What Hurt Do You Fear

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In my entry today, I talk about my irrational fears of injury, that I'll fall and smash my face in, that someone will hit me on the head from behind and crush my skull, stuff like that. How do you fear being hurt?

-- Kymm Zuckert (hedgehog@hedgehog.net), October 10, 2001

Answers

Every time I go in the subway, I worry that someone is going to push me onto the tracks. I either stand with my back to the wall or else look around a lot to make sure no one's sneaking up on me with his/her hands in a shoving position. And every once in a while I'll read that a subway pushing has, indeed, occurred, and then I have nightmares for days.

-- mimi smartypants (mimismartypants@hotmail.com), October 10, 2001.

I have that subway thing too and when I'm on with my kids who are 17 and 10, I hold their hands like the grip of death - well, my 17 year old won't put up with that anymore but I still clamp onto my 10 y.o. I'll probably try and do so even when he gets to be in his 30's. One time I was driving across Independence Pass near Aspen,Colorado and we were on this winding road with no guardrail at about 12,000 feet. I kept thinking about all the things that could happen, like a mountain goat could charge the car or a rock slide could carry us over the edge to a fiery death. My ultimate irrational fear was that I would get so rattled I would DELIBERATELY drive over the edge just to get the fear over with. Crazy? Admittedly.

-- Jon Arthur (rclover4@aol.com), October 10, 2001.

I have a similar one, in that when I went up in a hot air balloon with my parents a few years ago, I had a desperate fear that I would climb over the edge of the basket and plummet to my death. I tried to explain it to my mother and she said, "But why would you climb over the edge of the basket?" "Because I would be COMPELLED to by forces BEYOND my CONTROL!!!"

-- Kymm Zuckert (kymmz1@yahoo.com), October 10, 2001.

I have a subway fear that there will be an explosion or a tunnel- collapse underwater, but it seems more impersonal than fearing that you'll get pushed onto the tracks. I hold on to my kids, near the tracks, because I'm constantly imagining they're going to *fall*, though. (They're 10 and 7, and the older one is not keen on having his hand held in a vice grip in public, either...) The most common "I might hurt myself" fear I have, though, is about cutting my hands while washing dishes. I did once cut myself very deeply, requiring stitches, on a glass and I was alone in the house with a two year old, had to drive myself to the ER with blood pouring down my arm, and I think that I had a very intense reaction to that experience because I'm very disinclined to wash glasses, and especially when no one else is home.

-- Tynan (ty@power-lines.com), October 10, 2001.

I realize I'm a little late in answering, but I have to now or I'll never get over it! When I go to movie matinees, I'm often either the only one in the theatre, or share it with only one other person. And they are stadium seating theaters. I'm always afraid some freak will sneak up behind me and strangle me or something while I'm engrossed in a film about high school sweethearts or moms who are dying. Yikes!

-- Christen Roberts (email_christen@yahoo.com), November 02, 2001.


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