Lyuokdea said:
I do some of the similar things that you've described, although mine tend to usually be prompted by specific instances of being exposed to situations (usually on television) which parallel the phobia. Snakes are a big one for me, however, I usually am not worried about snakes at all unless I see something like a video with a snake or something. A week ago I saw a video with a huge python digesting a kangaroo,
Ah - I saw that too, a while ago, someone posted it here - and it got me too! I knew that it would, but I just had to see it. My thing is avoiding getting into a situation where I cannot escape or save myself - immediate danger - and where I could have prevented the situation if I had been more responsible. Vipers are the worst for me - that arrow head - eek - and there are Eastern Diamondbacks in the state, so it's a little more probable (not that that makes a huge difference - I still get thoughts of cobras, mambas, etc.
). The thing is that I'm not actually afraid of snakes - I realize some are dangerous, but I think they're interesting and love reading and watching shows about them when I can manage. Same goes for the other things.
and then looked down and glanced around my closet of a dorm room to see if a 30 foot python happened to be inside. (Actually at this very instant, I cought myself giving a quick glance to the floor again, thinking about it) However, the instances are usually specifically prompted by instances like that, and thus don't occur too often and aren't really intrusive.
Besides snakes, one of the other ones that always gets me, is when I read about biblical passages that would be considered, somewhat heretical by the established church. (Yesterday for instance i was reading analysis on whether Jesus and Barabbas were in fact the same person, or a manifestation of a violent rebel vs. a peaceful Jesus) For some reason passages like that always give me a fairly overwhelming feeling of god looking over my back, in the sense that i feel I am obtaining forbidden knowledge. (I guess a kind of garden of eden sort of thing) This sort of thing really gets my senses going for awhile, looking around the room and listening for noises and stuff, but I can usually distract myself by thinking of other things after awhile.
I also tend to check things like locked door and whether I have my keys when I'm leaving my room more times then necessary, although I almost always stop after 3 times or so, and can stop any reasoning to do it again, by specifically concentrating while I lock the door to make sure it happened etc. I think it may be the same impulse to a lesser degree. I would say many of the things you list pop up from time to time for me, but I'd guess on average it never takes up more than 5-10 minutes of my time in a day, so it is not incredibly destracting.
This is just personal advice - trust yourself. If you think something is wrong, do something before it gets worse. If you aren't concerned now, great. But if it gets worse later, don't wait until you get to be like me. I don't mean to scare you; I just think it's helpful to know that small things can grow to be seriously disabling and are much better if caught and treated early. But I'm in no position to give you any specific advice about what kind of help to seek.
One question, have you ever thought of taking self defense classes or something of the like, in order to give yourself confidence to deal with the idea of strangers or being alone? I'm not sure if you feel that would help you with your confidence or if being in an environment where you would think about strangers would make it worse for you. Being alone or afraid of people was never a huge problem for me, and I think most of it was the childish fear of strangers, but I thought the problem actually cleared up completely for me, by ironically, getting attacked once, and then winning the ensuing fight, against a guy significantly bigger than me (I'm 5'6" 135, He was probably 5'8 190) :) That incident gave me a lot more confidence in my ability when I'm alone or walking somewhere in the night.
Yes, I've developed plans for many situations. But this planning just makes things worse in the long run; It can always find
something. I don't lack confidence, and I'm not actually afraid of strangers or being in these situations for real. And I normally love being alone.
Did anyone read that link I posted? I don't intentionally have these thoughts, and I realize that they are irrational. And they aren't just thoughts - they cause real pain. The thoughts are only ever
potentials - potential danger, a potential mistake. The thoughts and images are of what might happen or what might be true.
For instance, if there really was a venomous snake at my feet, I would just deal with the situation - I know what to do and am confident that I could remain calm and not panic. But when the attacks happen, there isn't really a snake at my feet - but my body reacts as if the situation were really happening. So what do I do? If I don't do anything to get out of the situation, my body continues to panic. If the situation were real, I would react immediately. And that's the easiest way to make my body stop panicking - just react immediately - or better, avoid the triggers. The problem is that since the attacks are all in my head, they can happen anywhere, anytime. I am never safe. I can avoid or kill or be killed by real snakes; I can't avoid or kill or be killed by imaginary snakes - there's no escaping them. And that's just snakes. Meh, I'm really bad at explaining this.
I guess you could say it's like an alarm going off all of the time. The alarm is either a real alarm or a false alarm. Knowing what to do in case of a real alarm isn't the issue. It's knowing whether the alarm is a false alarm or a real alarm. The only way to shut off the alarm is to 1) find out for certain - 100% certainty - that the alarm is false or 2) react as if the alarm were real.
The alarm may sound in my head that someone is outside of the window pointing a gun at me, about to shoot me. Is the alarm real or false? It's probably false, but there's a chance, however slight, that the alarm is real. So I either need to react as if the alarm were real or find out for certain that the alarm is false. Suppose that I get up and look out the window - there's no one there. False alarm. But suppose that as soon as I sit back down, the alarm goes off again. I just looked out the window - but maybe someone is there now. They could have just arrived or hidden from view last time. Suppose I check again - false alarm. And as soon as I sit back down the alarm goes off again...
Does that sound familiar to anyone?
No, wait, I'm not afraid of cotton wool.
I aim to be the best possible and perform perfectly, but that's not always unrealistic; There are some things that I should be able to do perfectly or very near perfectly. But I don't think that explains my symptoms. It seems more likely that I have a biological predisposition or sensitivity and my deep sense of personal responsibility and perfectionism just triggered and feeds it. Of course, I could be wrong... anywho, I don't want to bore everyone with my problems, as fascinating as they are to me. 
, its like tissue paper you can't see through, anything could be happening on the other side and its this close to you! Many times I quickly open it (from the outside), and sometimes I end up peeking out the side, from the inside. Maybe I shouldn't have told you that, you might have an alarm going off next time you take a shower.
