To ask what you were terrified of as a child

[pinksuede]

NC for this one as I've told some colleagues about these before.
What were you terrified of as a kid that would make you laugh today ?

I was scared of the 'radiator man'. I would lay in bed at night and hear the tinkles and pops of the radiator as it was warming up next to me. I would imagine that it was the radiator man crawling through the pipes to come and get me in my sleep. He was entirely made up of cylindrical tubes of metal, his fingers were long pipes and his body was really slim but long and shiny.
I would literally scream for my DM to come to my room and make sure my radiator was turned off before I went to bed because I was absolutely terrified that he could get to me.
It wasn't until I was in year 7 at school that I told my brother about it and he laughed and laughed at me and said he had never heard of the radiator man. Up until that point I completely believed he was real. I had clearly made it all up in my own head and couldn't believe that no one else had heard of him.

Another one was giants, I was so petrified of them I would look around my room on a night before bed for hiding places where I could go if a giant managed to get his hand through my window. My favourite place to hide was at the bottom of a fancy dress box right at the bottom underneath all of the clothes. Again, I was convinced giants existed until I was about 10! 😂

Would love to hear other people's fears as a child that were completely unfounded.

Car washes, thunderstorms, the wind, and the bogie man that lived under the stairs which my older brothers made up and then kept saying they would put me in there.

Dolls, urgh yuck.

My DM bought me an evil, huge one that seemed bigger than me. I used to carry it (facing away from me) into their room and leave it there. Fucking monster always made it's way back into my room to stare at me though.

Oh really!! I always thought I was odd, I never told anyone because I was so embarrassed @Witchofzog.

I’m scared of the dark now as well but that didn’t start as a child. I think it’s claustrophia.

I was fucking terrified of the mummy from Tintin and the Seven Crystal Balls climbing through my window - we were in a ground floor flat at the time and I had curtains just like the ones in the picture of the Tintin book so I could picture it happening right there, and I had recurrent nightmares about it. Somehow it got all mixed up with Scooby Doo in my head as well so I was afraid of the dark, mummies, suits of armour, ghosts...

Clowns. I refused to go to the circus when I was very little as I was absolutely terrified of them. They still creep me out now, and if anyone had tried that "killer clown" gag on me when it was popular a few years ago I would probably be doing time for GBH now.

@teddy. I think it is something like the 3rd or 4th biggest phobia

My dad told me that owls peck your eyes out and when the wind used to whistle through the trees outside our house I thought it was the owls

Out of nowhere I developed a crippling phobia of escalators that go down. Going up them was fine, but I would burst into tears if anyone tried to make me go down them, and if there wasn't stairs or a lift it was a nightmare. Then it went away one day as suddenly as it appeared.

Dudley Moore. I have absolutely no idea why.

The Crimestoppers advert. That bit with the music at the start and I'd fly out of the room. Could never tell when it would come on. I still hate eFits to this day.

The Vitalite advert. My DH and I were looking at old retro adverts and I can't work out why I was so scared.

I used to think all my toys came alive on Hallowe'en. Until I was about 7 I refused to sleep in my own bed until I found out it wasn't true

I too was afraid of the flushing toilet as a child. I thought the toilet monster would come out and grab me. Similarly had a fear of black toilet lids and seats and am still not keen to this day on those. No idea why.

The witch on Snow White!

Oh and being sick but still have that phobia now (over 20 long years...)

Hartley hare anybody remember that creepy fecker?

Also birds, i still can't stand them. Evil beady eyes 👀 and quite clearly in league with the devil (who I'm also scared of).

Snakes in the toilet, you sit down and a snake slithers up the ubend and kills you when at your most vulnerable.

Now spiders - couldn't care less. I am the family spider catcher.

@RabbityMcRabbit - it was known as the "Bog Bogey" in my part of the world when I was a kid. You had to get out of the bathroom door before they loo stopped flushing or it would grab you.

@passwordfailure I'm not keen on dolls either. It's the ones with china faces that really creep me out.

Worzel Gummidge used to scare the bejesus out of me, especially when he swapped heads

The daleks on Dr Who.
The Goodies.

Arghh I forgot Wurzel Gummage changed heads he used to do that twisty thing and pop his head off

The three bears. I always used to see them in my mind at night, walking towards our house from the shop round the corner. They looked VERY angry, and I was convinced they were coming to get me.

The skin on anything (ie custard) after sister told me it was pig skin. She also told me chewing gum would wrap around my heart and squeeze me to death.

Chocky. It was a holograph type thing in the corner of the room in a children’s tv drama called Chocky and then Chockys Children. Terrified me.

The Esso tiger, as a very young child.

The fox and the cat in the Pinocchio film.

I was terrified of being stuck in a lift and needing a wee. Also being the smallest person in the lift (who was good at climbing) I knew they'd make me go through the hatch at the top.
I think I must have seen it in a film

AIDS (that tombstone advert!!)
Nuclear war (that cartoon with the old people!!)
The Dark Crystal!!
Watership Down!! (In my school they used to put it on ‘as a treat’ on the last day of school or on rainy days.)
The Tripods!!

There was also a bin bag full of something on top of the wardrobe in my bedroom. I was sure it was full of dead body.

Snakes in the toilet, you sit down and a snake slithers up the ubend and kills you when at your most vulnerable.

I thought there might be poisonous reptiles and amphibians under my bed when it was dark.

@blueangel1, good to know I wasn't alone! Also not keen on dolls either! Let's have a and a :)

I was absolutely terrified by the man who used to deliver our coal (council house in the 70's, no heating apart from two open fires). He was covered from head to toe in coal dust, and had these dark brown eyes that were really piercing in the light. He used to carry the sacks of coal around the side of the house to the coal bunker at the back, whilst I ran like the clappers upstairs to my room.