Living with a Phobia? Don’t Be Ashamed
This spring in the Eastern U.S., millions of Brood X cicadas with bulging red eyes and fat squishy bodies will emerge from the ground and take wing. As many as 1.5 million bugs per acre will click and whirr through the air, smash into windshields, and leave their molted exoskeletons clinging to telephone polls and pet fur.
Many people (not just scientists) find this event, which occurs every 17 years, entertaining, fascinating, even delightful.
I do not. I will return to a Covid-like state of lockdown for at least a few days while this horror movie springs to life.
I was born with entomophobia — a deep-seated fear of insects and bugs of all kinds. I assure you, this is not a learned or modeled behavior; it’s innate. The mere sight of a daddy long legs, a cockroach, a cicada — basically any arthropod or arachnid — will trigger full-on flight-or-fight syndrome.
I’m talking raw fear, rapid breathing, a strong urge to run away. A whining mosquito sends my nervous system into overdrive. I will not sit on bare grass because I worry that ants will crawl into my clothing.
The Diagnostic Statistical Manual, fifth edition, lists entomophobia among many specific phobias, collectively defined as “a persistent fear that is either unreasonable or excessive.”
Unreasonable? I would like my reality to be acknowledged, not judged or laughed at (yes, that’s happened). Intellectually, I understand that neither a common spider nor a cicada is a biological weapon and I am not their prey.
So what? Fear is “a conscious awareness that you are in harm’s way.” When my phobia is triggered, the emotional floodgates open, ranging from mild anxiety to actual screaming. In that moment, I am threatened. The body knows what it knows.
If you know someone with a phobia, please treat them with compassion, patience, and understanding. After all, a phobia is a highly focused form of fear, and fear is a primal human emotion we all share. When you’re scared, you want to be comforted and protected, not ridiculed.
Perhaps you, or someone you know, lives with a phobia you haven’t named. Dire fear of public speaking? Glossophobia. Fear of snakes (ophidiophobia) or dogs (cynophobia)? Crowded areas or open spaces (agoraphobia)? Thunder and lightning (astraphobia)?
One phobia that’s especially difficult to confront now in the era of Covid-19 is trypanophobia — a fear of needle injections.
So you see, being phobic is not weird or stupid or a bid for attention. For many of us, it’s part of being human.
I will always be an entomophobe. It’s occasionally inconvenient, but it doesn’t ruin my life. My phobia is not a personality flaw or defect. It’s part of who I am, how I’m made, and how I cope with the world. I’m not ridiculous or hysterical. I’m just me.
When the cicadas emerge, I’ll do whatever it takes to feel safe.
