Pedophobia.

Everyone is afraid of stuff.  I don't care what you say.  But you can beat your fears, trust me.  Here is the story of a phobia I conquered.

My name is Kristen Gibb and I used to be afraid of children.  

And when I say afraid, I mean absolutely terrified.  I avoided children of all shapes, sizes, ages, races, genders, names, and so on.  It didn't matter if it was my own cousins child or if it was the cutest baby in the whole entire world, I steered clear of the youngins.

I'll admit I picked up some negative coping mechanisms as well.  I am not proud of all the dead baby jokes I know or of all the times I've refused to hold someones baby.  But everyone becomes a little irrational in the face of fear, right?

Around age 16 my mother became a little worried that this phobia would deny her all of the grandchildren she wanted, so she made an agreement with me.  I could handle kids around the age of 10 or so, so she promised that she would take my children and raise them until I wasn't afraid of them anymore.  It seemed like a pretty good deal.

In October 2008, I went to Peru.  Little did I know that I would come face to face with my biggest fear down there:  NINOS, lots and lots of ninos.

My first encounter was terrifying.  I was deep in the Amazon jungle, a little secluded from the rest of my group where no one could hear my screams, when suddenly our tour guide's 5 year old grandson grabbed my hand and lead me into a hut.  I had been avoiding him like the plague and was caught completely off guard. I was absolutely defenceless.  He didn't know a lick of English either which only added to the terror.  As I looked for a quick exit or a plan of attack, I remembered my plastic tarantulas I had packed to play tricks on my group.  I offered him one and he was happy as a clam and left me to go show his grandpa.  PHEWF.  That was close.  Unfortunately, giving him that instantly made me his best friend.

I don't know how it happened, but things changed.  I eventually realized Dalan wasn't a big, scary ogre and that I actually had fun giving him piggy back rides and teaching him how to play tricks on people with this fake tarantula. Long story short, Dalan became my buddy.  But as far as I was concerned, all kids were still scary, Dalan was just the exception.

Once we got back from the jungle and started doing service work, I was bombarded with a flurry of orphanage visits.  They were the equivalent of walking through a haunted house.  Yet at each one, I got braver, or rather, at each one my fear began to evaporate.  I could feel myself changing, probably similar to the way the Grinch changes when his heart grows.  Kids really weren't so scary after all.

Today I'm proud to say I am kid friendly.  They no longer scare me, in fact I really enjoy the Sunday afternoons I spend playing with my Aunt Marge and Uncle Robb's grandkids.  We play zombies, mean mom, sardines, hide and seek, and all sorts of games.  It feels good to be begged to come play.  It feels good to act like a kid.

So there you have it.  My name is Kristen Gibb and I am no longer scared of children.  PHOBIA CONQUERED.