Here Are All The Irrational Things The Thought Catalog Staff Worries About So You Can Be Reassured That You’re Not The Only One
By Kim Quindlen
This is a very, very honest place to work.
1.
“The other day I had a moment of panic when I remembered a conversation I had 15 years ago with my high school hockey coach and worried about whether I sounded dumb.”
“Every night before I go to bed I have to look in both my closets, behind my shower curtain, and under my bed to make sure there’s no one in my apartment. I keep my door locked and one of the closets I check isn’t even big enough for someone to hide in, I’ve just see way too many crime shows.”
“I also have a bug phobia. When I lived in a house where there were centipedes (legitimately terrifying though), I made a circle of glue traps around my bed so that I could sleep at night knowing one wouldn’t be in my bed but then I started worrying one would go on the ceiling and drop down.”
2.
“Anytime I’m driving and especially when I’m driving on the highway, I always think, What if I just floored it right now? Like what if I just gunned it and drove off the side of the road? Can that happen by accident? How many cars would I take out with me? Would I survive? Would I get in trouble? And then I just end up freaking myself out and I drive way below the speed limit and everyone around me gets angry.”
“I also have the moment of, They’re going to think my ID is fake every time I’m flying and going through security.”
“Whenever I’m eating hard candy or like, a cough drop, and I go to bite it, I wonder if this is the time it’ll crack my tooth.”
3.
“I’ve never had hypochondriac tendencies. But now that I’m a mom, I scowl at anyone who coughs in my vicinity because I don’t want to get my baby sick—not because I’d be afraid that she’d die from whatever subway born illness I’d transfer to her but because taking care of a healthy baby is so much work, I can’t even imagine taking care of a sick one! So my worrying is inherently selfish.”
4.
“[After almost hitting a pedestrian with my car] – what if I killed a pedestrian and was charged with manslaughter?!”
5.
“Because I’m so horrible at remembering names, if I see someone I sort of know but I can’t recall their name in that moment, I have an agonizing however many minutes of deciding to either wing the interaction by greeting them with ‘hey, friend’ or hiding before they see me.”
“Also, as a mom, if I hear anything that even remotely sounds like my son is choking, even if he’s just clearing his throat while downing some applesauce, I reflexively shoot across the room to see if he’s okay. I don’t know that I can relax, and it sometimes feels pretty irrational even though (clearly) taking care of your kid is a rational thing to do and all.”
–KJ Parish
6.
“Whenever I go into large department stores with fluorescent lights I get really nauseous and feel like I’m going to either throw up or faint and then worry about how embarrassing that would be to vomit all over the floor of Nordstrom next to really pretty clothes or handbags.”
7.
“Always worried there are spiders in my shoes if I haven’t worn them in a long time.”
“I can’t lick envelopes because of the Seinfeld episode where Susan dies from licking really cheap envelopes.”
“I get really antsy on subway platforms sometimes because I think about how someone could push me or I could just decide to mindlessly fling my body in front of a train.”
“Unless proven otherwise, I am perpetually under the impression that nobody knows my name.”
“I am ALWAYS convinced I’ve hit ‘reply all’ instead of ‘reply.'”
“If it’s a public bathroom door with the push lock in the door handle instead of a regular lock and I can’t definitely prove to myself that the door is locked, I am paranoid someone is going to BURST in on me — ALSO never not convinced someone is going to push a port a potty over if I’m in it, my stress levels SKYROCKET.”
“Oh, oh my god, on a regular basis I’m convinced I’m going blind — I have no proof why, but I just know it’s happening.”
8.
“What if I’ve never been allergic to this type of food my entire life but I have unknowingly developed an allergy since the last time I ate this food and I am now going to eat it and not going to be able to breathe in the middle of this crowded restaurant and I will DIE.”
“What if all the oxygen in this plane suddenly just disappears for some reason and we all just can’t breathe anymore.”
9.
“Nearly half the time I leave the house in the morning, I’m convinced I forgot to turn of the stove/coffee pot/hair iron and have to text my roommates to check so the house doesn’t burn down. I don’t think I’ve ever actually left any of them on before but it’s such a normal part of my routine I never remember turning anything off.”
“Whenever my dog starts barking for no reason I always think It’s probably a ghost watching me watch TV.”
10.
“I’m always convinced I’ve left my doors unlocked and when I get home my cat will be gone as will my Mac.”
“Also when I dial a phone number I always triple check it for fear of calling someone I don’t know.”
–Alex Zulauf
11.
“When I’m driving I’m always scared I’m going to press the accelerator instead of the brakes and accidentally run over somebody or ram into a wall or something.”
“Also whenever I get a brain freeze, I immediately have to stop what I’m doing and lie down because I read that a woman died from brain freeze. So guys, BEWARE.”
“Also, whenever I’m in my apartment alone at night I make sure to double lock everything because I’m convinced I will die like one of those people on Law and Order/ I’ll get kidnapped.”
“Also whenever I’m sick I have to make sure I can tilt my head down to my chest because I read that if you can’t do that then you have meningitis.”
“And I never drive in the rain because one time I hydroplaned on a Baltimore highway and never got over it. Actually, I just kinda don’t drive…ever.”
12.
“One time it was raining so hard on 95 that I pulled over onto the shoulder. When it stopped long enough for me to see, I realized I had just been parked in an exit lane for 10 minutes.”
–Doug Johnson