Fear

[ER]

As I sit alone right now in a dark forest by a lake, I find myself wondering why the woods doesn't scare me like it does so many people. What scares me? Horses, yes, bad drivers, absolutely, but being alone in a nocturnal forest, nah.

What's the most afraid you've ever been?

Me, it was either that night camping alone in the Hundred Mile Wilderness and after dark someone approached and stood near my tent in the middle of a pitch black night, most remote forest east of the Rockies, no good reason for that stranger to be there, smoking, staying there through most of the night.....just standing there. Then that person crept off so quietly at some point before dawn I never heard him go. Absolutely creepy! Not the forest, the intruder in it. Old story, I know, I know. On my mind tonight though.

Or a time a co-worker and I were supposed to meet someone outside an empty building and we hid behind a wall when these armed gang members unexpectedly showed up right there and they would not have taken kindly to our presence, and we were trapped with no way out behind us and the gunmen in front of us, and we were expecting to get seen any second, which would have meant a lopsided gun battle, certain death, but the gang left without finding us. I bet my heartbeat tripled, as we crouched down I heard blood rushing in my ears, and afterwards I couldn't believe we just walked off perfectly untouched when I honestly thought we were dead. The second of my two weird responses to that was to laugh hysterically in the car driving out. Laughed til I was nauseous and had tears coming out my eyes. The Florida good old boy I was with said I was going to wet myself if I didn't get a handle on my adrenaline, which was a normal kind of funny so I did finally calm down but my God that was terror. We met up years later where he lived in Florida after he took another job and I asked him if that was the closest call of his life and he said yes actually it probably was because unlike other hot situations he'd been in neither of us would have had a chance.

Or the time I watched The Ring with my Aunt Christie. That was scary.

[Alex]

When we'd to go into hospital after finding out we had lost Lilly-Beth. Kristi was having a bad reaction to the meds she'd been given and I was terrified that I was going to lose her too. I've faced death and sometimes been afraid, and other times not, but that night scared me like no other.

[claws]

Having anxiety attacks. No scary movie or real life near death moment even came close. It is hard to describe an anxiety attack, it is a dreadful hellish overpowering fear that builds up and continually gets worse until the "climax" or the moment you think you're dying. Imagine your soul ripped to shreds in a hurricane, that's what it feels like.

[chefzombie]

when curtis was in surgery to have a brain tumor removed, then for the next 5 days until we knew it was benign.