Aug 2010 04

Living with Astraphobia…

11:12 pm ★ Filed under: Life ★ 2 Vampires

From my experience, living with a phobia is like living with a medical condition (which technically it IS a disorder). You can’t control it, you can’t always treat it, and sometimes it results in weird looks or laughs. Just like a medical condition, it isn’t anything to laugh about. It’s difficult to live with a phobia, to truly have a phobia. You’d think everyone might be phobic of at least one thing…and that isn’t true. I have been told that fear usually only affects the mind. You’re afraid of it, you know you are, you don’t wanna be around it (see it, hear it, or whatever I could be referring to), but it doesn’t cause you to do more than scream if you get a little bit of a shock.

A lot of people know I’m Astraphobic. I don’t have a problem telling people, even though I have been laughed at over it. And I’m constantly teased by certain loved ones when a storm is approaching. Now bear mind it isn’t just thunder and lightning; it’s the whole works. Especially the wind.

I do have all the symptoms of someone who is Astraphobic. During a storm (more or less depending on the intensity), I do shake, cry my eyes out, constantly have a rapid heartbeat, and even have panic attacks. I’m lucky to have the ability to breathe. It isn’t easy to do so.

Living with Astraphobia isn’t easy. Being terrified of thunderstorms…it leaves you awfully helpless. Storms are unpredictable (half the time) and most definitely uncontrollable. They’re not always destructive, but when they are, the results can be terrifying. I know that well, as I lost a close friend when I was younger to a storm. And as I get older, the more and more I feel like I’ll be destroyed by a storm. That, or I’ll lose everything I own.

The worst part of this fear though has to be the teasing that comes along with it. My brother is very famous for doing everything he can during a storm to provoke me, to make my reactions worst. When you have a panic attack, it isn’t easy to think or breathe, so attempting to make me feel even more frightened gets me closer to ending up in the hospital. He has yet to do it during a panic attack, but he gets me to the point where I freak out before the storm has even reached us.

I hope one day I’ll be able to get over it, for my own sake!