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Things which scared you as a kid and have stayed with you...

359 replies

GinJeanie · 20/06/2020 17:26

I’m talking about things which scared the bejeezus out of you at the time and you would still hate to encounter as an adult- no doubt irrationally. I have two examples and suspect if I revisited them, they wouldn’t be as bad as I remember. I won’t though - still too scared!
The first is a book called A Candle in Her Room. It’s about some sisters who have an vile, evil wooden doll in their house and horrible things keep happening to them. It was a children’s book but I found it terrifying. I’m a middle-aged woman but NOTHING would make me read it again. The thought makes me want to vomit.
The second is a public safety film called Apaches which was shown in the 1970s. It involved a group of children dying one by one on a farm (all had horrible accidents)... I know I will never watch that film again even though it’s readily available on YouTube. My terror is too great.
Anyone else?

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ShinyRuby · 21/06/2020 17:22

I spent a couple of years really scared of nuclear war as well, some kids at school had watched World in Action or something & 1982 was being talked about as a start date! I worked out that I had just 2 years left. I can remember my dsis telling my parents that everyone was talking about nuclear war & my dm saying "it might be closer than you think!" Sad My parents were realists & are still the same now, I've had to stop dm a few times when dc are involved.

I still hate those stupid " the world's going to end on..." theories but at least I know they're rubbish now.

I really was a nervous child, I'm honestly not as bad now!

BlueSuedeStiletto · 21/06/2020 17:29

@pleasestoprainingplease o have a recurring dream about getting stuck in a small space- cave, tunnel etc. I loved 999 as a kid, maybe I saw that episode and it sparked a fear?

Thinking back I'm not sure it was the best thing for a child to watch, but it was on very early evening and I was a very mature 10 year old so I guess my parents thought it was ok 🤷‍♀️

JacksCreation · 21/06/2020 17:37

@HelpMeh

The Atmosfear board game!! I remember that!

My best friend had it and I remember going round her house and playing it with her family on her birthday. Her Dad had picked up a card on the way round the board that said "when the clock timer is at 02:00 you must scream" so he did and my best friend started crying! It just made her jump and scared her so much.

We must have been about 12.

Imissmoominmama · 21/06/2020 17:40

@Nishky- I remember that episode. There was a scene where the vampire man was at the window in the dark- it was many years before I could cope with windows without curtains in the dark!

DesmondTheMoonbear · 21/06/2020 17:41

Obviously he was on because no one died in 999 world,

That's what I thought until I watched an episode of 999 which featured an explosion in a home due to a gas leak. When it was announced that one person died, I couldn't believe it. I felt so shocked and so betrayed. Of course I knew that people died, but not on 999. I still loved the show after that, but I had recurring nightmares about gas leaks for some time and they're still one of my biggest fears.

SouthWestmom · 21/06/2020 17:50

Oh my god hope that's mine. I haven't read the rest but that book haunted my childhood. Even now the name Dido freaks me out.

Ginger1982 · 21/06/2020 18:08

Frank Finlay as Jacob Marley in A Christmas Carol - rated U! Fuck me! 😱

Things which scared you as a kid and have stayed with you...
BlueSuedeStiletto · 21/06/2020 18:08

@DesmondTheMoonbear no way!!!!
I feel so betrayed ☹

Fun 999 fact- if you remember the girl who got her hair caught in the whirlpool at a waterpark, it was my local waterpark and my dad was the paramedic who took her to hospital afterwards!

He would never let me go there and I never knew why until I was an adult and he told me it was because they had an Ambulance there almost every day and it he thought was super unsafe.

It got shut down in the end after someone nearly drowned in the lazy river and it turns out the council had cut hundreds of corners safety wise including putting wall tiles on the floor so people were constantly slipping over and smashing their heads on the floor.

I resented so much that he never let me go, I resent even more that it turns out he was right! Grin

sheknows31 · 21/06/2020 18:19

The film called toothfairy where she kills you if you're in the dark 😱.

White noise creeps me out, watched too many horror films.

Vomiting. Legit haven't vomited in 22 years and thought of that day happening petrifies me.

PrincessHoneysuckle · 21/06/2020 18:21

Another kid turning their eyelids inside out.I quit gymnastics after that.It freaked me the fuck out!

letsgomaths · 21/06/2020 18:34

Loud bangs: balloons, party poppers, fireworks, toy guns, anything that bangs in the theatre. I very rarely go to the theatre, because there's always the risk of this. If there's a gun to be seen on the stage, I am paralysed with fear in case there's a bang. As a child I didn't like it when sausages were referred to as "bangers"; I got the idea that they really could bang loudly.

Birds that flap their wings noisily; I get uneasy near pheasants, in case they fly off noisily. I can handle pigeons, although they scared me as a child.

Electric shocks; not because they might be deadly, but the sensation. Static shocks freak me out; when it's the sort of weather when they're likely, I take great care to avoid them, by touching metal things with my sleeve. At secondary school I did not volunteer to make my hair stand on end with a Van de Graff machine, and I refused to take part in the whole class holding hands to experience a shock. Somebody also described a "violet wand" to me: I almost freaked out just hearing about it.

@Angelonia Re the Secret Garden scene of everyone dying, in one of the films that scene is quite scary. Everyone's rushing along in a panic, and Mary is screaming "give me my doll!", and you see the doll burning in a fire. In the same film, when she's creeping round the Manor to look for Colin, there's a storm, and lots of scary-looking statues and paintings are lit up by lightning. I get the shivers thinking about that.

jmh740 · 21/06/2020 18:46

The clown on Blackpool pleasure beach

maddiemookins16mum · 21/06/2020 18:51

Catweasel.

GinJeanie · 21/06/2020 18:54

Oh my goodness! So many of these are from the 70s and 80s... what were the adults thinking?
@JacksCreation - your horror hedgehog has made me feel queasy... Totally agree about Worzel Gummidge as well. His face was terrifying and his voice! [sobs]

OP posts:
Hippofrog · 21/06/2020 18:59

1987 hurricane, still frightened of windy weather.

cinnamonbun · 21/06/2020 19:02

When the wind blows

..and the casualty theme tune after an episode about a house fire gave me nightmares for weeks

Fluffybat · 21/06/2020 19:06

Strange but true. My uncle let me watch it once when I was really young. It was an episode about a ghost taking a woman's heart out of her chest. Scared me to death. I was only about 7.

Geekster1963 · 21/06/2020 19:08

Pylons. I remember when I was about six they told us this story in assembly at school about a boy who climbed up a pylon and died. I was petrified for ages to go anywhere near one. I’m still not keen, especially when you can hear them crackling.

Geekster1963 · 21/06/2020 19:11

Another one is they showed us the Jaws film once at primary school, I was probably around 9 so very early 80’s. I had nightmares for a long time about that body popping up from under the rock. I also used to think a shark would come up the toilet or plug hole in the bath. My Mum went mad with school!

Cattenberg · 21/06/2020 19:16

Yes, to those public information films. I was only I about four or five, so I didn’t realise the children were actors.

A friend (who’s in his fifties) was terrified by The Singing Ringing Tree and Ken Dodd’s Diddy Men. They still freak him out.

SpringerJS · 21/06/2020 19:20

The thing about saying "Bloody Mary" three times into a mirror and she appears behind you. I was told that on a residential summer camp thing when I was about 11 and didn't sleep a wink.

Yes to Jaws. Still worries me now, even when I'm in a swimming pool! I have to make sure I swim quite near someone else so that the shark will eat them first and give me time to get away...

Inthebackoftheimpala · 21/06/2020 19:31

Exclusive to Northern Ireland but the add commissioned by the NIO that uses the song Cats in the Cradle. My family owned a bar and the shooting scene traumatised me so much. It also ruined a good song for me as its all I think about when I hear it.

Augustgirl · 21/06/2020 19:32

When I was five to about seven , I was traumatised by being allowed to watch the cartoon version of x files which always started with a woman watching tv and then the next thing you see is colours flashing in her living room and she starts screaming ( something came out of the screen).

I also watched a film aged 7 (can't remember what it was called) where a deranged man takes out a scientists eye using some kind of pick , because he needed it for the eye scanner on the door.

As a teen, watching scary films on sleepovers (the others- the scene when the kids were hiding in the wardrobe) Jeepers creepers , sleepy hallow etc.

peaceanddove · 21/06/2020 19:33

@Ormally

Oh yes, 'A Candle In Her Room'. I also add to this 'Midnight Is a Place', brain bleach needed for the image of a small factory boy almost crushed by a metal carpet press that smashes down to glue fibres to carpet. And the horribly fascinating detail of a sentence about some relations of phosphorus handlers (in jobs as safety match makers) who recalled 'luminous vomit' piling in the gutters on routes home from the factory because of the chemicals and their (major, carcinogenic) danger.
Another scene from Midnight is a Place was where a young boy is trying to escape from the horrible pig monsters in the sewers. He climbs up a ladder and half hauls himself out of a manhole, but they get him and we watch him screaming as they eat his legs. This was at tea time FFS Confused
Grapesoda7 · 21/06/2020 19:34

The welly boot on the escalator advert for me too.

When I went to Maceys (as an adult) they had an old fashioned escalator. My husband had gone up it and was wondering where I was. I was at the bottom shrieking ' I can't get on!'

Also Jaws, I still get freaked out at the swimming pool if I have to swim past the grate thing. Also if I'm at the seaside in the summer, if there are loads of people in the sea, it reminds me of Jaws.