Scared of things multiplying

Have you tried Hypnotherapy?It's not an old bloke swinging a watch on a chain, it's just chat and suggestions and may be able to relieve your anxiety around heights.

Fears usually start in childhood imo. I don't like heights and sweat profusely if it's on TV with cliff edges. When I was 4 mum was putting out the washing chatting to a neighbour. I stood in a wide open upstairs bedroom window balancing on one leg pretending to be a ballerina. Mum told me to get down and sent our collie dog Sandy to get me down. He grabbed my flared dress and dragged me back onto the bedroom floor ripping my dress. I think this caused the phobia of heights. I don't like pitch black bedrooms either and need a dim night light to sleep. Probably because I was locked in a cupboard at 3 yrs old and fell asleep in there - not by my lovely mum I hasten to add.
So OP you are normal most people have phobias. Perhaps something happened when you were a child or you saw something that frightened you.

I have claustrophobia. It really is dreadful. I can’t use lifts, lock toilet doors or be anywhere that I think will be enclosed. I freaked out at the dentist because I couldn’t cope with him and the dental nurse crowding above me. He gives me sedation now. I really should seek help with it because it’s getting worse. I’ve really tried to overcome it but it’s useless!

As the others say, it's a phobia. I also used to have this. I couldn't even get to the second step of a stepladder without getting vertigo and panicky. Had it most of my life. I cured it though - by going to fly an aeroplane :-) One of those trial flights you can get - you see them on gift voucher websites like red letter days. You go up with an instructor and are allowed to take the controls for a bit. I was really quite scared but it wasn't as bad as when your feet are on the ground somehow (eg going up a ladder or something attached to the ground). But eventually I relaxed into it and it was lovely being up there. Scary when we landed. And that was it - no more phobia of heights.

I've seen a similar thing where they took people up in a balloon that were scared of heights.

kittylester

Ooh, I can't cope with heights either.

On an outward bound course with school (approx 100 years ago!) we had to climb a very minor rock face. I got stuck half way up and someone had to move my feet and hands for me.

The silly thing is that I believe I will get over it and get really excited about going round the ramparts of castles etc.

I had to feel my way round Framlingham Castle and Warwick Castle. The London Eye was really boring with closed eyes.

I am exactly the same! Its so crazy to bring on the result of plunging from a height. I went round the ramparts of Warwick Castle about 25 years ago, went up to the very top of Conwy Castle and been up Blackpool Tower. I was always a bit queasy but its got so much worse.
Driving back from our Welsh holiday I had to drive through Snowdonia, there was a length without fencing to the left. My husband is full of how wonderful the view was and I was just terrified so close to the edge.

I was blood phobic from an early age and given to passing out when seeing blood - my own or anyone else's. When I was expecting DD1 at a pre natal appointment a trainee doctor was taking a blood sample when the syringe broke off in my arm and blood shot up all over him and me. I screamed and then passed out. The consultant was horrified and wondering how I would manage when giving birth so she sent me to see a friend of hers who was a physiatrist.
He traced the phobia back to when I had my Polio vaccine at school when I was 11. I returned to the Class room chalk white and passed out. The teacher was less than sympathetic ordering me to stop making a fuss and take my blazer off as I seemed to be too hot. Blazer off and my blouse was soaked in blood. I thought I was going to die as I had heard on the news that some children had died after receiving the vaccine.
It was also discovered that I naturally have exceedingly low blood pressure, which means that a shock or severe pain makes it drop to the floor and I pass out.

Once I understood all that, I learned to cope by sitting or lying down, head between knees and taking deep breaths until it passes. It became a family joke that if anyone had a small injury I would pass out on their behalf (as I did at the dentists when DD1 was having an extraction. Now, in spite of many recent injections, blood tests, etc. I have coped fine

There is so much that is not understood about the human psyche. I’ve read more than once from different sources that arachnophobia in particular could possibly be a primeval phobia or words to that effect.

I find this notion interesting in the same way that I think it is amazing that the Labrador retriever dog without any training and encouragement on our part is pre-programmed to fetch socks and dirty undies from the wash basket every morning😼

To be honest, I think it’s just a heightened sense of self preservation, as we get older we lose a varying amount of stability in our legs and bodies as well as self confidence and this is just your brain telling you to be careful near the edge of a drop. My husband has a nasty habit of treating mountain roads (whilst on holiday) as a rollercoaster ride despite it scaring the life out of me, he doesn’t do it so much now since I screamed at him to stop and let me out of the car in the middle of nowhere once I was literally shaking and feeling sick

I have noticed both in myself and others, that as we age certain things either worry us more than they did in our earlier years, or suddenly start to worry us.

You have always been afraid of heights and now it is getting worse.

I am not qualified to say whether this constitutes mental illness or not, but I very much doubt that it does. At the back of our minds is the thought that a fall now (over 70 for me) is likely to have far more serious consequences than it would have had fifty years ago. Another thought in the back of our minds is that we want and hope we will be able to look after ourselves for the rest of our lives, but there is so much focus now on age-related difficulties and illnesses that we are bombarded by terrors every way we turn.

May I ask, have you had your eyes tested recently? If not, it might be a good idea, because a deterioration in ones sight can lead to a failure to estimate depth correctly, thus making us unsure, as to what we actually see. It may be something as simple, these days, as a cataract causing wonky depth perception.

If you frequently have to walk, drive or cycle along a narrow country road or lane with a drop (fenced or unfenced on one or both sides) your fear is not really irrational. If you are having difficulty assessing whether a kerb is 2 inches or 6 the fear is not irrational either.

Most of us feel chary about climbing ladders, taking down curtains while balanced on a step-ladder, alone at home now - we didn't when we were thirty, but now commonsense tells us to take care or delegate the task to someone younger.

If you are seriously worried about this: consult your doctor - the sooner the better. There is no point in worrying about something that may be nothing, but you will continue to do so, until you know it is not a serious problem.

M0nica

DH has a button phobia. He managed when working by pulling shirts over his head like a T shirt and changing as soon as he got home. In the days of oyjamas with buttons on jackets and waist bands, he neverwore a jacket and his mother, then me would cut the waist button off and sew the waist together. Retired, he wears T shirts and sweaters. My sister was an arachnophobe (spiders)

My DH also has a button phobia. He coped with shirts etc. when he had to wear them for work but buttons en-masse freak him out.

He says it is because his grandmother had a button tin (as they did in the olden days) which he used to play with until he found cigarette ends in it.

He also has a phobia about cigarette ends. He won't sit anywhere near an ashtray. Thankfully these days smoking is banned in many public places.

I don't like heights and have got worse as I have got older.

JackyB

I don't think a fear of - or respect for - heights is irrational at all. Coming out in a sweat or having other symptoms when confronted with them is, of course, not right, and maybe you should have therapy.

Fear of spiders (or mice, or snakes) is irrational though. I'll never understand where that comes from.

Having known of people, dogs, who died or had to be rushed to hospital after being bitten by snakes yes, I would say having a fear of them is quite healthy.
However, panicking is the wrong thing to do, one should back away slowly.

petra

Allira

I don't think it's a mental ailment.

It's a phobia and I have suffered since I had a panic attack when climbing up a sheer cliff when I was a teenager.
Even watching someone near the edge of a cliff on TV can make me feel queasy.
I can feel panicky if someone else is standing at the edge of a drop.

You can follow a desentisitisation programme with a psychologist but I just avoid heights if I can.

I knew we were sisters I’m exactly the same. 😱
I even shout at people on the telly 😂

I hate being driven if there's a drop on the left hand side.

When I worked abroad a colleague had a phobia about carrots. When we went out for Christmas dinner, about 20 of us, his plate had carrots on it and he went white as a sheet and started sweating profusely. If I hadn't seen it I wouldn't have believed it.

I don't think a fear of - or respect for - heights is irrational at all. Coming out in a sweat or having other symptoms when confronted with them is, of course, not right, and maybe you should have therapy.

Fear of spiders (or mice, or snakes) is irrational though. I'll never understand where that comes from.

I have a very bad phobia about spiders! I try to catch them & evict them but sometimes as on two occasions last week they seem to run towards me.
In both cases they ran right to my feet & ended up being stepped on as ran under my foot. Felt guilty for ages after as hate killing anything! Woke in the night feeling that a spider was near. Searched but couldnt find & no more sleep as I had to keep checking. Little ones I can cope with but the bigger ones I am terrified of but have to deal with as I live alone now! How has anyone else coped with this phobia?

I'm afraid of all these things mentioned..

On a trip to the Grand Canyon I had two friends walk to the outside of me because of the drop. And my main memory of the visit ( in fact the whole holiday) was a man with a toddler who was letting him run around and wasn’t holding his hand. I think the worst thing about a fear of heights is the fact that you feel drawn towards the drop as much as repelled by it.

Allira

I don't think it's a mental ailment.

It's a phobia and I have suffered since I had a panic attack when climbing up a sheer cliff when I was a teenager.
Even watching someone near the edge of a cliff on TV can make me feel queasy.
I can feel panicky if someone else is standing at the edge of a drop.

You can follow a desentisitisation programme with a psychologist but I just avoid heights if I can.

I knew we were sisters I’m exactly the same. 😱
I even shout at people on the telly 😂

Ooh, I can't cope with heights either.

On an outward bound course with school (approx 100 years ago!) we had to climb a very minor rock face. I got stuck half way up and someone had to move my feet and hands for me.

The silly thing is that I believe I will get over it and get really excited about going round the ramparts of castles etc.

I had to feel my way round Framlingham Castle and Warwick Castle. The London Eye was really boring with closed eyes.

I have panic attacks and phobias to the point of passing out unconscious. I recommend getting CBT (cognitive behavioural therapy) to help you cope when the fear sets in, it has really helped me. In Hampshire/Berkshire we have a self refer system online called talking therapies, so google your county and talking therapies am sure you will find it. So no need to go via Dr (especially nowadays waiting weeks for appointments). Although the Dr can also refer you but quicker if you do it yourself. Good Luck you can overcome it!

Monica, DGS has a button phobia. Apparently, Steve Jobs has one too.
bigmama1960, DH is scared of heights and I think that is getting worse with age. I couldn’t believe it when we were walking next to a canal last week and there was a drop of about 3 feet to the water and he pulled away from the edge.

I have a fear of the dark .
When I encounter it - memories of a nightmare in which I'm buried alive flood back .
I feel as though I'm suffocating .

I don't think it's a mental ailment.

It's a phobia and I have suffered since I had a panic attack when climbing up a sheer cliff when I was a teenager.
Even watching someone near the edge of a cliff on TV can make me feel queasy.
I can feel panicky if someone else is standing at the edge of a drop.

You can follow a desentisitisation programme with a psychologist but I just avoid heights if I can.

My friend has a phobia of butterflies/moths.
Haven’t heard of the button phobia before M0nica but have no doubt is a very real fear.

DH has a button phobia. He managed when working by pulling shirts over his head like a T shirt and changing as soon as he got home. In the days of oyjamas with buttons on jackets and waist bands, he neverwore a jacket and his mother, then me would cut the waist button off and sew the waist together. Retired, he wears T shirts and sweaters. My sister was an arachnophobe (spiders)