It Makes Sense In My World.

Yeah, I had to more or less confront that fear today when my friends decided they wanted to buy a tarantula. 

I’m up reading up on arachnophobia facts and causes now as an attempt to understand my own irrational fear. I found some interesting stuff, but I am still terrified of the damn thing.

The possible causes are really interesting.
Arachnophobia is one of the most common fears. In Western studies roughly 55% of women and 18% of men cite some degree of fear of spiders.

In a National Geographic article, one scientist thought that the fear of snakes and spiders stemmed from evolution-based thinking. Since mammals had to identify reptiles as dangerous enemies in early times, when the Earth was more dominated by reptiles, that it carried over into a fear of things we still associate with reptiles today.

Another theory that tried to explain the cultural stigma stated that in the 10th century most people thought that diseases were carried by spiders. In the Dark Ages they thought spiders carried the bubonic plague, though it was actually rats on merchant ships, and that the negative connotation from that might’ve created a bad stigma for spiders.

According to Wikipedia, some experiments using crickets show it is possible for some animals to be predisposed against spiders from birth. (Since spiders eat crickets I could see how that might make sense.)

Also, the types of spiders feared most can change depending on the region. In Africa larger spiders are more commonly feared, while in South America and India smaller, more venomous spiders are more commonly feared.

But I think the theory that applies to me most is that many phobias are triggered by early traumatic experiences. I had a bad experience with a banana spider as a kid before my family moved to Ohio. Since then I distinctly remember that experience making me cry and nervous around spiders. I think because of the climate in Ohio, I then spent 2 1/2 years roughly not often exposed to spiders. When I moved back to Florida and suddenly big spiders in the backyard every summer was common, my response changed usually to immobilization when I saw them. I would avoid the backyard for up to two weeks if I thought a big spider had a web back there.

I read that even just a split second of panic in early childhood trauma can trigger a phobia. And when I took Psychology in community college/high school our teacher had us write our account of a traumatic experience with all the details we remember. I wrote about my banana spider incident. We then had to have another person who was present at that time write their account to compare. My sister wrote her account and I realized that when the banana spider was on me and I was on the ground crying as a kid, I apparently was blacked out from fear for some time after because many details I had entirely blocked from memory.

I also read about the degrees of severity of arachnophobia. I think I count as maybe mildly severe?
I’m not insanely bad. Apparently some arachnophobes check every room they enter for a spider. I don’t do that. And some experience legit panic attacks, black outs or heart problems in the presence of a spider. I don’t do that.
However, I do encounter nausea and dizziness (experienced tonight) as well as sweatiness and  increase in heart rate. I didn’t feel completely immobilized tonight; I even got up a couple times to go in the room where the tank was and look from a safe distance. 
But the idea of that thing moving its little legs or crawling at any kind of pace of something makes me want to burst into tears. And the entire time I was hanging out with my friends, I still felt very hyperaware that the tank was in the next room, even if it was locked.

I realize my fear is kind of irrational. Tarantulas aren’t the same as banana spiders or brown recluses or horrible spiders like that. And the tarantula really didn’t move hardly at all and is apparently pretty docile unless you fuck with it.
And my friend pointed out to me that just like different breeds of dogs or different types of fish, there are many types of spiders and that a bad experience with one type shouldn’t taint my image of all types of spiders.

But it still scares the living fuck out of me.

I was reading the best treatment dealing with exposure usually starts patients with pictures and videos of spiders, in some cases interaction with virtual spiders, before the patient interacts with a real spider.

Maybe if I try to make myself look at a couple pictures over time and slowly try to work up to spending more time in the presence of the tarantula (in its tank!) then I can become more comfortable with it. But I definitely would’ve preferred baby steps leading up to the actual seeing the live tarantula tonight.

God.

I fucking hate spiders.
Spiders and heights/sudden drops.
I hate that shit so much.

Ugh.