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Phobiaphobia?

© Sarah Davis

In the recently presented column on fearsome clowns, I made use of the technical term "coulrophobia". Believe it or not, this term (referring, of course, to the fear of clowns) is one of the most commonly queried phobia names on the web. There are, however, plenty of other unusual phobias with formally-established names. Here are a few of the phobias with which monster-lovers (and monster-haters) may be very familiar:

Blennophobia- The fear of slime.

Bogyphobia - The fear of Bogies (Goblins).

Bromidrosiphobia- The fear of B. O. ( Seriously!)

Cacophobia- The fear of ugliness.

Demonophobia- (This one's self-explanatory.)

Dysmorphophobia- The fear of deformities.

Helminthophobia- The fear of being infested with worms. (Grooossss!. This one must be pretty common. At any rate, if there's such a thing as helminthophilia, I don't want to know about it.)

Mottephobia- The fear of moths.

Mythophobia- The fear of stories.

Necrophobia- The fear of death and the dead.

Ommetaphobia- The fear of eyes (Especially of the crawling persuasion.)

Oneirophobia- The fear of dreams.

Parthenophobia- The fear of maidens. ( Experienced monster-hunters know that it pays to be suspicious of those.)

Phasmophobia- The fear of guh-guh-guh-GHOSTS! (Zoinks!)

Phagophobia- The fear of eating or being eaten. (Check out Maria Tatar's book, "Off With Their Heads" for commentary on how big this one is in childlore a la Hansel and Gretel)

Pediophobia- The fear of dolls. (As opposed to pedophobia, the fear of children, although I suppose that might be relevant here too.)

Phengophobia- The fear of daylight. (Hmmm..)

Sciaphobia- The fear of shadows.

Scoleciphobia- The fear of worms.

Teratophobia- Fear of birth defects or fear of freaks.

Phobia Phinders:

The Indexed Phobia List

(An indexed list of hundreds of our nightmares.This site even has advice on how to name a phobia if you should happen to think of a new one.)

A Phobia Survey

(Readers tell which phobias they'd most like to be rid of. Heights, spiders, strangers and swimming underwater are among those mentioned. One pragmatic soul responds, "NONE - fear is a healthy thing; it keeps the mind alert" )

The PHOBIAS!!!!

(Another extensive alphabetized list of fears. So complete that it may give you ideas for phobias you never knew you had.)

Every Phobia Known to Man (No Joke!)

( The site itself is definitely no joke ( although I don't know if I can say the same for Arachibutyrophobia (Fear of peanut butter sticking to the roof of the mouth), Metrophobia (Fear of poetry) or Phobophobia (Fear of phobias)..then again.. )

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