Trypanophobia. Phobia of hypodermic needle procedures.
It's pretty common, but the severity mine was once at is what makes it ridiculous. These days I'm only really effected by blood tests.
When I was a kid I used to love injections... Yeah I was weird. And then I needed a blood test so I was looking forward to this new kind of injection!
A junior doctor did it. In my hand. I still don't **** understand to this day why, before trying my arm, they did it in my hand - a particularly painful place to draw blood. They couldn't find the vein. It hurt, a lot. They tried several times. I fainted lots. There was blood everywhere but in the syringe. They eventually tried my arm, at which point I was of course tense. It took several hours before they got any blood. Absolutely ridiculous.
So, for the next 10+ years I was petrified of injections of any kind. I had to have routine injections usually done in school at the GP, drugged up on valium. Seriously. I never got my BCG, because I punched the nurse in panic mode. She was being an unsympathetic bitch to be fair. I'm sorry but if you're a cow, don't be a nurse.
On top of all this, I'm pretty sure it's the product of my squeemishness. And that in itself is a problematic pain in the arse. I cannot watch things I'm interested in because of it. I couldn't dissect things in school because of it. Remember that awesome documentary where Gunther Von Hagen dissected people live? Oh man I really wanted to watch but I kept feeling faint...
I'm only recently, in the last 2-3 years, getting over it. But I still can't watch it being done or think about it for very long before my arm goes cold. And blood tests, if I have to have one, send me into panic. Blood tests are bad because it's not like an injection where I can rationalise by going "it doesn't hurt and it doesn't take long". Bood tests ARE painful and they take AGES!
There's a tv documentary series on a the moment called Junior Doctors... And I often see them on there struggling to draw blood. The ones who are determined and keep stabbing away I want to **** repeatedly punch in the face with the needle, because it's that ridiculous attitude that ruined my life. Okay, fine, you have to learn - but if you do it twice and have no luck go get someone experienced - ESPECIALLY if the person is showing **** distress! In fact, don't **** do it on anyone distressed! On the show I've seen them practising on people with obvious trypanophobia, or attempt to do it when tired. EUGH!
I have a couple of other phobias but they are less proper fear and more ocd-like uncomfortableness. The first is metal, particularly metal that smells. I don't like to touch keys, pennies, paper clips, jewlery, some door handles, etc. It's mostly small metal objects that gross me out, which are copper or gold in colour. If they are discoloured at all it's worse. It's not crippling, but I'd rather not have to touch these objects. At it's worst I cannot help imagining putting these objects in my mouth, and that makes me feel physically sick.
I don't have trypophobia, but I do understand why it bothers Kim. They gross me out too.
When I was a kid I used to be scared of owls... Mum used to have this horrible owl ornament that I would keep turning round so it wasn't looking at me. I still get the creeps when some species of owl look directly at me. But it's kinda a nice creepy.
Also when I was little I hated buttons. Apparently wouldn't wear anything with buttons and appeared to be scared of them. My nan used to have this gross metal button (nightmare...) on a table by her phone and It used to make me feel sick. It's weird though cuz mum had this tin of buttons and I used to play with them, making pictures on the floor. So I guess the button phobia was just when I was really young, and the metal button was just because it was metal.
Similar to the owl thing is... I don't even know how to describe it. Sometimes water freaks me out. If I said deep water, that wouldn't be entirely true. Deep contained water? But only sometimes. For example, the huge tank at Georgia aquarium with the whale sharks in it - no problem... But there's a particular tank at London Zoo which gives me the serious creeps. I find it difficult to stand near it. There are some other examples, there's one at Birdworld in Kent which I hate because the hallway is also narrow and the tank is hard to judge the size of. They usually have large convex glass window with dark murky water inside and large dull looking fish. This is worse than the owl thing. It gives me the serious creeps. But it's kinda cool.
Yeah I'm a mess aren't I.
