Hisssssss!

I finally brought up the subject of my snake phobia in counseling on Tuesday. Just barely. I was getting ready to leave, and for once, I remembered to mention this problem of mine. She first said I probably don't encounter that many snakes, so it couldn't be much of a problem. I don't work in the reptile house of the zoo or anything. But when I mentioned that I can't even stand to allow the kids to watch those lunatics on Animal Planet, because I run screaming from the room, she agreed this was something that needed work.

There wasn't really much time, but she did ask if I had any episodes when I was younger. I haven't really. My brother chased me with a little bitty garter snake one time that sent me (stupidly) up one the ladder of one of those huge traffic signals for trains. Of course he followed me, and I was trapped, begging him to go away, and did I hear a train coming? In a rare act of kindness, he left me alone.

I had one other snake-chasing incident. A retarded boy down the street found a dead bull snake in the gutter. He managed to get it out with a stick and then walked around the neighborhood with this dead, bloody five-foot snake on a stick. At first, my friend and I tried to convince him to put it back, but instead he lunged at us with it, which sent us scurrying away. He thought this was great fun, and proceeded to follow us with his nasty talisman until we went in the house. We watched him from out of view at the window as he waited for an incredibly long time for us to come back out and then giving up, tried to find other people to chase. My mom came home, and we told her. She doesn't like snakes either, but she had enough courage and authority to tell Robert to put the thing back in the gutter because he might get sick from it. Leave it to mom to come up with that one.

My final major snake memory was a gigantic bull snake coiled up in our back yard, hissing and puffing up as the neighbor's German Shepherd barked at it on the other side of the fence. My mom called me out onto the deck, where I got the luxury of witnessing the neighbor with one of those hard garden rakes, spike the snake and pull it over the fence for the dog to eat. That makes my skin crawl just to think about it.

As the years went by, my fear of snakes got progressively worse. I could suffer through movies like Indiana Jones for a while, but now I can't even stand the sound of a snake, much less the sight of one. Even realistic drawings startle me. I ran from the room crying when I tried to watch Natural Born Killers with that snake imagery scene. I throw books and magazines across the room when I find a surprise snake slithering through their pages. I quit going in the jungle exhibit at the Omaha Zoo after I embarrassed myself in front of John's parents on their first visit to Nebraska.

John and I had been going out for at least a year when they came to visit us. Since the Omaha Zoo is one of the best in the country, we always took visitors there. The jungle was pretty new at the time, so there was a major crowd in the place. I hadn't been in it before, but I had heard about the boa constrictor. There is a path going through the jungle of fake but realistic looking logs and trees (there are real plants and small trees too, but that has nothing to do with my story). The boa resides inside one of these fake logs that has a cut-out covered in a piece of plexiglass. Doesn't seem that bad, right? The problem is this log is suspended over the walkway, and there is no alternate route like there was for the suspension bridge. There he was in all his snaky glory, fat pale belly pressed up against that glass.

I thought I could make it. I really did. The crowd was so thick that we were literally shoulder to shoulder with people in this area, and we were just sort of pushed along. I clenched John's hand in mine, closed my eyes and buried my head in his shoulder. He talked me through, telling me we were almost there when suddenly someone thought it would be funny to hiss. As you would expect, I freaked out. My fight or flight response was on flight, and I bolted, pushing people out of my way and running on down the path. I finally came to a stop in front of some birds where I realized I was crying. John's mom came up to see if I was okay, patting my back while I tried to breathe normal again.

So here I was, seeing John's parents for only the second time, and I have a phobic attack in front of them. I'm sure they were wondering right then how they could extract their son from that relationship, even as his mom tried to comfort me.

After that, I started to avoid snakes even more, which I came to find out is the worst thing you can do for this type of phobia. I always thought exposure therapy was a load of shit and thought of all the times people tried to test my fear by shoving snake pictures in my face, throwing rubber snakes on me, or telling me to look when they knew there was a snake in that direction. Every time I would freak out and end up shaking, sometimes sobbing, once even passing out when I couldn't escape.

People toss the word "phobia" around too casually, and most people don't understand what a true phobia is. It is sheer terror, something that causes an uncontrollable reaction. It's not funny, and messing with someone's phobia only makes it worse. It's not just a fear like how I worry about the black death mold in my bathroom. It's totally irrational, base fear. I won't try to make it sound like it's okay, because it's not. It's abnormal and restricting. People think it's silly, and it is, but that isn't an invitation. You can make fun of it, kid me about it, whatever, but don't tease me and torture me by testing it. It's real, and you're going to feel really bad when I'm huddled in a corner crying. I hardly ever tell people of my phobia in fear they might try something as a joke.

I'm tired of being tested. I'm tired of having to leave the room every time the kids want to watch Crocodile Hunter. I'm tired of avoiding the reptile house at the zoo, having to wait outside while my family goes without me. I'm tired of having to make John black out snakes in the magazines I read. It's a pain in the ass. It might be a minor pain in the ass, but it's a pain in the ass nonetheless, and I want it fixed. If I could find the guy that cured Salma Hayek of her snake phobia by doing something with pressure points, I would, but I don't know that guy. I have to opt for therapy.

My first assignment is to journal every day about snakes. I promise I won't do that here, and knowing how good I am at doing things every day (I am doing well with this Holidailies thing though), I probably won't be too consistent. Still, I know it helps. I try to talk about snakes more too, and I find it getting easier to even talk about it without having my vivid imagination full of coiled, scaly nightmares. Maybe I'll beat this thing yet.