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“What Fact Became Terrifying To You As An Adult, Which You Didn’t Notice As A Child?” (30 Answers)
Contrary to a common misconception, fear isn't something we're born with, it's something we develop over time. In fact, babies don't exhibit it for the first time until they're around 8 to 12 months of age.
That means that most of our fears are learned at some point in our lives, and they're not all learned in the same way. Some fears, as psychologist Dr. Vanessa LoBue points out, can be learned by conditioning, or by having a negative experience with something. For instance, you might learn to be afraid of dogs if you’ve been bitten by a dog, or you might learn to be afraid of bees after getting stung. But we can also develop the jitters to things by watching someone else's fearful reaction. For example, instead of growing to be afraid of dogs by being bitten, we can also develop a fear of dogs by watching a friend freak out at the sight of a snarling Chihuahua. Likewise, we can learn to be afraid of dogs by hearing negative information as well, like hearing from your mom that little dogs bite.
So Reddit user Mahouswen decided to investigate this further and asked people on the platform to share what they find horrific in adulthood that didn't even bother them in childhood.
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#2
How expensive grocery shopping is.
#5
Capitalism is by far the most evil and psychopathic system in human history.
The rabbit hole never ends.
#6
The fact that it doesn't take as long to get old as you think it does when you're a kid.
Or that you have less freedom as an adult than you do as a child (as you wish to be grown so you can do whatever you want whenever you want).
#7
Just how common SA is. I was not at all prepared for how inevitable it was that I would be SA/harassed as a woman.
Tempest 7 months ago
This!! There’s a statement which says that every woman has experienced sẽxual harassment in their life and it’s no joke! Sometimes you don’t even realize that your experience was sẽxual harassment/abuse. I was 12/13 years old when an uncle nonchalantly groped me during a carpooling session with my dad sitting right next to me (dad was probably nodding off). I didn’t realize that this was messed up until much later in my teens when I started having an unexplained queasy feeling whenever he was around. This is the first time I’ve openly admitted this because I feel so ashamed of it. No I’ve never mentioned this is anyone else because I know my family will never believe me.
#8
*I'm* the adult now. There isn't anyone responsible for me. I need to be the responsible one. And I have to be the adult responsible for my kid. Who thought it was a good idea to put me in charge?!
#9
Ain't nobody actually in charge. Everyone is faking it in front of the kids. Should've been much more of a little s**t as a kid. Those adults knew nothing.
#10
Most people are one paycheck away from becoming homeless.
Laughing otter 7 months ago
Last week I heard a Republican state senator say that “being poor is a sin.” Of course, he’s an evangelical Christian.
#11
As I get older, one thing that terrifies me more and more, the more I think about it is...
HOW EXPENSIVE EVERYTHING IS.
You could BURN through $100, $200 in the blink of an eye, and all you've done is bought groceries and household stuff. You haven't even bought clothes yet, or paid electricity, internet, phone bills, you haven't added anything to savings...and then you think of stuff like credit-card bills...
How fast you could absolutely ANNIHILATE $1,000 just by trying to STAY ALIVE is truly horrifying to me.
I don't care WHO you are - $25.00 an hour is NOT a living wage ANYWHERE anymore.
Nichole Harris 7 months ago
Dear Lord sooooooo this!!! The ONLY thing that keeps me from having a heart attack every time I do the budget is the knowledge that I can't afford that either
#12
The age of my parents.
#13
You never really know someone and their true intentions. The friendly neighbor Gary could actually have a couple bodies in his basement or is a pedophile. Or your co-worker or friend that seems to like you actually hates your guts and is jealous.
#17
How easy it is to die young. Lost a few peers right out of high school in automotive accidents - no d***s involved, just 'freak accidents'. Its terrifying out here.
#18
As a kid, you always feel like there's a safety net: no matter what happens, someone will pull you out of trouble and take care of problems.
When you hit your 20's and slowly realize that's not true, it's a bit panic inducing. People will literally allow you to collapse in the street and let you die if they see helping as too big of a hassle. You can become homeless, starve, get sick...and after a certain age there is nobody there to pull you out.
#19
That everything poses a risk of death or injury. Driving. Running down the stairs. Weather.
#20
Getting bullied and excluded for being weird was fine as a kid, I just ignored those kids or played along and told them I believed all kinds of insane things just to see if I could get them to believe I was crazy. Everyone told me when I was an adult it wouldn't matter. Then it turned out the meanest kid at your school is nothing compared to the person who makes the schedule at the average hourly wage job, and three of them equals one girl from HR. I don't really think people go into middle management for any reason than a desire to sadistically torture other people while wearing a big fake condescending smile.
Janet L 7 months ago
Can anyone tell me one benefit of the HR system? Highly paid people who sit around and think of ways to make life difficult; hopeless in a crisis or professional dispute; take weeks to get the simplest tasks done. Maybe we should all work in HR. I met a very senior HR manager socially and she was the meanest b***h I’ve ever come across.
#21
Aging: I have severe back and shoulder joint problems.
featherytoad 7 months ago
When I hit 50, I became much more conscious of how my body is just going to start failing and will give me nothing but problems in the years to come. When you're younger and healthy, you just don't think about it.
#22
That your parents don't know everything and were making up it as they went because now I have kids and I don't know s**t and am making it up as I go.
Michael Largey 7 months ago
As a kid, the day I realized this about my parents was the funniest day of my childhood.
#24
As a kid, I didn’t realize you could seriously injure your back by simply sneezing.
#25
Thunderstorms became scary once I owned a home near trees. Loved them as a kid.
#26
They give nearly everyone a car license. We all just trust that everyone else sort of knows what they are doing on the roads and won't plow into you and kill you.
#27
Life expectancy.
When you're a kid, everyone is old. I never thought much about the ages my grandparents were when they died. It's frightening to think about now as I get older.
They were 59, 62, 65, and 69 when they passed.
#28
Just how cutthroat things tend to be in college and in the adult “at-will employment” world. I’m suspicious that this is a contributing factor to the mental health crisis.
#29
Very few of us leave this world fully intact. I had a horrific wisdom tooth removal just as covid hit. It was extremely deep rooted, and the dentist was kind of a butcher (I did NOT have insurance so the job went to the lowest bidder). Took about an hour for the extraction; he had to break it into several pieces, and had to go back in AFTER sewing me up because he left some behind.
I do NOT do well with change, particularly changes to my body. It took me a few years to psychologically recover from the experience (a global pandemic and my overuse of cannabis at the time really didn't help any). I still have anxiety episodes every once in a while thinking about what part of me will fail or have to be removed next.
Also, American healthcare is a joke and a scam. That's pretty damn terrifying.
#30
Adults don't know what they're doing either.
What do you think ?
Tempest 7 months ago (edited)
Something that I realized all too late as an adult was just how selfish people really are, especially the adults. It’s always them trying to better themselves even at the cost of other people’s lives. When I was at school I was deliberately exposed to only the nicest kids (my parents always got in the way whenever I sidetracked to hanging out with trouble-makers) and then I went abroad for university where I was suddenly exposed to all sorts of people. I was so naive to people’s nature that it took me a friend asking me to open my eyes and see the people for who they are during my final year to realize how desperately selfish most of them are. I know it’s not everyone but the majority are this way and it’s not easy to find the few who have no ill intentions.
Game Guy 7 months ago
In fairness in our society you almost have to be. Give $1000 to a charity instead of putting it into your 401(k) when you're 25? That's $45,000 you won't have when you retire, and no one will care if that means you can't afford to stay in your house. We have no safety net, and anything we donate is money we don't have to live on. Unless you're Bill Gates, that matters because no one is going to save you if you run out of money.
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Tempest 7 months ago (edited)
Something that I realized all too late as an adult was just how selfish people really are, especially the adults. It’s always them trying to better themselves even at the cost of other people’s lives. When I was at school I was deliberately exposed to only the nicest kids (my parents always got in the way whenever I sidetracked to hanging out with trouble-makers) and then I went abroad for university where I was suddenly exposed to all sorts of people. I was so naive to people’s nature that it took me a friend asking me to open my eyes and see the people for who they are during my final year to realize how desperately selfish most of them are. I know it’s not everyone but the majority are this way and it’s not easy to find the few who have no ill intentions.
Game Guy 7 months ago
In fairness in our society you almost have to be. Give $1000 to a charity instead of putting it into your 401(k) when you're 25? That's $45,000 you won't have when you retire, and no one will care if that means you can't afford to stay in your house. We have no safety net, and anything we donate is money we don't have to live on. Unless you're Bill Gates, that matters because no one is going to save you if you run out of money.
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