[NT] Irrational Fears

[mrcockburn]

Is it possible for you T's to have irrational phobias? How do you come to terms with them, if so? And what are they, and how did you develop them?

Mine:

Pit bulls - got attacked once, almost lost a limb. Two other times, I got lunged at. Now I cross the street to avoid them. No other breed has ever been aggressive towards me.

Dentists - three very very bad/painful experiences. Think: root canals without anesthesia/novocaine. Incompetent student dentists...

Raccoons - they're just violent little fuckers. Never encountered them closely, but they travel in gangs and will fuck you and your dog up. Evil...

I have a dentist appt this month, and I am already shaking at the thought of it. I don't think a T would have this problem.

 

[Not_Me]

Height - or rather, the possibility of falling. If I had a reliable safety harness on, I would have zero fear climbing a skyscraper. But without one, I am hesitant to lean over my 20 storey balcony.

Arachnids - and other fast moving indoor bugs. I wouldn't call it a phobia, but I think they look repulsive. Every time I see your avatar, I get the urge to kill something that has more than 4 legs.

 

[Haight]

Bears.

Need I say more?

 

[Oaky]

The fears mentioned in this thread so far are not particularly irrational.

 

[funkadelik]

The fears mentioned in this thread so far are not particularly irrational.

I'm sure, though, that you could rationalize even the seemingly most irrational fears somehow.

And I suppose "irrational" is a matter of opinion and perspective, too. A dentist might think your fear of dentists is irrational ("yes, you've had three bad experiences, but that doesn't mean the next one will also be bad...most dentists are quite capable and besides, you were with students when the bad things happened"), while someone else (perhaps they also fear dentists) might say "yes, it's quite rational that many bad experiences will lead you to fear dentists like that. This is not an irrational fear."

 

[Simi]

I'm not a T, but my INTP friend's biggest fear is being shot in a drive-by....
Which is pretty odd, considering we have like the lowest crime rate in the states, practically.

 

[Xyk]

I was irrationally afraid of large dogs for a while. Now there's not really a material stimulus that I can't overcome with willpower. I do choke up when talking to pretty girls.

 

[lunalum]

Nearly all of my fears are fully rationalized


My trouble with heights borders on the irrational.... even if I'm nowhere near falling off the edge, being more than 15 feet above ground without any sort of enclosure or harness makes me uncomfortable. But it is all about the absence of restaints. I could be on a rollercoaster out into the void of the sky and not have a problem at all (the problem would be walking to such a coaster...)

 

[mrcockburn]

I seem not to have "normal" fears either....I love spiders, I let them crawl around me and name them "Charlotte" (and then toss them on the ground so they can get to work eating the bugs that really are disgusting). Heights I love. Skydiving fiend and love walking on the edge of steep cliffs (I have good balance).

But raccoons and dentists?

mommy!

 

[violet_crown]

I have pretty significant phobia about biting off my own tongue. I have no bad experience or particular memory to anchor this fear to, but I've had it for almost as long as I can remember. It's most acute when I'm driving, especially when making left-hand turns. I just imagine someone hitting me in my car while I'm making a turn, biting down, and losing my tongue forever. As a precaution, I always tuck my tongue behind my teeth whenever I'm driving, and I never talk when a turn is being made even if I'm not behind the wheel.

I worry about sharks when I'm swimming. This includes the pool in my backyard which is chlorinated and 5" at its deepest.

I have another phobia about people with massive deformities. Not PC, but I don't play that sideshow shit. I can't watch the bulk of the shows on TLC. I have never and will never watch 1)The Goonies, 2) The Elephant Man, 3)Freaks, 4)The Fly or any other freaky humanity type films. Like I said: fully aware that it's not right, and they're just people. But fuck that shit.

That about covers it for me. Not bothered by heights or spiders or close spaces or anything like that. But you put me in a wave pool with a conjoined twin and I'd lose my shit.

 

[mrcockburn]

I have pretty significant phobia about biting off my own tongue. I have no bad experience or particular memory to anchor this fear to, but I've had it for almost as long as I can remember. It's most acute when I'm driving, especially when making left-hand turns. I just imagine someone hitting me in my car while I'm making a turn, biting down, and losing my tongue forever. As a precaution, I always tuck my tongue behind my teeth whenever I'm driving, and I never talk when a turn is being made even if I'm not behind the wheel.

I worry about sharks when I'm swimming. This includes the pool in my backyard which is chlorinated and 5" at its deepest.

I have another phobia about people with massive deformities. Not PC, but I don't play that sideshow shit. I can't watch the bulk of the shows on TLC. I have never and will never watch 1)The Goonies, 2) The Elephant Man, 3)Freaks, 4)The Fly or any other freaky humanity type films. Like I said: fully aware that it's not right, and they're just people. But fuck that shit.

That about covers it for me. Not bothered by heights or spiders or close spaces or anything like that. But you put me in a wave pool with a conjoined twin and I'd lose my shit.

Be glad you're not an ancient Egyptian criminal. According to a peer reviewed source - The Mummy (my high school peers and I reviewed it on Amazon.com) - standard punishment was to have your tongue clipped out.

 

[Vizzy]

Driving. I don't worry about me, but I'm afraid I might kill someone.

 

[Nijntje]

cockroaches and the dead coming back to life.

irrational fear is irrational.

*nod*

 

[Jessica]

cockroaches and the dead coming back to life.

irrational fear is irrational.

*nod*

The dead will come back to life.

 

[SilkRoad]

I agree that many of these don't seem "irrational", especially if they were triggered by a bad experience.

I'm an INFJ but I have a couple of phobias, flying (turbulence especially) and thunderstorms. To a certain extent they go back to bad childhood experiences (like, being in a smallish plane on the edge of a thunderstorm once...). The flying one got much worse (like, raise the level from anxiety to phobia) in recent years due to being in an emergency landing followed by a flight with loads of turbulence. So, while I know it's irrational, it does have causes to a certain extent.

I have read that INTJs can be phobia-prone due to inferior Se, or something like that? Does that sound at all accurate? Might apply to INFJs too.

My mom is a probable INTJ and doesn't have phobias per se that I'm aware of but she can be a bit OCD. She has to check the stove more than once (not ten times, but still more than once) before leaving the house, and often doesn't trust my dad if he says he's pretty sure he turned it off...that sort of thing. She was also always really worried about triggering allergies and stuff like that. She didn't want me to get my ears pierced because my grandmother had hers done and tended to get infections. (I never did get them pierced, my interest passed on...). She's awesome, but I realise in retrospect that she was more neurotic about some stuff than I realised at the time.

 

[jimrckhnd]

Straight razors... no idea why but those things give me the horrors. Which is inconvenient as a barber straight razor shave is the best and closest a man can get.

Being confined closely. I can work myself into a full blow anxiety attack just thinking about cave in/collapse scenarios. Allot of my colleagues love caves and enjoy pocking around in them. Me? Not no byt HELL no. I’m not phobic – I can do it if required but I don’t enjoy it and I’m last in, first out.

 

[Oaky]

I'm sure, though, that you could rationalize even the seemingly most irrational fears somehow.

And I suppose "irrational" is a matter of opinion and perspective, too. A dentist might think your fear of dentists is irrational ("yes, you've had three bad experiences, but that doesn't mean the next one will also be bad...most dentists are quite capable and besides, you were with students when the bad things happened"), while someone else (perhaps they also fear dentists) might say "yes, it's quite rational that many bad experiences will lead you to fear dentists like that. This is not an irrational fear."

Hmmm, though most usually the fear of the dentists arise for awareness of a risk of pain. And dentists do inflict pain often to their patients so it's not necessarily irrational to fear the risk of possible pain that you might get with a visit. It does not necessarily have to be experience-wise.

 

[funkadelik]

Hmmm, though most usually the fear of the dentists arise for awareness of a risk of pain. And dentists do inflict pain often to their patients so it's not necessarily irrational to fear the risk of possible pain that you might get with a visit. It does not necessarily have to be experience-wise.

I'm not saying it's necessarily irrational depending on how you look at it. Certainly, in a more animalistic part of the brain, we associate (and it's a good thing we do) pain with a tendency to not survive. But in the case of a dentist, the pain you experience there is more conducive with a tendency to survive (since bad teeth, etc. tends to lead to larger health problems). If one was being completely rational, the pain experienced at the dentist would be worth the health pay-off and, therefore, nothing to fear.

You're right, though, it doesn't necessarily have anything to do with experience, although that could be one way of looking at it.

 

[violet_crown]

Be glad you're not an ancient Egyptian criminal. According to a peer reviewed source - The Mummy (my high school peers and I reviewed it on Amazon.com) - standard punishment was to have your tongue clipped out.

Oddly enough, I think the self-mutilation component is an important part of the phobia. I do, however, appreciate your academic viewpoint on this issue.

 

[mrcockburn]

Straight razors... no idea why but those things give me the horrors. Which is inconvenient as a barber straight razor shave is the best and closest a man can get.

Being confined closely. I can work myself into a full blow anxiety attack just thinking about cave in/collapse scenarios. Allot of my colleagues love caves and enjoy pocking around in them. Me? Not no byt HELL no. I’m not phobic – I can do it if required but I don’t enjoy it and I’m last in, first out.

Caves!! That's another one. I would NEVER go spelunking, because that's where thousands/millions of bats live.

Being swarmed by millions of bats while backed against a wall = not pleasant, I'd imagine. Never mind scorpions, plate-sized flying cockroaches crashing into my face, or any other unexpected critter...

Not to mention, bats are supposedly natural reservoirs for rabies - naturally present/dormant in 0.01% of all bats. That's 1/10,000...but still. Rabies is not fun...there are videos on youtube of people actually dying from it. Scary stuff.

There has also been cases of people contracting rabies by breathing in al the concentrated infectious vapor within a cave.

Certain parts of Texas would make me uneasy as well. (A daily million-bat "commute" in Austin, at least)

/paranoid rambling