Phobias and how my worst phobia began

My big confession: I once left a country because of a spider; or, strictly speaking, a principality.

I have one of the most common phobias around; arachnophobia. Even just thinking about spiders makes me shiver and my flesh crawl as though hundreds of little eight-legged creatures are running all over my body. Believe it or not I actually have an even bigger fear, one that really came about while I was in High School; Crane Flies. I am actually more scared of crane flies, also known as daddy long-legs here in Britain, than I am of spiders and believe me that takes some doing.

I had actually thought that I was getting a little better with spiders, however when one approximately half the size of the palm of my hand ran across the living room floor two nights ago I screamed loud enough to wake the dead. Because the spider ran under the sofa and Pete was unable to catch him, I insisted on being taken into the bedroom and refused to come back in. Even now, two days later, I still keep on checking my legs to make sure that nothing is crawling on me.

I know without doubt though that I will never get any better with daddy long-legs. September is a hellish time of year for me, as it always spawns hundreds of them and they all seem to try and fly straight at my face. I said that this particular fear came about while I was at High School and I was being honest. For anyone that remembers what the layout was like at Crestwood School during the late Eighties and early Nineties, picture the grey mobile classroom building around the back of the school; I think it was near the domestic science classrooms. Come September the entire end of that particular mobile would be absolutely covered with daddy long-legs. When I say covered, I do mean covered. Quite literally heaving with them, barely a millimetre between each of those that were settled on the building, while others crawled over them to try and find a place in the sun.

For a period of time that mobile was my form room and I had to go into that building every single day. Later on I had lessons there one day a week, in the afternoon immediately after lunch. Anyone who remembers that particular lesson will remember me begging people to hold open the doors while I built up my courage to run from the side of the main building past the crawling end of the mobile, up the steps and through the door. Since then I have viewed them with all the fear attached to spiders, with the additional horror that they fly....

At one point my phobias were so bad that they were having a detrimental effect on my life. I worked hard to try and get over them, but only managed to get so far. I simply cannot get past this point and the reaction I had to the spider from two days ago (the reaction I am still having) has shown me that I do actually need to try and find a way to at least reduce the level of fear that I feel. So, if anyone out there knows a good method of dealing with phobias I would love to hear about it.