SEVERE Arachnophobia

I have had enough. I have always been scared of spiders but now my phobia is just ruining my life and upsetting me whenever I see a spider. I have had two spiders in my room and freaked out after seeing each one and spent hours afterwards panicking that there are more spiders hiding in my room.
I read an article about keeping spiders out of the house but there was a picture of a spider at the top and I screamed and leaped off my bed wtf??
Whenever I walk into a room, I check for spiders.
There is a pile of clothes on my floor which I need to put into a suitcase tomorrow and I am sat here worrying that a spider will crawl onto or under the pile during the night or that there is one inside the suitcase omg but i'm too scared to check.
My parents are starting to get angry at me because my reaction when I see a spider is so over-dramatic but I can't help it. They don't understand.
I would rather die than be near a spider but a sad fact is that there are going to be soooo many more situations where I'm near a spider that I cannot escape from and this is just so terrifying.
At university open days, I asked the students about whether or not there are lots of spiders on campus because this is actually my main worry.
My fear of these eight-legged beasts is making me feel crazy. I even sometimes feel them crawling on me when they're not even there.
What should I do?

Reply 1

username2088165

Hi! Have you tried getting any professional help for your phobia? :smile:

Reply 2

mc-ren

i have actually always been kind of interested in spiders and arachnophobia. it just interests me how a spider is such an insignificant, harmless creature yet it manages to strike such fear in people's minds - more so than any other animal in existence

when i was younger i didn't like spiders, trying to catch one with a cup i found to be extremely intense and scary, however i overcame it when i picked up the confidence to start to handling them. nowadays i just pick the big ones up with my hands and take them outside.

Reply 3

Jas056

I have arachnophobia too so I feel your pain. I was scrolling down my newsfeed one time and there was a picture of a spider, I screamed and chucked my phone against the wall

Reply 4

username2512877

Original post by mc-ren

Phobias are very commonly irrational fears and are not necessarily rooted in threat. I similarly suffer from a very strong phobia of moths despite them all being completely harmless and causing me no danger whatsoever. In fact, my phobia evolved very much in a social context - in other words, it arose because those around me were scared of moths, not because I was inherently afraid of them (or because of personal experience).

It truly is an extremely unpleasant and annoying thing to have. I constantly find myself panicking and overreacting when seeing moths, or when they are in my room. It's almost like suffering from anxiety and going through panic attacks. My only advice is to slowly force yourself into being with them. It's called exposure therapy and it's one of the most effective ways of curing phobias, although it's difficult as hell. If you see a small spider, try as much as you can to get close to it and sit down doing whatever you want to do. For me it's still a work in progress but I'm slowly getting there. Little by little you forcefully interact near them, trying to ignore them and get on with what you were doing. It's slow but it works. I wish you the best of luck. I know how it feels, it's almost embarrassing I know. But you'll get over it soon enough.

Reply 5

All in the mind

Desensitisation can be effective, but it can take a while. You have to break down the objectives into manageable tasks and be determined to keeping going until the stress response has eased e.g. start by looking at pictures of spiders.

Breathing techniques can help you to relax and off-set your panic response as you interact with the objectives. http://www.clinicalhypnotherapy-cardiff.co.uk/breathing-techniques/

Therapy can short-cut the process, but it will usually come at a price. If you can afford it, it could stop the current misery of your phobia.

Reply 6

Calmizen

I have the same problem, earlier today there was a spider on my bedroom wall and I screamed at the top of my lungs, also felt sick and refused to go back in my room and was terrified (after my father killed it) there would be more of them in my room. I’m fed-up of being so terrified of these 8 legged creatures. They are taking over my life...

SEVERE Arachnophobia

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