A phobia of phobias

I wonder if there is such thing as being afraid of a phobia...a phobia of phobias...(Googles...) Phobophobia. It’s sort of redundant, but conclusive. If you care scared of phobias, you have phobophobia and should probably stop reading this blog posting now...

If you have Allodoxaphobia, you shouldn't read my blog, because it is a fear of opinions.

Arachibutyrophobia is the fear of peanut butter sticking to the roof of your mouth.

Alektorophobia is the fear of chickens. Hm...

Anthophobia is the fear of flowers...I think all of my boyfriends have had this...figures.

Chrematophobia is the fear of money...maybe my bank account has this...

Francophobia is the fear of France...are you kidding me?

Gymnophobia is the fear of nudity. I totally know someone who has this!

Lachanophobia is the fear of vegetables. Like attack of the killer salad?

Nephophobia is the fear of clouds. That's unfortunate.

Omphalophobia is the fear of belly buttons. How does this happen?! Just avoid looking down? Spend your whole life running away from your belly button?

Sitiophobia is the fear of eating or of food. I definitely don't have this. At all. Ever.

I found all of these on www.phobialist.com. If they are incorrect, I apologize. They are also not meant to offend anyone with any phobias...if you have a phobia, especially one listed above, I would LOVE to hear about it. For real.

So this brings my to my phobia. It's tied into a phobia that I will name later, but it is the fear of using a shower other than my own. No joke. When I was growing up, my shower was never used by anyone else but me. I was an only child and didn't share a bathroom until freshman year of college. My parents also had a huge shower, it had two shower heads and was probably 6ft by 6ft. Both of our showers had large windows above them as well as an additional overhead light.

My fear began when I was probably...eight or nine? I was traveling with my family and my god father to his girlfriend's house on the west coast of Florida. It was an island beach house complete with an outdoor shower and view of the water. I loved it. Well, until I had to use the shower inside. Mom and I had gone to the beach and come back later than normal. The outdoor shower didn't really have a light, so mom forced me to shower inside. Now let me describe a bit about the indoor shower. It was in a small bathroom with very little light. Downside number one. It also had a black shower curtain/liner. Downside number two. It had no overhead light and was confined to a very small space. Downside number three. So this is before I realized my fear, so I got in the shower, washed my hair, etc. When I got out, I reached for the towels on the counter, which were also black. Not good. So as I grab a towel, I hear a "plunk" sound. Note to self. Hearing "plunk" in the bathroom is never a good sign. So I didn't really think about it until I wrapped the towel around myself and the "plunk" skittered across my foot. Yeah. Plunks can skitter, because the plunk was a cockroach that was on my towel, and then on my foot. Needless to say there was a lot of screaming and half-naked running around. Oh, and in Florida, cockroaches can fly. They're called palmetto bugs. Wrap your head around that, why don't you. Katsaridaphobia just got taken to a whole new level. By the way, that is the fear of cockroaches.

So anyway. Ever since that day, I have had an irrational fear of showers. What has been in them, what IS in them other than me, the shower curtain liner being dirty and touching me...it's just not a fun event. So, the bottom line being, if you plan on inviting me over and there is a need for me to shower, make sure you use bleach and remove anything remotely dirty or creepy. And for heavens sake, watch out for plunks!