So about a year ago I was serving as a secretary in the Relief Society (the women’s organization in the LDS church) and we met weekly in the evening for presidency meeting at the president’s home. We had a meeting scheduled for an evening that Dan would be out of town for work so I suggested they come over to my house for the meeting. I was feeling a little self-conscious that we hadn’t been able to buy much furniture or put up pictures or anything we’d only been in our house for a few months, so compared to where we usually met my house was not NEAR as nice. These are super nice, non-judgmental people, but I’d be lying if I didn’t say I was feeling self-conscious. :)
So we had our meeting in the dining room around the table. After we’d been talking for quite awhile, probably over an hour, Stevie stopped and put her hand over mine while looking into the kitchen and said, ever so calmly, “Jessica, I think you may have a mouse.” In terror I turned to look where she was looking and I saw movement, I screamed and apparently squeezed Stevie’s hand really hard (she later told me) as I jumped up on my chair just really flipping out. I can’t remember if I started crying right then or if I held back my tears until after they had left, but I was really really really upset.
First of all I absolutely HATE mice, like really absolutely hate hate hate them. Second of all, I was already self conscious about having them over to my house and then they see a mouse!! I was so embarrassed, but more than embarrassed I was scared, I didn’t know what to do about it. We had our share of mice in our house growing up and I was aware my dad set traps and took care of it but I had nothing to do with any part of it except the screaming and crying just as I did this night! I was so distraught up on my chair just wondering how I could stay in this house, I remember thinking about how I didn’t know how I would get to the stairs up to my room because I was so scared to set foot on the floor.
Stevie asked me if we had some mouse traps we could set before she left, I think she could tell I was totally helpless and she would need to help me. I told her we didn’t have any traps. So she called her husband and asked him if he could bring a few traps over for me. Bless his heart he came right over with 3 traps, we put peanut butter on them and he set them out for me in the kitchen and over by the couch were Stevie said the mouse had ran. He showed me how I’d have to pick up the traps in the morning so my kids wouldn’t get hurt. I didn’t know if I could do it except that I had no choice! Then Stevie talked me through what to do if caught a mouse in the trap, she told me I could throw out the trap and recommended using a broom/dust pan. After they left I was shaking for a good long time up in my bed wondering if a mouse would come upstairs and how it got in the house in the first place and all that awful stuff. I was literally in hysterics from being so afraid of being home alone in this situation, I just felt so violated! Had it been in the cupboard, do I need to throw out all of our food? Don’t worry it gets worse…
After calling Dan and my mom for sympathy and advice I got ready for bed and summoned the courage to go check the traps before I laid down. Sure enough there was a mouse in the trap by the couch with his big black eyes bulging up at me. I tried to be brave, but I needed more of a barrier between the mouse and I, so I went out to the garage to put on some work gloves, and boots up to my knees. Well, here’s where it get’s worse… I went to open the door back into the house and IT WAS LOCKED!!!! I was locked out of my house, with Dan out of town, a dead mouse on the floor, and 3 sleeping kids upstairs all at about 2 am. Not a good situation!!
I did have my phone on me, so I called Dan to ask him what to do, lucky guy. ;) He told me to try and kick the door in, it was kind of broken anyway. Kicking didn’t get me too far because the door was too high off the ground (it has 2 steps up to it, but no landing to stand on to kick from) so I started using my hip/side just heaving myself into the door. (I had some nasty bruises later) I have no idea how long it took me, an hour? 10 min? It was all adrenaline baby! But I did manage to break into the house. Yay! Small victory, and then I had to move on to the nasty chore I had waiting for me, the mouse. I swept it onto the dust pan and the whole way out to the garage I was flinching in anticipation of it springing to life and chewing off my face, you know, just the normal irrational fears of a phobia.
I called Dan to let him know that I was in and did the deed, and he said, “Jessica, tonight you became a warrior.” I told him I didn’t want to be a warrior and he needed to come home and take care of these things! But, I must say that this experience did help me overcome my fear, at least just a little bit. I was forced to face my fears because there was no one else to do it for me and I definitely didn’t like it but I survived and I guess that’s a step in the right direction. What are your irrational fears?
