Today, I want to talk about silly fears. This isn’t about anxiety or panic attacks; those are not silly. They can be excruciating. Instead, I’m talking about really dumb fears. The kind of fears that sometimes don’t make sense and never truly interrupt your day-to-day life. Some things on this list I’m embarrassed to share but hey, vulnerability is the name of my game! So, without further ado, here are some of the really silly things I worry about:
1) My car running out of gas the minute my gas light comes on. (Yes, I know I have at least 30 miles to E, but I’m not going to chance it!)
2) Audibly farting in front of a bunch of people. (My worst nightmare.)
3) My phone dying when I’m out with friends. (What happens if I need to request a Lyft?! What happens if there’s an emergency and I can’t call anyone?!)
4) Losing my phone in a random location. (In college, I left my phone in a bathroom and never saw it again. Legitimate fear! Also, I’d owe Sprint a lot of money as I’m still paying off my phone so it’s also a financial fear.)
5) Getting stung by a bee or wasp. (I’m always so concerned about how I’d get the stinger out.)
6) Not closing Chip’s cage correctly so he is able to get out of it and make a mess in my mom’s apartment. (She’d forgive me for this, right?)
7) Not remembering to grab my credit card from the sleeve at a restaurant. (Never fails, as I’m walking out of the restaurant, I must check my wallet to make sure my credit card is there.)
8) Walking down stairs. (I’m always imagining tumbling to my death whenever I’m walking down a set of stairs. I grip the handrail firmly.)
9) Opening my laptop to a blue screen of death. (I have a backup Chromebook but it would mean no work-from-home days until I could get a new laptop + the remote server installed onto it.)
10) Throwing up. (I haven’t thrown up since college. I’m trying to set a record here.)
11) My seat belt not being buckled in on a rollercoaster and falling off and dying. (Once, I hadn’t buckled myself in correctly and when the ride operator came to check, he buckled me in. But ever since, I’m so worried that a ride operator isn’t going to be so careful and I’m going to die by flying off a rollercoaster. I spend the whole time leading up to the ride starting pulling hard on the seat belt to check it. In hindsight, this is probably not a silly fear because DEATH but I’m leaving it in.)
12) Being stung by a stingray. (Always do the stingray shuffle, guys!)
And, for the best one of all, 13) An insect burrowing under my skin and sucking all my blood out. Does such an insect exist? I don’t know, I’m not going to Google it. But I remember one of my classmates in kindergarten telling us a story about how a bug flew into his sister’s eye and if his dad hadn’t been able to get it out, it would have sucked all of the blood out of her body and she would have died. Maybe this is when all my worrying began because you better believe I’ve been worried about blood-sucking insects since then.
Tell me one of your silly fears!
It’s funny how our brains can come up with pretty irrational fears. My fears are mostly over creepy crawly things and small rodents. Like I am terrified of spiders, snakes and mice. A mouse ran across my room when I was in high school and I screamed so loud my parents thought there was an intruder in the house that was attacking me. I scared the mouse in the process and it peed on my carpet. We could not get rid of the smell so had to replace the carpet. I am VERY glad we have a cat so I will never have to worry about a mouse in our house (that’s what I tell msyelf!) I also am always worried/scared that someone else is going to merge into a lane at the same time I do. So I like triple check before changing lanes on the freeway.
After you have a baby, you have really crazy irrational fears in the early weeks because your hormones are just whacko. I had horrible visions of falling down the stairs while carrying Paul. I could see it in my mind so was super duper careful when walking on the stairs with him. I heard on a podcast that it’s a survival thing to have those super awful fears in the post partum phase because it makes you extra protective of the baby or something like that. But gosh I hated how I could see myself falling down the stairs. It was a relief to find out that it is totally normal to have those fears!
Ok, while some of these might actually be silly, having silly fears is not silly at all… if you know what I am saying 😉
One of my silly fears: that J or I will slip in the shower (even though we have a bath tub mat to prevent that), so I ask him to never lock the door (which he doesn’t anyway) when he showers.
Silly enough?
There are flies which do exactly that sorry to say. They lay their eggs under the skin where the maggots then develop using an obvious food source. I do not think they are in your part of the world though if that helps.
I am also totally paranoid about running out of gas and falling on the stairs. Most of these fears read perfectly legit to me. Haha but then I am a paranoid sort…
One of my silly fears are half sunken ships. If the boat is 100% under the water, I’m cool. Floating at the dock? Awesome. But decayed and half in the water looking all creepy? NO THANKS. I have no idea where it came from.
OMG, yeah, def don’t google the bug thing 😉 I hope that doesn’t happen with your phone or CC getting left behind. I have to compulsively check that I put things away where they go after I use them too.
My fears are about being late and (not related) losing my teeth.
Some of these are such legit fears, like the roller coaster one! ACK! I loved roller coasters when I was younger, but Final Destination always made me question it LOL.
I won’t say I’m afraid of heights, but I’m afraid of falling from said-heights. I can’t look over the edge of anything without being overcome with anxiety, it’s awful! Unless I’m in something secure, like a plane, I’ll just be over in a corner in the fetal position.
Wasp and bee stings suck SO MUCH. I just got stung by both in the same week, so I’m over them. Pro-tip: Wasps don’t leave their stingers behind because they’re jerks and will live to sting another day. Bees will lose their stingers and the best way to remove them is to gently scrape them away. And a bee dies after it stings you. Both hurt the same! (Onion and/or white vinegar helps take away the pain afterwards!)