Stuck

I had a difficult time coming up with a fear of mine that I could describe to you all. The ones I came up with made sense in my head, but I had a difficult time coming up with a good explanation. I was able to piece together a few sentences in the time the people around me wrote a few paragraphs. Despite my mental block, I was able to come up with a fear I could clarify easy enough.

When we are little, we love to explore new things. We try and do things that may not work, just for the sake of discovering something we didn’t know before. One thing I used to love was getting myself into was small places. If I saw a little cubby of some sort the first question I would ask myself was, “I wonder if I could fit in there.”

(Now if you haven’t noticed, the last word people would use to describe me is small. Most have growth spurts through middle and high school. Mine happened to take place my entire adolescence. My parents took many videos of my music programs when I was in intermediate school—they “wanted to catch every moment.” Watching the video pan across my class, attempting to sing in key, keep panning, and panning, then Boom! There was me, towering over everyone in the top row of the risers.)  

Despite my size, I still attempted to explore every hiding place I could. I don’t remember if there was a traumatic incident where I wasn’t able to get out, but this is where my fear stems from. Now, I no longer try and fit into small spaces, but—besides the fact I am in high school—I am deathly afraid of being stuck in a small space.

I have contemplated the possibility of being claustrophobic, like my mom, but eventually I ruled that out. My mom absolutely will not go into a cave. I have no problem with it. The one link we do have is a fear of the CAT scan. While I am inside, I have to focus on my breathing. And I mean focus. I never open my eyes, because I know just inches away from my face is a sheet, no, an immense wall of plastic. To you this may sound silly but to me it is my worst nightmare. Thousands of questions run through my mind: “what if the machine malfunctions?” “What if I start hyperventilating and they can’t see?” “What if it starts on fire!?!”

The horror movies about being buried alive don’t help my situation at all. They made me think about what will happen when I die? What if I am still alive when I am buried but they just didn’t know it?? ... Maybe I should just stop watching.