, I would be on the wrong floor and who knew might be waiting there? It was all about not being in control and having to trust that the world wasn't actually out to get me.
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Did that get better?
 
As I have said I was raised by my grandparents, they also had their youngest Son still living at home as he was a teenager at , and then there I was as a 5-year-old in a very cramped space. My uncle was exactly 10 years older than I was. Naturally, he took delight in teasing me. I still sleep with my mouth firmly closed, so he can't put bugs in my mouth at night. He is gone now, and missed by all of us. One night some years ago our cat jumped up on the bed missed my side and smacked me on the mouth with a wet paw.I knew immediately and I knew where her paws had been. I jumped out of bed and gave my lips a good scrubbing with soap! Then I e-mailed him thanking him for the threat of bugs in my mouth. He denied all knowledge and tried to blame my oldest uncle. Then we both laughed like hell!
 
Stairs that didn’t have a backer on them. I couldn’t walk up them and finally managed it a few times by clinging to the handrail. I even had a problem walking down them. I still don’t do well on stairs, up or down. Escalators were no joy either.
 
I had a lot of irrational fears when I was younger such as fear of ghosts or that someone was hiding in a closet or under the bed. It was so bad that it would keep me up at night. I'm on a low dose of SSRIs (paroxetine), which keeps my irrational fears at bay and allows me to sleep. The only drawback is, I don't get scared when I watch horror movies any more. Actually, it killed my secks-drive, too, but being able to sleep is more important at this age.
 
My parents were nominal Protestants, but there was a significant Catholic presence, with a large Catholic Church in the adjoining town where my mother dragged the young me to shop. Nuns could always be seen there walking around, old order nuns in their black head-to-toe habits, never smiling, and looking grim. I was afraid of them; they triggered a “grim reaper” vibe in me… 🙀

I was also afraid when driving past cemeteries in my parent’s car, and it really freaked me out when as a child I realized that I had a skeleton inside my body! - - Aieee! 💀

My mother was a scary piece of work, too…

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win231 said:
When I was around 4 or 5, I heard a thump 'a thump noise coming from the laundry room. When I walked in, the washer was walking toward me. Scared the shortcake out of me.
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Well, yeah. Yeesh, at a young age something -- well, that scares me now! I hate it when the washer gets overly excited and animates like something out of Beauty and the Beast. :/

So, yes, I can imagine that would be terrifying for a young child. Freaking washers.
 
moviequeen1 said:
As a young kid learning how to swim,I was afraid of the deep end,,my biggest fear was if I jumped or dove into the water how would I know to come up for air. I eventually overcame my fear
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Hey, I had that fear too. Mine was more about being potentially sucked down into the vaste, unknowable depths of the "deep end."
 
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