Phobias: Fire | Mental Health

I thought this post would be a particular point of interest for some of you who read my post for mental health topics. Phobias are quite overlooked, no one really ever discusses them. They are used more as an asset for getting views on real life TV or spoken about vaguely in magazines. The word (phobia) itself is often over exaggerated, too, for simple fears of things.

Although I don't know much about them, I know I have one. And I know I can share it with you...

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I have had a phobia of fire since I was a very young child. Phobias are often seen as an irrational fear of something, and I'm sure you're sat their thinking that a fear of a great, big raging fire is hardly irrational. It burns, kills and destroys. Well, my fears are a lot deeper than that. I can't even be close to a lit cigarette or a burning candle. I have to be five meters away because I'm scared it will fall on something near by and cause a bigger fire, or burn me. 

My fear suddenly began when I was first invited to a birthday party, I must have been about four and the sounds of balloons being popped scared me enough. But when the birthday cake came out, I had to be taken out of the room because I was just crying hysterically. 

Similarly, I remember going on holiday to Cyprus when I was around five or six. We decided to go and watch the entertainment at the hotel. Obviously because I was so little I didn't take much notice of the boards that said what the act would be, so I was blissfully unaware that it would be some abnormally muscular man running out with a tiki torch drinking oil and spitting out fire. Again, I had a melt down and had to be taken out of the room.

At primary school Christingle services, I made my mum or dad hold my candle, whilst I distanced myself. Then came back to eat the sweets and raisins at the end...

Secondary school was even worse when it came to Christmas services. I tried to explain to teachers I couldn't hold a candle because of how scared I was, thinking they would understand. Oh, how they laughed and told me how ridiculous I was being. The worst thing was, I couldn't even hold the candle away from me because it would of set fire to the person in front of me. I was constantly checking behind me to see how close other people's candles were to me. It got to a point where I had to ask my friends to hold it for me whilst I tried so hard not to have a panic attack. 

Fire alarms were terrible when I was little. These really sent me off on one and I always had to have a teaching assistant take me out five minutes before the alarm went off. God, I was such a weird child. 

I never really got to enjoy firework nights because of this fear, either. I was encouraged to try holding sparklers but I just put my foot down. Have you seen how close the last spark gets to your hand!? I wouldn't even trust myself to put it out in the water, I'd be frozen with fear. 

It was sad because I felt like I was holding so many people back. My family stopped having fireworks when we found out I didn't like the noise, or the amount of sparks they cause and the fact my dad had to light them. It also made a mess though.

My last melt down because of fire was actually last night. We were just waiting for Grandma's birthday cake to come out and I saw this big orange light against the kitchen wall and thought mum had set fire to something. Maybe I was going to be in a house fire. My eyes just widened and my whole body stiffened up. I stared as this cake came into the room. At least it wasn't actually a fire, but sparks were flying everywhere. I felt like I was going to be sick.

A lot of my friends smoke, too. I have a lot of trust issues with this as I have received numerous malicious cigarette burns. When Tom smoked, he had to keep his hand with the cigarette in well away from me if he wanted to give me a hug. Although it's not fire, it's flammable and cigarette burns hurt like a bitch.

The worst thing about it, is because I am in so much fear that I might be in a fire one day and I will just be paralyzed with fear, so I won't be able to save myself. Someone would have to risk their own life to. I wouldn't want either of those to happen.

Do you have any phobias or weird fears? Comment below or let me know through my social media pages.

Take care xo