It's a bug's life in my office

There is nothing worse than being told that you have a cockroach (or potentially two) in your office. Don’t get me wrong – I’m a BIG animal lover – even the most commonly hated animals – like bats and rats, They’re sort of  vulnerable for being hated so much.

But I am NOT a fan of insects. Spiders give me the chills when they run – all the hairs on my arms stand up – but cockroaches give me feel-sick fear.

So I’m sat at my desk with my feet wrapped around my chair – feeling like one could crawl up my trouser leg at any given point.  

Marvellous.

I remember when my cat had fleas from frolicking about in bushes too much; it was like every inch of my home was suddenly contaminated. You feel like you’re crawling with them – I immediately bought 3 bottles of house spray – blasted everything and quickly vacated (with the de-flead cat) and ran away to my Mum’s house for a holiday.

(I’m itching, just thinking about it!)

Ignorance is bliss, right?

I didn’t even realise cockroaches were a problem in London. Being told casually by my friend that “oh, they’re probably in most restaurants in London” was certainly news to me.

Irrational fears about insects are as their name suggests – really irrational; like me changing my sheets when I was eight, all because my brother dropped a monstrous spider onto my duvet whilst trying to throw him out the window.

My phobias are pretty common in the grand scheme of things – (does that make them less irrational?):

• Claustrophobia in crowds – I can’t bear being caught up in a crowd of people – I’m quite little, and the feeling of being surrounded by people’s bodies – and ultimately their many auras – fills me with horror. I go all *panic attack*
• Spiders. These little wriggly all-shapes-all-sizes Arachnids are scarier due to their unpredictability – and the way they run. I always feel like they are literally crawling all over me. I’ve got better since I was little and the latest school craze was for boys to throw Daddy-Long-Legs spiders into girl’s unsuspecting faces. *shudder*
•  And apparently, as I have discovered today – cockroaches.

We know phobias are irrational as they make you over-react as your mind distorts reality – but fear is one of the hardest things for our minds to conquer.

A cute blog about phobias I came across called ‘Irrational Fears’ lists stories of reader’s different phobias – some freaky, some not quite so. They quote Franklin D. Roosevelt’s when he said:
 OK. I’ll stand up to my fear – I’ll face my cockroach, by unwrapping my feet from my chair and placing them firmly on the floor. It is only a little evil cockroach – a bug. Calling it a bug is far less scary...  Conjures up images of ‘A Bugs Life’ or ‘Antz’.

‘The only thing we have to fear, is fear itself’

However, I think that ‘Ignorance is bliss’ is a far better quote than Frankin D. Roosevelt’s brave statement.