T-T-Telephones! ((ARCHIVED))

((ARCHIVED))

Earlier today the worship leader of our youth group called me so we could set up a time to meet and plan songs for an upcoming missions trip. It took me well over fifteen minutes to stop shaking.

Yup, I have a fear of talking on the phone. It’s one of the few fears I actually have, right up there with electricity and someone breaking into my house. (What? I’m an open book!)

After my talk with the worship leader (I went back and forth on whether or not to answer it), I looked up “telephone anxiety” too see if I’m the only one. Apparently not!

Telephonophobia is actually a thing! Also, it’s a pretty funny word.

And of course the first thing on the article is “It may sound weird . . .”

Now, I’m lucky enough that I don’t get panic attacks or anything. But my heart starts pounding and my palms get all sweaty and stuff . . . I could be wrong, but I’m sure that pretty much screams, “FEAR!”

I avoid talking on the phone at all costs. You want to make plans with me? Text me! Shoot me an email! Anything but a phone call!

I don’t know why I’m so scared to talk on the phone. Maybe it’s because when I was little, I called my grandfather and didn’t realize it went to voicemail; I thought he was messing with me. Or maybe it’s because I’m not really a fan of the sound of my voice. Or maybe it’s because I suck at conversation.

Written words are my forte; spoken words are not.

I’m bad enough in front of people; don’t put me in a position where I can’t read their body language and see what they’re really doing! For all I know they’re scowling and wishing they could hang up. Gah!

Blimey Cow explains it pretty well. I don’t think I disagreed with a single thing in this video:

It’s so awkward! And scary! Really, really scary.

What, you think I want to be terrified every time the phone rings? You think I want to ask my mom to call my friends and invite them over instead of doing it myself? Because I don’t. I really don’t.

Luckily, there are so many ways to get out of it nowadays. Most of my friends text me instead, and I’ll answer pretty quickly if it’s something important. (Thought I’m guilty of letting a text message sit for days on end without replying.)

It seems I’m not the only one with this fear either. That makes me feel a little better at least. We should have a telephonophobe convention! But . . . let’s not set it up via phone call. That . . . that wouldn’t work out.

But hey, I should probably listen to Jesus and give my fears up to Him. I know they didn’t have telephones back in the first century, but God surpasses time, so I bet He didn’t want us to worry about phone calls either. Maybe next time instead of panicking, I should start praying. That’ll probably work a lot better.

Well, now that I’m done ranting about telephones and calming down after my frighting two-minute call earlier, I’m off to write a very dark one-shot fanfiction story in which I turn a main character into a psychotic villain. I don’t have a fear of that.

(It’s a good thing I want to be a writer. No work calls . . . I hope . . .)