This is about a huge spider - brown with orange stripes on its legs - the kind that could have come in a banana box! It had been making an enormous web under my windowsill for about a month. Last weekend a kind roofer that was quoting for upstairs agreed to move the spider and proceeded to chuck it over the neighbours’ fence. I went out for a couple of hours and returned to find it had come back only to make a massive web from the fence to my motorbike. I “chased” it back to the fence using a twig and was threatening to kill it with a brick when my conscience kicked in. I ended up getting it on a garden spade (in spite of its incredible web production) and left it about 50metres down the road. I assumed it would set up home under someone elses window.
Anyway today when I was leaving work, I saw a small spider on my screen which I managed to flick off with my gloves on (after the palpitations had settled). I was just about to pull away when I saw the same huge spider as before (or perhaps its sibling) on my right mirror, orange stripes and all. I panicked, jumped off the bike but couldn’t get far because my headphones were still plugged into the satnav, couldn’t get my helmet off in the panic and, in all the commotion, I lost the spider somewhere. :w00t: I then spent the next 10minutes checking the bike, my jacket, boots, gloves, mirror, helmet…and all over again at least twice in search of the spider. I didn’t find it and couldn’t stop thinking about it on the ride back. I’m worried it will pop up again and if I am actually moving I think I would end up crashing. How stupid would that be?
Things got worse when I actually got home, I found 4 small spiders on my back door and one huge one on the car mirror. Admittedly, I may be looking for them now.
So…has anyone else seen a lot of spiders recently?? Does anyone have any solutions??? Can anyone do hypotherapy for this ridiculous phobia???
Anita
ps - I do not have (and never have had) mental health problems
maybe it is a cultural thing, seems a lot of people in this country have this arachnophobia. i can put any size spiders on my palm, …but i am really scared by frogs:D
Sounds like the ordinary orb web spiders that are very common this time of year in gardens etc, and make large impressive circular webs. There are millions of them and they are very easy to see being quite large when adult. They are of course completely harmless (to humans that is)
funny you say that, since the day i brought my bike home, ive moaned at my mum to cut back her rose bush and bliming tree cos i could see spiders in it… she hasnt bothered, and spider webs have started to appear by my front light… but i tend to get out the cleaning cloth and kinda whip the cobs away… not puttin the hands near that with or without gloves… only downful was all the whipping i do with the cloth, has resulted in me getting hit too…
i did though have a bumble bee keep walking towards my front tyre today at uni even when i moved the bike, until of course i asked some poor guy standing by to come kill it incase it stung me… equals happy unstung me!!
Once i’ve gotten over the shock of seeing a spider run across the floor i like watching them going about their business:D my dad had a wolf spider that lived in his lorry cab called septimus:w00t: used to amuse my dad for hours chucking flys in his web for him lol but yes we’ve seen a massive increase in spiders this year oh and wasps lol
When do they go away again?
Just got a massive shiver when I looked up the wikipaedia page. Maybe I have to look at the picture all the time and then…okay thats not going to work…I have just zipped up my fleece to stop them getting to me and there isn’t even a real one here!
And I didn’t need to know they can bite!
Can I spray something on them? Perhaps spider repellent?? What about jungle formula???
I didn’t look behind me but have taken to checking the ceilings and walls every time I change room. I am so grateful that its all painted white.
I don’t think its a cultural thing learned from my parents as they’re Sri Lankan and would happily sleep with bugs crawling and flying around them. It may be a British thing though or perhaps due to the fact that when I wanted to stay up late as a child, my mum would tell me that the spiders would come out after midnight to get me. I slept with the quilt over my face for years to make sure the spiders wouldn’t see me!
This could be the reason for a move back to Scotland! Give me midges or clegs anyday
(I just looked at the picture again and shivered again. In fact it happens every time I look at the picture. I dont remember being this scared of spiders for years!)
It’s October. “Garden spiders” are at there largest. The weather is getting colder and they want to move in somewhere a bit warmer. None of the native English spiders are even mildly venomous (to humans) so stay calm.
Bees don’t sting unless there is something very wrong. Their sting is a defence mechanism (of last resort for most). They don’t go out thinking “I’ll sting someone today.”
A respectful dislike of insects is healthy, it’s a survival instinct, just as is avoiding snakes, stroppy dogs and the p*ssed off wife.
But none should make you get into a panic, there’s no reason, so stay cool calm and rational.
(Unless it’s Mrs. O, in which case panic is permissible.)
Er, ama7 . Is there anything to stop YOU trimming back the rose bushes? Why are you nagging your Mum to do a simple job you could do?
I know its irrational. You are completely right. I will endeavour to keep calm and not crash if it reappears. But…the next time someone asks me what characteristics an ideal man should have, I must remember to say “not scared of spiders!”
Bwahahaha!!!..that’s the funniest part of the whole story!
I seem to remember having this conversation with you the other Saturday night, this mahoosive spider if I remember correctly was no bigger than a 10p/50p piece with it’s legs outstretched, hardly big enough to steal your car and run off with your telly now is it?!?!
And whilst I do appreciate it is a phobia and by its very nature that means its an irrational fear, there must be something, hypnotherapy as you’ve already mentioned, that can be done to conquer this fear?
Glad to see the conservationist in you is alive and well, doing a grand job conserving yourself!
Bees don’t actually stalk people you do know that right?
If you had ignored it and let it get on about it’s business it wouldn’t have stung you and it would still be alive to help do it’s bit for the environment. There’s only one insect that i’ll happily kill and that’s a wasp (sorry Sam) as they are bloody annoying, and will sting you, and are completely pointless anyway, well except for the one’s that can do leather repairs anyway, and I think that amounts to, errr, one!
