When I was a kid as far back as I can remember I was terrified of heights, just petrified, I used to have all kind of dreams about being forced (no idea in my dreams about who or what was forcing me, just a feeling I’ve always had) to climb something treacherous, the outside of a building or something and then fall. These stopped around the time I turned 20 when in my dreams I started to fly instead of falling, and then the dreams stopped, never had another one. Now the other thing with this is I used to be able to put my mind in a weird state, kinda like turning off my thoughts, relaxing and if I closed my eyes it felt like I was falling backward, I used to be able to do this till I was about 20 so about the same time as my dreams stopped, I can recall the feeling, just I can’t stop thinking on command anymore. See I’m still scared as hell of heights really scared but I think control has a lot to do with it, understand the reason I “volunteered” submarines is because if someone told me to start chipping & painting on some mast way up high, it just wouldn’t have worked out. Fast-forward to when I worked for Northern Telecom and worked in cell, now I never did tower climb but spent a lot of time in aerial lifts, 80+ feet in the air, it bothered me but nothing like say getting off an elevator on the 20th floor and being on an open air balcony; scares the shit out of me, I mean I freeze up kinda. Not sure if this anything to do with my abuse or is this just some control issue I have?

Any thoughts gentlemen?

Cee

i'm afraid of heights, too. never associated it with CSA. i just thought that it was a healthy instinct for self-preservation.

i am afraid of water - or rather - of drowning - never did learn to swim. i'm ok as long as i don't get into water where i can't touch bottom. i don't know where that fear came from. but there were definitely some scary episodes in my childhood related to swimming pools.

i am also afraid of speed. i put that down to a couple of bicycle crashes i had as a kid.

i have a fear of authority figures that is well-grounded in reality - and connected to CSA.

my greatest fears have always been of people and relational stuff - mockery, contempt, rejection, etc. TOTALLY caused by CSA!

i think most of my fears are aggravated, augmented and magnified by the CSA but not all are caused by it.

Lee

Self-preservation? Something I don’t typically display under any circumstances, I typically react and do what has to happen with zero regard, heights are the only thing that gets me like that.




Same here, just I’ve always lived with a death wish and until recently never understood why, just like I said scared as hell of heights, like right now I’m staying in a hotel on the 17th floor, no biggie but as soon as you get off the elevator, bam right there, 17 stories up 48” of walkway, straight down, when I checked in last Sunday it just freaked me out, bad! It’s kinda weird too some bridges don’t bother me, others scare the shit out of me, some bridges don’t matter, too much traffic, can’t figure it out?

Cee

Oh, y'know Cee, I hate that Hyatt indoor atrium thing for the same reason. I'm okay if I'm cocooned by walls, but that's it. Have a favorite 60-foot bridge for some local shoots...as long as I don't look over the edge too much.

I think you hit on it with control. Mine's a little backwards.

I've always loved commercial flying, staring out the window at the view for hours. But back when I flew my own plane, I remember being about 7000 feet up and suddenly seized by panic when I realized I was being held aloft by one engine and I was the only one who could get me back down on the ground. I quit shortly after that, ostensibly because I was having trouble with my eyesight.

Any insights anyone?

Love to fly will look out the window till i get a crick in my neck, awesome views like the Grand Canyon leaving LAX going east or anytime flying over NYC, typically I try to sit in an isle always trying to get off the plane asap cause flying today just sucks; I remember the “good ole days” being able to smoke and carry power tools onboard, let alone a hot meal in coach, 11hour flight and they don’t even feed you anymore wtf.

Cee

Just for you Cee

Not to be a know-it-all, but technically fear of heights is not Vertigo, its called Acrophobia. Related to CSA? I don't know, but anything's possible in our F-ed up world.

Vertigo is a malfunction of the balance mechanism of the inner ear, which produces a sensation of spinning and falling through space. I had an attack of it a month ago, and it totally disabled me for three days, until it finally passed.

Jude

Thank's for clarifying that Jude.I have vertigo and the last attack I had knocked me flat on my back.During the actual attack I really thought me and the stove were going to fall through the kitchen wall I crawled on my hands and knees to the couch and remanined imobalized for the rest of the day.
Maybe the fear of hieghts is attached to vertigo becasue if you ever had an attack up a ladder etc......
As for it steming from CSA I don't know either.There was a lot of physical abuse in my life as a child. Maybe that contributed to it.

I don't like hieghts/bridges where I can get close to the edge. The closer to the edge I get the greater the pull to go over. Jump/fall I don't know, that's why I say pull.

“high anxiety” awesome!

Jude the vertigo was more about the mental/physical feelings not associated with my fear of heights, it’s just that the feeling of falling backwards was really strong when it was happening but strangely enjoyable and liberating, nothing like my fear of heights, I could never place where it came from maybe it was a prelude to dis-associating during my abuse, who knows?

Cee

I have this too!!!!!! I've had dissociative disorder for most of my life (CSA induced) & have a huge fear of heights... But for some reason when I'm at a ledge, I feel a need to go over it. & I tend to feel that nothing bad will come of it! This has intensified my fear of heights: Fear of what I may do when at heights! I also have similar feelings when driving, like swerving into oncoming traffic.

I have also had a bunch of intense vertigo over the years. Not every day, but pretty regular.

Candu, have I got a bridge for you! (see above) We can creep to the top of the span together. I hate freaking out alone...

Great! Company on the way down.

Hang on, Candu. Here we go!


Gravity sucks.

I also have some fear of heights. I remember when I was 15 and went up to the top of the Empire State Building. It creeped me out pretty badly. But I didn't have a feeling of being drawn toward the edge.

My great fears are from csa. The kidnap experience. He actually worked at creating terror. But then I think I was given LSD. Probably a high dose. It created terror. I had an EMDR session for it a year ago and it tripped me so badly that I dissociated right there. I think my fears are sequestered in an alternate personality which can get triggered.

I'm slowly fitting the pieces together.

Puff

I know it might seem strange for all of my drug use but describing mental/emotional happenstance in my own mind is so very hard, I’ll try this again. Imagine your body in any position, standing, sitting whatever, you can close your eyes, and if you concentrate, you stop thinking, it feels like your falling backwards, you can feel it in the pit of your stomach, just like when I’m staring out my hotel balcony now, yet it feels good, it feels safe, it’s inviting, you can open your eyes and poof back to normal, it’s just like “good vertigo” if there can be such a thing? Its why I asked if maybe anyone thought maybe it was what my mind did prior to being abused, disassociating; just wondering if anyone has any ideas, it’s one of the few things I’m having problems dealing with, I remember it starting after I carried el diablo into the ground? Maybe it was jubilation at my tormentor’s death, idk?

Cee

Cee

I want to suggest something that occurred to me when I first read your post on fear of heights. I didn't get the idea included in my response.

Now I want to raise the question as to whether somebody either actually dropped you when you were very young, or maybe that someone purposely scared you badly by threatening to drop you when you were very young.

Puff

Puff I had never thought of that, it’s so simple you might be right, until I was 4 I lived in a the second floor of a duplex, it also wouldn’t surprise me if he did threaten to throw me off or something, he was such an evil man!

Cee

Y'know, people joke about that Puff, but I think you have something. Considering I was physically abused in my crib and, as a toddler, had my knee torn up with a metal weed eater blade - at least that was always the mommybitch's cocktail party repartee after she'd knocked back a few - I think it may have been possible in my case. Have no memory of it.

Frankly, after that Paris balcony-dangling incident with MJ, I've wondered how his kids will fare. Loved his musical creativity, but he was a real warped &%$$##

While I don't know if this has anything to do with my fear of heights but when my brother and I were young (12 ?) we took a bike ride and ended up at at a bridge over a wide river running through our city. While at the middle of the bridge we were threatened by a group of older boys. They convinced us that they were going to throw us off the bridge and into the river if we didn't give them all our money and our bikes. We ended up with our bikes but we were really badly scared and quickly headed for home after they let us go.



Lancer - I just saw your above post with the Therma & Louise clip. That movie makes me cry on a number of different levels.

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