Fear of the dark at 19?!
Question: I've been afraid of the dark since as far back as I can remember. When I was very young my parents would come in and turn off the light after I fell asleep, and if I woke up I would lay in my bed and cry because I'd be too scared to get up to turn it back on. As a 19-year-old I am still afraid of the dark and usually sleep with a light on. Anyone who has ever slept in the same room as me has complained about this and told me I need to get over it.
I have tried to sleep in the darkness for a couple weeks at a time on a couple occasions. If I can get to bed early enough (around 10pm) I'll be fine unless something wakes me up much later (around 2 or 3am). If I am awake after midnight for any reason in the darkness, it takes hours to fall asleep, during which I get extremely anxious, upset, and paranoid. After dealing with those feelings plus a bad lack of sleep for more than a week or almost two weeks, I usually give up.
Is this something I should treat, or just work around?
Answers: I've been afraid of the dark since as far back as I can remember. When I was very young my parents would come in and turn off the light after I fell asleep, and if I woke up I would lay in my bed and cry because I'd be too scared to get up to turn it back on. As a 19-year-old I am still afraid of the dark and usually sleep with a light on. Anyone who has ever slept in the same room as me has complained about this and told me I need to get over it.
I have tried to sleep in the darkness for a couple weeks at a time on a couple occasions. If I can get to bed early enough (around 10pm) I'll be fine unless something wakes me up much later (around 2 or 3am). If I am awake after midnight for any reason in the darkness, it takes hours to fall asleep, during which I get extremely anxious, upset, and paranoid. After dealing with those feelings plus a bad lack of sleep for more than a week or almost two weeks, I usually give up.
Is this something I should treat, or just work around?
I know how you feel. I am around your age and I, as well, can go to sleep just fine if someone else in my house is up and around and I can hear them (that is comforting to me) and it is early in the night. But if I don't go to bed until late (after midnight) and everyone is in bed I usually don't fall asleep until 4 in the morning! Yikes! You can tell your doctor, but I believe that you can cure this phobia yourself as I am trying to do. Does every little sound at night cause you to jerk awake? That is my case. I think I see things in the dark of my room and hear things (the house squeaking), I don't like hearing sounds I can't place! So . . . You should try focusing on going to bed earlier, maybe while someone is still awake. I have also found that Nature Sounds help me a lot! I love the peaceful sound of rain or the ocean. This is a free website where you can set the sounds and they will play all night if you want: http://www.soundsleeping.com/ Or you can go to the library and get a Nature CD or some sort of music that is peaceful to you (I can't sleep to music . . . too distracting). When you are sleeping really focus on the sound of the rain or ocean or whatever and simply focus on that as it lulls you to sleep. It is really helping me! If you want more advice feel free to contact me.
im still scared of the dark and im 14
Despite people giving you a hard time about it - its not all that uncommon. Really. I know someone that is 22, and someone that is 35 - and those are just the folks I know where it has come up in conversation
You my friend need professional help. And you wont get it here from Yahoo answers
Get it treated I would definetly tell your doctor
I don't know any better than you on what to do about this problem, but it does seem to be a phobia. There are (I think) 2 ways to treat phobias - thru "flooding" which is exposing someone to the scary thing for a long time, until they are too tired of being scared that they settle down (you can only be in a panic about an hour, I have been told) or thru gradual exposure, where you are exposed to the scary thing for longer and longer successive periods of time. Sounds to me like you tried flooding, and it was a miserable failure. So maybe the gradual approach would be better.
Try getting a book on phobias (or anxiety) at the library or bookstore, and see if it has more advice. Otherwise, you may want to seek counseling if this gets to be a serious problem for you!
All the best!
It is nothing to be ashamed of! Fears are fears and can be hard to overcome. You will eventually grow out of it. 19 or 9, doesn't matter! Don't worry about! If people make fun of you, Tell them that you can't help it. Its not a big deal. You could get it treated if you think it is a serious problem but i think its fine.
Hope I Helped!
Good Luck!