Running from Nemo

I couldn't watch Finding Nemo in the theatres. I had to wait until it came out on video so I could hyperventilate in the privacy of my own home.

I know I'm not the only one who had a strong emotional reaction to this movie. I even know a couple of people who said the movie brought them to tears. They were parents whose children lived in far away places. They had every reason to be upset.

Me? I just couldn't stand the wiggly, slimy, disgusting, animated fish.

Many people have a phobia--an unreasonable fear of something that is usually quite innocent. Sure, the people who are afraid of heights have a decent reason for their fear. Fear of snakes and bugs? Most people can understand that as well. But then you get into the weird fears that make no sense.

Have you ever looked at The Phobia List? People are afraid of some extremely odd things--flutes, gold, names, and even the color purple. Some people are even afraid of phobias! I honestly can't imagine how a lot of these fears work, and I even used to make fun of some of those poor, nameless souls until I slowly became one of them. Sure I can play a flute and I love gold, but show me a fish and I'm likely to turn an unhealthy shade of pale and rush out of the room. I knew it was getting bad when I actually vomited in the street after accidentally stepping into a fish store. They had a giant, grotesque trout-like thing right by the door!

Everyone wants to know how my fear developed. I honestly don't know. I never liked fish. My childhood often included carnival fish or other short-lived creatures of the sea. They invariably died within a week because my younger sister liked to take them out of the bowl and pet them. Just typing that makes my skin crawl. I would help clean the bowls, but I never did like the way their limp bodies twitched in the net.

When I entered high school the fear really took seed. I paid way too much attention in biology and learned about all the poisonous, scary, and dangerous creatures that live in the water. It took only one semester of biology to convince me that natural water was not a place I should swim. And I haven't. Not since then.

Around that same time my aunt had a fish tank and was constantly complaining about her fish jumping out and landing on the couch. I tend to fixate on things, and I fixated on how it would feel to have a fish jump out of its tank and land on my neck. The cold, slimy, squirmy body... I couldn't stand that thought. I carefully avoided fish tanks from that day forward.

And the fear grew and grew and grew.

Now I'm 30 years old and the mere thought of a fish touching me makes my heart race. I can't stand going over bridges because I know that there's a giant sturgeon waiting for me at the bottom of the river. It will eat me. I know it will. Yes, I'm psychotic.

Last summer I had to confront my fear head-on. My husband and I were taking an innocent nightly walk around our neighborhood, a town that was no where near the sea. Suddenly I saw it. A big, dead fish lying right in the middle of the sidewalk. I did my little hyperventilation thing and vowed never to walk that way again. My husband tried to convince me that it was a fluke and the route was perfectly safe, but I knew better. If people throw a fish out of a window once, what's to stop them from doing it again? How else would a fish get there? It certainly didn't fall from the sky!

I feel fortunate that my phobia rarely interferes with my daily life. I know people who are afraid of birds and moths and I can't even imagine how it must feel for them to go out into the world and know they could be confronted with their worst fear at any time. I know I'm generally safe as long as I avoid aquariums, pet stores and people who keep fish. I do have a problem with my new job, though. Several of the offices I deal with have fish tanks in their reception areas. I have to bolster up my courage and try not to look.

And if I ever crash into a river and become fish food? I've already figured out a plan for that: I'll just have a heart attack and die before the sturgeon gets me.