spider story

[Jennifer Piersol]

--- In HPFGU-OTChatter at yahoogroups.com, "Iggy McSnurd"
<coyoteschild at p...> wrote:

<big ol' snip>

> Every week or two, I simply attack the hose to our vacuum cleaner

<'nother snip>

A man that vacuums???  Every time my husband decides I've taken too
long to thoroughly clean the house (not often, as he's as messy (or
moreso!) as I am), he'll take out the vacuum and "clean".  Then, I
feel terrible when I turn into my mother (also not often when it comes
to cleaning) and have to re-vacuum the house right afterwards.

Okay, here's my spider story.  I'm horribly afraid of spiders - so
much so that if there's a spider in our room, unless I SEE the body
after my husband has smashed it, I'm awake for the next hour just
sitting up in bed looking everywhere for more.  In the past few weeks,
we've had two HUGE black widows in our hallway that surprised me
during routine trips to the kids' room in the middle of the night... I
almost touched one when my hand went to turn on the hall light.  So I
get very easily freaked out (COS wasn't too bad because the "real"
looking spiders didn't do anything to anyone).

It all stems from when I was oh - 6 or 7 years old.  I was in bed, and
I had this horrible nightmare that daddy-long-legs (they're really
cellar spiders around here, but we still call them daddy-long-legs)
were crawling all over my head and face while I was in bed.  I
screamed and screamed, and my parents (who were in bed, so it must
have been late) just sorta yelled at me from their room "It's just a
dream, sweetie... go back to sleep!"  Well, I couldn't leave it at
that, so I got up, turned on the light, and there on my pillow were
two daddy-long-legs.  I don't remember anything after that, so it's
possible I was so scared that I passed out (wait - now that I think
about it, I do remember freaking out and turning my pillow over and
over periodically for the rest of the night to make sure there weren't
more - and I slept with the light on for weeks afterwards).

Anyway, that's why I'm scared of spiders now.  I think it's also why
I'm not hesitant (no matter how tired I am) to go to my daughters'
room when I hear them calling for me. ;)

While I'm at it, I'm also afraid of heights (ferris wheel incident) to
the point of panicking at the thought of having to ride on a ski lift.
 I'm scared of L.A. traffic (but mostly only when someone else is
driving, and it's getting better now that I'm on antidepressants). 
I'm not afraid of public speaking, per se (I get nervous, sure, but
it's not debilitating), but I *am* afraid of talking to new people...
so much so that I can rarely call people I don't know on the phone. 
My husband teases me about the fact that I can't order pizza.  And I
also have regular nightmares about my teeth rotting and falling out,
although I think I read somewhere that that means I'm afraid of
something else, which of course, I can't remember at the moment.

And horror movies?  No way.  Let me just say that when _IT_ came out
on television, I BEGGED my sisters to not watch it... instead, they
turned up the volume so that I could even hear it in my room with my
door closed and the covers over my head (and the light on), so I ended
up sleeping in my dad's room for TWO WEEKS!  And I was about 16 years
old!!!!!

Jen, who is trying not to transfer her fears to her kids, but whose
daughter is just as afraid of spiders as she is...