Some Updates

Being Alone: Still putting it off. Although I have watched the hypnosis video almost every night to fall asleep. I don't think it has much effect on my fear, it just gets me to sleep.

Needles: A week later, here is my arm:

It's green, yellow AND purple!

More Needles: Donating blood definitely did not get me over my fear of needles, so I'd like to do something else with that. There's a bone marrow donor registration this Friday that I'm considering. That would be more of a constant fear, since I would always be waiting to find out if I had to donate or not. We'll see.

Also, I read an article (titled "Is Your Personality Making You Fat") that said this:

How many times have you been skydiving?

Our image of adrenaline junkies usually involves people with the kinds of bodies that look amazing in jumpsuits and wet suits. However, an analysis by the National Institute on Aging (NIA) of more than 50 years of data from almost 2,000 people found that excitement seekers are more likely to be overweight or even obese. That's probably because when they're not jumping out of airplanes, they can always get a small rush by sneaking out for a midday margarita or blowing off the treadmill to go to a rock concert. 

I was expecting something a little more insightful from the title... I suppose that makes sense but the way that last sentence is phrased sounds like something anyone could have come up with. It sounds like an assumption rather than a valid conclusion.

Fear Confrontation: Needles

I donated blood this morning! Unfortunately, it was not as easy as I would have liked it to be, but it felt really nice to be helping others.

I went to the blood drive early this morning. They took down all my information as I got more and more nervous. Then a phlebotomist pricked my finger to check my iron. She said this is usually the worst part of the whole process. It almost was; my finger is still sore. Then I moved to the donation area and another phlebotomist put the needle in. It was pretty painful, despite what everyone had been telling me beforehand. And it turns out I was in pain for a reason. The needle was in my vein but no blood was flowing into the bag. My arm started to feel a little numb. The phlebotomist called someone over to help, who said that he could either take the needle out entirely or they could try again on my other arm. I didn't want to be in pain again, but I didn't want to quit either. So I said they could try again. It wasn't nearly as painful the second time and I kept pretty calm.

The phlebotomist said that the failed first attempt was his fault, but I think it was because I was making too tight of a fist. They gave me a ball to squeeze in my hand, and when he said to squeeze it, I assumed that meant to do it hard. The second time I was told to squeeze lightly. So it still was his fault, but maybe my fear inhibited me from successfully doing something for once! I was taking his instructions, but at the same time I probably would have clenched my fists on my own. Once I was able to relax a bit more, I was able to accomplish what I set out to do.

The whole experience was quite positive. I feel very pleased about what I did for myself and someone else. I would absolutely recommend participating in future blood drives. I would like to do it again someday. My first arm is still really sore, but I'm sure that won't happen again next time. Otherwise, everything went really well!
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WAIT I LIED. Just took off my bandaid and nearly vommed...

WHAT IS THAT?!?!!

I just Skyped my mom immediately (tethered and proud) and she said there's not much I can do... I'm still totally baffled... How did that happen?! It wasn't even as painful as it looks! That was from one prick of the needle! I'll post updates as this heals...

A Few Updates

Hypnosis- I tried a few more videos and they didn't go as well. They were fantastic for falling asleep but gave me the most awful dreams. I think I'm going to retry the the Being Alone video since that seems to be the only one that was pleasant. I'd also like to try watching one during the day to see if they are actually helping me fall asleep or if I'm just tired. Also, the Nail Biting video did absolutely nothing against my habit. Anyways, this was and continues to be a fascinating experience. I'd love to hear how it's affecting other people (is anyone trying this with me?). I showed it to one of my friends, who hated it.

Being Alone- I keep putting off this fear confrontation. I guess I want to do it at a time when I'm not too busy (so I don't feel as though I'm missing too much of the outside world). But that wouldn't really be too fear-inducing. I waste at least an hour a day on the internet, but for some reason I'm not motivated enough to use one of those hours to do the fear confrontation. I should probably do it tomorrow night, when I'll be busy getting all my work done for chem lab the next day, so that I get really anxious about completing everything. I hope this happens soon; I'm excited to do it. Starting is just difficult.

Needles- I'm happy to announce that a forthcoming fear confrontation will be dealing with something I am very much afraid of- needles! I signed up to donate blood next Wednesday. As scared as I am, this is also kind of exciting. I really appreciate the concept of blood donation, so I am happy to take part in it. I'm glad to suffer through a few minutes of fear to aid someone in need. I wanted to do the last blood drive but it was on my busy day of the week. This one is also on my busy day, so I decided to skip my fitness class in the morning. It's not a big deal since I get 3 skips for the semester and I've only used one. This will definitely be a worthwhile experience.

I Can't Believe I'm Doing This

Tonight I'm going to try something new. In my recent (google) search for more fears to explore, I came across some ads for hypnosis. Since I'm running out of things to blog about, here we go.

I searched Youtube for hypnosis and I found some guy named Rob who has 183 videos in which he whispers into a microphone. I lol'd. I'm going to try the Hypnosis for Being Alone video, since it's something I've talked about before and plan on exploring further. I'll let you all know how this goes in 21 minutes! Here is the video in case any of you are interested:

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What did I just do? That was a supremely odd experience. I couldn't feel my hands... It was like I couldn't move them even if I wanted to, but I didn't want to. I must have fallen asleep during the hypnosis but somehow had enough energy to put my laptop away. This morning I semi-woke up having a good dream and went back to sleep, except I was able to continue the dream. That was so weird. I can't tell if I enjoyed it or not. I suppose I'm mostly curious to find out if it worked or not.

It's hard to remember what Rob was saying, but I think he talked about how being alone can be more of a positive time than negative. I'll see how this rationale affects my upcoming fear confrontation. I don't feel as if I am "cured" of my fear, but maybe it will be less scary.

Although I'm still not sure how I feel about all this, I'm going to try another one tonight. Rob has another video dealing with breaking bad habits, including nail biting, which I have been prone to all my life. I've tried lots of things to get rid of it, but nothing has worked. I'm especially eager to stop now that I have a nail art blog in which I post photos of my own hands. I usually photoshop my cuticles to look nice, but that takes time. I hope this can help me stop.

Fear Confrontation: Sharing Myself

During class yesterday we were asked to go around the room and say a moment when we felt a strong calling to do something or feel a certain way. When it came to my turn I took the easy way out and chose to share something that isn't terribly revealing about myself. I shared a story about feeling the need to travel abroad throughout high school, which is true, but I was contemplating talking about a different moment in my life, one in which I felt my strongest calling. I decided against it because it would be too scary to reveal that part of myself to a room full of mostly strangers. I thought about this last night, and today I decided to, quite appropriately, share it on my blog.

One day when I was 13, I was lying on the couch watching tv with my parents and I started shaking, as if I was having a seizure. My mom took me to the hospital and at some point in the waiting room, everything went dark. When I woke up again, I didn't know who I was, who my mother was, or why I was in a hospital. My mom tried to tell me who she was, but I didn't believe her. I was rushed into a white room, where I was given a spinal tap. I didn't understand what was going on, so I was kicking and screaming a lot. My mom was visibly upset and had to leave the room, so I felt really vulnerable in there with the doctors. It was the scariest thing I've ever experienced.

The next day, I was in a lot of pain, which continued for about 2 months. A couple of doctors came in to talk to me to figure out what had happened and help me relearn my life. My mom was with me the whole time. She told me things about myself that I couldn't remember. When she told me that I had a sister I was really excited. Something clicked at that point that made me believe she was really my mother. Despite everything I had just been through with the spinal tap, something told me to trust her.

I'm not ashamed of this time in my life, nor am I sad about it. I just prefer to share it with people I know will understand. This is where a few of my other fears stem from - needles, because of the spinal tap, and showing my back, because I have a few large scars. I want the overcome these, just as much, if not more than my other fears. I've tried to get over the self-consciousness gradually, but I'm still not entirely comfortable. Maybe an upcoming fear confrontation will deal with my fear of needles, who knows...

Fear Confrontation: The Cinnamon Challenge

Like the drowning post, this isn't really a fear confrontation. Just something I did that loosely relates to my blog.

You may have heard of the cinnamon challenge, in which one attempts to consume a spoonful of cinnamon. Tonight at 2nd dinner in D-hall, Matt and I took the challenge and both succeeded! There's not much else to say about it, since we didn't do this: 

Oh GloZell. But both of us knew that wouldn't happen. We were pretty confident. Fear wasn't much of a factor, except I didn't want to look like a giant loser making a mess all over D-hall. 

Spoiler alert! The secret is to not swallow it immediately. You have to make all of it less powdery and then swallow. If you try to get it down while it's still dry you'll look like GloZell.

Why I'm Doing This

I've been asked a few times as to why I chose to blog on the topic of fear when it doesn't really seem to be an issue for me. I suppose I should have provided some more background than was given in my first post. I truly appreciate scaring myself. I want to become a fearless person. So far, I've done alright. I have tackled some pretty major fears in dangerous ways. But I still have smaller ones to conquer.

Perhaps I only like to be scared on my own terms. I get excited right before doing an adventure sport because I know that I'm about to be scared; when a pigeon flies close to my head in the city I'm not as happy. I want to completely eliminate my fears, both big and small.

I'm not sure why I wish to identify myself as "fearless". Maybe it just sounds cool. Maybe I just want to complete what I've started (why stop scaring myself now, why not scare myself until I no longer can?). Maybe I just want to accomplish something most others can't. Yet still, something compels me to do this. I guess I would be doing these "confrontations" without this blog, since I enjoy them. They get me closer to my goal. But I'm glad that this blog forces me to write about them and reflect upon what I'm doing to myself.