With the presence of mind, of course, everyone can say this was a terrible move. In hindsight, I'm sure she can, too. But fear is a powerful motivator and I doubt she ever thought that a spider would crawl on her while she was driving with her child and cause her reaction to be this strong. But I'm going to let everyone continue finger wagging and "I would never" ing.
Seriously? Even MW has posted where she's had a couple of encounters with a spider in her car. Spiders are everywhere. It's something that you might have to deal with daily.
I know it is not rational, but they are bugs people. Bugs. They won't eat you. YWIA
OK - so now I've read the thread, and all I can think about is the story (I think it was an MLer) about the lady who not only had a spider in her car, but an entire nest of spider babies inside her car. And she didn't notice they were there until she got into her car, started the engine...and looked up.
Anybody remember who that was?
Ha. I was just coming in to post the story. Fortunately, I was in a parking lot when the spiders rained down on me. But still.
OMG! I will never, EVER forget this! It's one of my favorite stories. I have no idea why because it sends chills down my spine. But still. Favorite!
You know I do not have a phobia of any kind of insect or arachnid or reptile or amphibian or anything. I'm honestly not so afraid of anything to the point that it's debilitating.
HOWEVER...however... if goddamn Charlotte the spider with her six inch leg span or whatever or even just a little generic spider I wasn't expecting crawled up my shoulder I would probably freak the fuck out, too. Does that mean I should never drive again? Probably not. Does that mean that I should have my license taken away? No. Get the fuck outta here with that. Geez.
Unfortunately for her, her reaction proved to be extremely dangerous. Luckily for her and her child, no one was seriously injured. She should be ticketed and fined accordingly. She doesn't need her license revoked or be in state monitored therapy or other such nonsense.
I agree, taking away a license is not a rational response, but she is a danger and should be punished accordingly. AND, she needs therapy. If she is that affected, she needs to get some help if for nothing else than her own sense of being. Spiders are everywhere. EVERYWHERE.
"Spiders are common" - Uh... do y'all have spiders living in your car on a regular basis? You have nests of them hanging out in your vehicle? I know I don't. Even if she does have a spider phobia, I think it's reasonable to expect that one is not going to surprise you in your car while you're driving.
Dude, they are everywhere. Likely, you have eaten them. More than once.
"Spiders are common" - Uh... do y'all have spiders living in your car on a regular basis? You have nests of them hanging out in your vehicle? I know I don't. Even if she does have a spider phobia, I think it's reasonable to expect that one is not going to surprise you in your car while you're driving.
Dude, they are everywhere. Likely, you have eaten them. More than once.
"Spiders are common" - Uh... do y'all have spiders living in your car on a regular basis? You have nests of them hanging out in your vehicle? I know I don't. Even if she does have a spider phobia, I think it's reasonable to expect that one is not going to surprise you in your car while you're driving.
Dude, they are everywhere. Likely, you have eaten them. More than once.
Ha. I was just coming in to post the story. Fortunately, I was in a parking lot when the spiders rained down on me. But still.
holy shit.
holy shit!
HOLY SHIT!!!
HOLY FUCKING SHIT!!!
I wouldn't get back in my car. ever. DH and I have two cars. he can drive the station wagon for the rest of his life.
The first thing I did, after ditching the gorgeous baby blanket I'd used to wipe the roof clean (you'll note that I also left my child to his own devices (at three weeks old) and got myself the fuck out of the car), was call DH to tell him we had to buy a new car.
OMG! I will never, EVER forget this! It's one of my favorite stories. I have no idea why because it sends chills down my spine. But still. Favorite!
I have to say, I've gotten a lot of mileage out of the this story. It's truly the most horrifying thing I've experienced.
This is the kind of story your grand children will be telling...except by then it will have embellishments of course.
For example, you will have saved your three week old infant from a spider worthy of Tolkien-esque descriptives along with its hordes of tiny babies and the blanket you used to smother them was the fabled golden fleece of Jason and the Argonauts.
Also, I like to think I am a strong mama bear and would do anything to keep my kids safe, but I honestly can't say how I would react to having a cockroach crawl on me in the car. I am deathly afraid of roaches.
I had one fly up my skirt once. I was driving my parents' convertible Mustang one the highway and up it went! I DID flip the fuck out, but I also screeched over to the shoulder, put it neutral, ebrake, then jumped out and nearly stripped on the side of the road. I guess my fear of dying in a fiery head-on collision was greater than the roach up my skirt. :::shudder:::
Post by KateAggie on Sept 21, 2015 15:51:34 GMT -5
I don't like spiders. I don't really have a huge fear of them, and I'm rarely suprised when I see one. That doesn't change the fact that I had one crawling on me in a store this weekend, and flipped the fuck out. I almost ran my cart (with my kid inside) into an endcap. Because regardless of the commonality of spiders, I still don't expect a huge yellowish spider to crawl on my arm.
I've been thinking about this all day (unfortunately. Because, spiders) and I feel like I was harsh in my initial reaction to it. I keep picturing very large scary spiders, cockroaches and bees in the car on my body as I'm driving along and in these scenarios I'm not seeing myself reacting well.
So I don't know. I guess at first I was thinking of one of those little spiders I see in the basement all the time but if it was one of the huge ones pictured or even a large cockroach .or a few bees.. Ugh. I don't know
I hate spiders so much, and I hate them even more for not realizing that cars are sacred spaces where they do not belong. I didn't even realize it was possible for spiders to be in cars until a few months ago when I was driving and one started crawling down the windshield. I was really impressed with my ability to kill it fast.
Also there may or may not be a video of me killing a spider on youtube. There was this terrifying spider on the chair in my son's room, and it was in the middle of the day so DH wouldn't be home for a long time and I knew I had to kill it. I was so scared that I recorded a video of myself killing it - for some reason that made me feel less scared. I used a frying pan. I also didn't have a bra on so there's a lot of flapping under my shirt, and a lot of screaming. lol
I've been thinking about this all day (unfortunately. Because, spiders) and I feel like I was harsh in my initial reaction to it. I keep picturing very large scary spiders, cockroaches and bees in the car on my body as I'm driving along and in these scenarios I'm not seeing myself reacting well.
So I don't know. I guess at first I was thinking of one of those little spiders I see in the basement all the time but if it was one of the huge ones pictured or even a large cockroach .or a few bees.. Ugh. I don't know
This is a tough one.
I agree with this... I've had dreams about things that don't usually scare me, but the dreams are so intense they leave me on the edge of hysteria. So I spend the morning trying to keep myself calm and just when I think I'm alright H and I go to the home improvement store to pick up plants for the garden and everything comes rushing back and it's all bad and H doesn't understand why I'm jumping at every shadow every touch every vibration every flicker in the corner of my eye
I know my first post in this thread was judgmental. That was my bravado. When I think about it more...I definitely have those moments where there is no rationality. I hope that one day I can find balance.
ETA: This is also one of the reasons I steer my fear towards calculated hatred. Spiders don't always have to die. But if they are in my space, if they are deadly in any way, their life is over.
I find it strange that people are all over this mom like she is the worst person ever for simply having a fight or flight response to a phobia, yet if the same mom left her baby in a grocery store cart or hit car because she was tired, the same people would probably be defending her like crazy. Both actions are careless and put your child on danger.
It's fight or flight. You can't always control the response.
People tend to show more understanding and leniency when it's something they, themselves, have experienced before. Like in the parents leaving kids in cars threads -- several people have admitted to forgetting their children are in the car with them and many more admit to "spacing out" when driving, and more than once. Those are equally concerning situations that parents put their kids and other drivers in but I don't remember anyone saying that those people should have their licenses revoked or have to attend therapy before getting into a car again.
I haven't read more than this, BUT... You don't know if you're going to leave your kid in the car. You just don't. You DO know if you're going to freak the fuck out if a spider is on you. You know because you've done it before. This isn't something that randomly happens one day.
I haven't read more than this, BUT... You don't know if you're going to leave your kid in the car. You just don't. You DO know if you're going to freak the fuck out if a spider is on you. You know because you've done it before. This isn't something that randomly happens one day.
Okay, this is not how phobias work. It's not a conscious choice to act nor is the act a conscious choice. It just isn't. Which is why it often takes therapy and exposure and medication for phobias to get under control. And it's not something that someone might seek help for unless and until it leads to tangible dysfunction in one's daily life.
This is another reason why we need more awareness about mental health issues, because they are so misunderstood and maligned.
Yes, I know this. You missed my point.
The point being you know you have the phobia to begin with. You don't know if you're going to leave your kid in the car until it happens. It's comparing apples and oranges. They look the same, but the underlying reasons are different.
Okay, this is not how phobias work. It's not a conscious choice to act nor is the act a conscious choice. It just isn't. Which is why it often takes therapy and exposure and medication for phobias to get under control. And it's not something that someone might seek help for unless and until it leads to tangible dysfunction in one's daily life.
This is another reason why we need more awareness about mental health issues, because they are so misunderstood and maligned.
Yes, I know this. You missed my point.
The point being you know you have the phobia to begin with. You don't know if you're going to leave your kid in the car until it happens. It's comparing apples and oranges. They look the same, but the underlying reasons are different.
I guarantee you that lady didn't know she was capable of abandoning her child in a moving vehicle until it happened any more than a mother thinks she's capable of forgetting her child in a car until it happens. It bet before this happened that mother would have thought she would have the presence of mind to put the car in park before freaking out, but you can never predict how a person will react when terrified.
There are so many things people can have phobias about. I mean, should a person with a clown phobia not get a license just in case they come across a clown while behind the wheel? What phobias should people be allowed to drive with?
The point being you know you have the phobia to begin with. You don't know if you're going to leave your kid in the car until it happens. It's comparing apples and oranges. They look the same, but the underlying reasons are different.
I didn't miss your point. I disagree with your point.
So, someone disassociating (which is a common and normal mental process until it affects your life in tangible ways) and forgetting their child when they know ahead of time that they are busy/anxious/in a hurry/tired/doing something out of the norm -- unavoidable and accidental and understandable.
Someone reacting out of instinct and fear from something they know they are phobic of -- completely predictable and purposeful and their fault because they should have sought out help before stepping outside of their home even though they have no idea if they will ever happen upon said phobia in their car.
I get that they are not exactly the same but come on.
Still missing the point by a mile. I'm not saying anything about how people will react when they have a phobia. People know their phobias. They know their triggers. MW said in this thread that she will pass out if one touches her. It's not like they crop up in the middle of the night with no warning. (I say that, but there are some phobias that you may not know that you have, such a fear of heights or agoraphobia that crops up when you're in the middle of the ocean. Spiders are common, so people who have the phobia tend to know that they have it.)
You can't predict that you have disassociation until it happens.
There's a spider living in our front patio who likes to build his web across our front gate. It's annoying because I hate getting web on me when taking the dogs out or getting the mail. But I don't have the heart to kill him because, well outside is his place. He is pretty funny though, if you get close to him he starts angrily vibrating/making circles with his body, I assume to look larger and more menacing than he is. I'll probably end up missing him when his insect life times out but I won't miss the webs.
The point being you know you have the phobia to begin with. You don't know if you're going to leave your kid in the car until it happens. It's comparing apples and oranges. They look the same, but the underlying reasons are different.
I guarantee you that lady didn't know she was capable of abandoning her child in a moving vehicle until it happened any more than a mother thinks she's capable of forgetting her child in a car until it happens. It bet before this happened that mother would have thought she would have the presence of mind to put the car in park before freaking out, but you can never predict how a person will react when terrified.
There are so many things people can have phobias about. I mean, should a person with a clown phobia not get a license just in case they come across a clown while behind the wheel? What phobias should people be allowed to drive with?
Well it's not like a clown is something people just happen to see randomly in their car.
my uncle once had a hornet fly out of the vent in his car. he jumped out of the car, while the car was still running and it ran into and got stuck on the concrete divider on the road. he waited until the cop got there and had the cop kill the hornet before he would get back in the car.
not before the cop tried to talk him back into the car and my uncle told him he could have a new car if he wanted to drive away with a hornet in the car.
I would pay good money for photos and/or video of all of this.