What's Your Most Irrational Fear?

Mixed Signals

I told my wife how I hated driving under traffic lights on windy days. I’d once visited a factory that ­manufactures them and learned how huge and heavy they are. She told me I was nuts and that traffic lights never fall. Fast-forward to me driving home one rainy, windy night. I pulled up to an intersection and, lo and behold, the traffic light was lying in the middle of the road, smashed to smithereens. So my paranoia isn’t without merit. It even has a name: fanariphobia. But I like to call it trafficlightis.

—John Meeker York, PA

Shell-Shocked

As a kid, I heard stories of snapping turtles who ate my grandmother’s pet ducks. One day, I was in a rowboat with my aunt, occasionally dipping my hand into the lake. Suddenly, there was a huge snapping turtle inches away from my hand. I’ve been scared of them ever since. Then, in my 20s, some friends convinced me to join them in jumping into a lake from a bridge. On the way down, all I could think of was snapping turtles swarming me when I landed. I flailed my arms and legs midair in a futile attempt to stop myself, totally muffing the jump and doing a painful belly flop into the water.

—Jennifer Thorne, Auburn, Alabama, USA

Sky Is The Limit

Every time I step out, I can’t shake off the feeling that the sky might come crashing down on me. All that open space feels overwhelmingly vast, and I feel incredibly vulnerable. I know the ground beneath my feet is solid and that the sky has always remained where it belongs, stable and unyielding but the logic doesn’t seem to work. So instead, I focus on things that bring me comfort: the warmth of the sun, the gentle rustling of leaves, the sound of passers by laughing and talking. One day, I hope to replace this anxiety with a sense of peace and appreciation for the beauty that surrounds me.

—Kizhumundayur Narayanan, Thrissur

 Frozen Green

I have ‘prasinophobia’—the fear of the colour green—since childhood. Whenever I spot the colour it brings shivers down my spine. I feel this more acutely at traffic points. As I wait for the signal to turn green, my heart races to the point of rendering me immobile. But the honking of vehicles trailing behind me comes to my rescue forcing me out of the freeze.

—Preetha Rengaswamy, Chennai

Oh, Bother

I loved reading Winnie-the-Pooh books growing up. But I was terrified of his friend Eeyore. I’d make my mom hide my Eeyore stuffed animal at night so it wouldn’t scare me. I wouldn’t stop reading Winnie-the-Pooh, but I turned the pages very slowly so I could prepare for the ­potential appearance of Eeyore.

—Zak Valdes Freehold, NJ

Not a Fan

Have you ever lain in bed, looked up and wondered what would happen if the ceiling fan dropped on you? I have! This is a fear I have harboured since I was a child, and one that still follows me, well into adulthood. Watching the fan spin, especially at high speed when it sometimes wobbles on its clamp inspires pure terror in me.

—Poonam Deshpande, Thane

Testing Times

I will candidly admit to suffering from multiple phobias—heights, water, elevators—the list runs long! However, one phobia that continues to give me nightmares well into my current sexagenarian status, is the fear of examinations. Not that I was ever a poor student, and I never appeared for a test unprepared. Still, well before the big day, I would start feeling nervous and jittery, terrified of failing and having to repeat a grade! Once I settled into my professional life, I fully expected riddance from this irrational phobia of my childhood. Unfortunately, it has refused to let go. Even at this ripe age, when life mercifully poses no more exams to me, I frequently have bad dreams of getting caught unprepared as I sit down to write an exam.

—Arvind Arya, Mumbai

A Needling Feeling

When I was a boy, I had what I now know is called globophobia—the fear of balloons. Given that a child’s social calendar includes required attendence at many birthdays, I had little opportunity to avoid my source of terror. To make matters worse, fellow attendees who knew of my fear would follow me around, popping balloons in my face. The result: A lot of tears that no amount of cake could soothe. One day, my mother and brother got together and came up with an intervention. I was guided into a balloon-filled room, given a needle, and instructed to pop every single balloon. They refused to talk to me if I didn’t do as they asked. So I sat and popped, crying through it all. Luckily it worked!

—Ankith Sujith, via email

Flower Cower

My irrational fear? Sunflowers. This is largely because I accidentally wandered into a huge patch of them on my aunt’s farm when I was a kid and I couldn’t find my way out. This was shortly after watching The Day of the Triffids, an old horror movie about killer plants that come to life. The leaves clung to me, and it felt as if they were trying to hold on to me and wouldn’t let go. I do love munching on sunflower seeds, though—I’m eating them instead of them eating me.

—Carol Linn Grove, OK

Mind Firmly on Matter, Please

I find the feeling of my feet dangling over open air totally unsettling. Being on a swing, ski lift, carnival ride or similar are all no-gos. However, I can walk around an airplane at 36,000 feet with no issue.

—Lois Shaffer Blythe, CA

Fear the Underwriter

I will not drive behind a semitruck hauling a double-height trailer of stacked cars out of fear that the chains will break and the cars will come rolling down the ramp into me. If I can’t get by it, I’ll slow down so other drivers pass and get between us. Anyone who doesn’t share my fear, I have to assume, has better car insurance.

—Hazel Bowman Prescott, AZ

Slip and Slide

Has anyone ever fallen from the upper berth of an Indian train? Probably. After all, people do fall from all sorts of places, from chairs to ladders. But have I ever seen anyone fall, even children? Never. In fact, kids rather enjoy the upper berth. But here I am, a fully grown man, dreading the prospect of sliding off it in my sleep! For as long as I can remember, I have dreaded overnight train trips since it invariably means having to climb up to the higher berths. And as everyone knows, whatever one’s seat number, if an elderly aunty or dadi is a copassenger, it’s basic courtesy to offer her the lower berth for the night. So, for me the nights are invariably sleepless as I vigilantly focus on staying within the berth’s confines.

—Dr Rudrajit Paul, Kolkata

Robbed Blind and Breathless

I worked in a bank for a decade. I also have horrible allergies. I was always afraid that one day bandits would try to rob the bank, herding tied-up employees into the vault and duct-taping our mouths. Of course, it would be allergy season and I would be unable to breathe through my congested nose. Fortunately, in all my tenure, all the bank was ever robbed of were pens.

—Jane Tedder Lawrence, KS

A Tough Pill to Swallow

I carry a stainless steel water bottle everywhere, but I refuse to drink from it while driving, no matter how thirsty I am. I’m afraid I’ll drive over a bump or pothole while sipping and knock my teeth out. Once, I had a headache and pulled over on the highway to swallow ibuprofen. I told my boyfriend, who was following me in his truck, that I’d stopped to clear something from my eye because I was embarrassed by the truth.

—Leslie Lazarre Helena, AL

Things that Go ‘Boom’!

My irrational fear is that an asteroid will rip through the sky, crash to the ground with me trapped under it. Whenever there is lightning and thunder, or I hear something go ‘boom’, I instinctively scan the skies fully expecting to see a giant space rock zooming towards me. Far-fetched? Absolutely. Can you convince me otherwise? Not a chance!

—P. S. Mehta, Jabalpur

That’ll Make a Heart Skip a Beat

My whole life, I’ve been horribly afraid of suffocating. When I was a baby, my mother had to buy all button and snap clothes because I had a tantrum if she tried to pull a shirt over my head. As an adult, I once crawled out of an MRI machine because I was so panicked. Hard to tell who was more freaked out by that: me or the MRI technicians.

—Deborah Breda Mechanicville, NY

Shaken to Your Core

I have a horrible fear that an earthquake will strike when I’m at my most vulnerable: while I have a Q-tip in my ear. The things that living in Southern California will do to you.

—Elizabeth Boolen Burbank, CA

Eyes Wide Shut

Every time I shut my eyes while in the bathroom taking a shower, the image of sharks circling around me, ready to attack appears vivdly in my mind. Needless to say, I’ve mastered the art of superfast face washing and may even have broken a record of some sort.

—Mahendra Suthar, Bengaluru

A Feeling You Can’t Overlook

I love nature and scenery, especially when enjoyed from observation decks, bridges and overlooks. But every time I sightsee, I imagine that the observation deck’s foundation will crumble, the bridge will collapse or the overlook’s underpinning will slide into the ravine below. Don’t you just love the outdoors?

—Patrick McLaughlin Charlotte, NC