I do not have nausea when driving up the hills, no migraine, no spondilitis or vetigo etc.
I’m above 40 now and I have a dreadful fear of lizards and frogs. I began researching my life backwards and wanted to know since when I had this fear?

was it from birth ?
———————-

I was surprised. I wanted to know more about myself when I was 10 years or so. I talked to many friends who were more or less my age and all of them vouched together that I was known as the “garden lizard” (oonaan in tamil) and “house lizard” slayer. Mind you, house lizards may be harmless but sometimes garden lizards are poisonous. They told me I used to single-handedly catch a lizard small or big and cut out its head and that used to be my hobby !! and I used to tie strings around frogs too..

When did it all change ?
————————

I was amazed that I did all that back then, since I cannot go near 2 ft of a small house lizard leave alone a garden lizard now !. So I continued my research and one day my MOM was talking about how I used to terrify others by showing them lizards to them etc. I dug deeper. Voila got it. There was this aunty of mine. One day I showed her a lizard on her table and she let out such a blood curdling shriek that I was grounded for 4 days by my Mom. I was taken aback by her scream but at that time (I guess I was about 12 years or so) nothing changed I continued to be the all powerful lizard slayer

End of School
—————-

I did not get admission into one of the prestigious colleges in north India. All of my friends got admitted. ONE year I was at home doing nothing. I remember crying crying and crying for a whole night, the night I knew that I did not get admission. Progressively during that year the fear of lizards started coming up, the fear came up so much that I even remember asking my friends who stayed in an north indian college hostel what were the size of lizards in north india ? Phew ! and when I started college i.e age 18 or so my fear of lizards became total .

Conclusion
———————-

1) Either that wild shriek let out by my aunty when I was 12
2) Or the continued depressed state my mind was in when I was 18 or so (for about a year)

could have contributed to my fear

and mind you I am still NOT afraid of roaches at all.

More evidence
================

Since either of the above reasons could have been the cause, I was very careful when showing my fear of lizards to my children and my eldest boy was so unafraid of cockroaches or lizards and he too was turning out to the slayer of insects like his dad in his younger days.. This continued till his age of 7.

Till one day
====================
My wife is really scared of both roaches and lizards. Now I used to tell her countless times not to show her fear before the children BUt one day when she and my eldest son where alone in the lift there was this huge cockroach and my wife had let out a loud shriek indeed. It was so loud that neighbours came to help.

fast forward
=====================

you guessed it right. My son 10 years old now is very very afraid of cockroaches now

I think I have zeroed it on the cause of this phobia for roaches and lizards. **The shrieks let out by elders**.

So if you really really really want your son or daughter to grow without this lizard phobia or cockroach phobia please please please do not shriek or cry out loud in front of them. When you see a lizard or cockroach in a room and if your child is also there, unless there is a danger of the child touching the insect, just calmly walk away from the room. This will do a world of good to him/her.

The Descent of Woman – Elaine Morgan.

I was trying buy it. Could not find in any of the local book stores. It was available only in Amazon.

- Priya Raju

I read a book on evolution called “Decent of Women”, it talks about fear being passed on through evolution. It has been observed that the fear for snakes and spiders is very rampant and cannot be explained by any observable factors. According to the book, one part of our evolution was spent on the sea shore. The biggest pests were crabs and eels. Since crabs resemble spider and eels snake that is why large portion of humanity still carries the fear. The book goes on to say that if you ask people to describe why they hate snakes they would say “they are slimy” which is not true for snakes but eels.

I am not sure how scientific the book is and don’t have it with me so writing this from memory. It was a very interesting book, though. Written by Ellen Morgan, I think

-Archana