I posted a photo on Facebook of my chewed pens, sitting in their spotty pen pot, looking…well, quite disgusting actually.
My caption had a jokey air about it, along the lines of: what is this a sign of? A deep thinker? Intelligence? Someone who is permanently hungry? What I wasn’t expecting back in the comments was an offer from a hypnotist to cure me!
I contacted her and pointed out that while I would like to be cured of pen chewing, a more chronic problem that I have is a fear of flying and could she help?
I haven’t always been terrified of taking to the air. It is one of those fears that has steadily grown in size, to the point where this summer I had decided to visit the doctor to get Valium for the flight to Spain. I mean let’s face it – holidays are bloody stressful as it is, without the added stress of flying. There’s the stress of sorting out your body: remembering to get your bush and legs trimmed and if you’ve left it too late to book in at a salon, you’ve got to tackle the forest yourself with that rusty old Bic at the bottom of the detritus drawer in the bathroom, that you find nestled under a dried up tube of Anusol, a crocodile clip with teeth missing and a nit comb. This takes time in an already busy schedule. There’s the pets to sort out. The number of times I have forgotten that the 2 cats need feeding while we are away, until the night before. Airport security now adds another stress that I curse, whilst at the same time reminding myself that it’s to prevent a terrorist attack, so go with it. Sorting out all those little plastic bottles though, causes stress. Listening to 4 tween/teenage girls trying to get 6 bikinis plus a whole shed load of other clothes in to hand luggage, moaning the entire time that we haven’t paid Easy Jet the extra dosh to take decent sized suitcases is stressful. We’re going to a beach, for Christ’s sake – 6 bikinis and a couple of pairs of shorts should cover all bases. You see, by now I’m already stressed to the eyeballs and I’m still at least 24 hours away from an airport.
The taxi arrives at silly o’ clock and for some reason I have to clean. For some completely irrational reason, at 4am when we are trying to get 6 people out the door without waking up the neighbours, I have to clean the entire goddamn house. So I’m cleaning, I’m checking we’ve got passports, I’m screaming at everyone to keep the noise down, I’m checking doors are locked, I’m turning off switches and I’m checking the doors again…I’M SO STRESSED!
Have a drink at the airport, people tell me, to calm your nerves. I look at those people in the Wetherspoons at Heathrow, drinking pints at 5am and I wonder how they can do it. So, to save me from having to down a couple of glasses of wine at the crack of dawn, I am taking up the offer of hypnotherapy. I so desperately want to be cured of my fear and I am assured that the technique is transferable, so the Bics will be safe in my office once more. I shall keep you posted. Until my session on Wednesday, pens will continue to die.
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Oh I can’t wait to hear how you get on lovely I had hypnotherapy to help me as I have a massive phobia about blood. And I’m convinced it helped me. Look forward to hearing how you get on xx #BloggerClubUK
It was great I won’t know for sure if it’s worked until August, but it was a really good experience x
Bloody hell. I’m trying to arrange a holiday in August but reading this I might just get a giant italian flag, hang it in the garden, play the 3 tenors on repeat and get pizzas and chianti in for two weeks. Good luck with your Wednesday session (and the holiday) Jo #BloggerClubUK
Haha! Brilliant. Don’t be put off by me