I am afraid of dolls, probably due to traumatic experiences in early childhood.
Once I got a beautiful doll from my godmother as a birthday present. She was dressed so lovely and I loved her so, that I took her to bed with me. I was about six years old. It was in the middle of the day and I was taking a nap. When I woke up and reached for my doll, my doll looked grotesque. My brother was a sick individual with a warped sense of humor (or mental problems) had taken my doll, cut her hair off and burned out her eyes.
Still groggy with sleep, when my eyes opened this was the first sight I saw. I don't remember what my reaction was, if I screamed or what, but I do remember crying and I could nt get that sight out of my eyes. From that day forward i never played with a doll on my own again.
Then, as a teenager I was babysitting my neighbors kids and her daughter wanted me to play with her doll with her. Trying to overcome my fear I relented. But, as we were playing the Barbie dolls head came off and fell on me, and I like to died. It seems that I was not outgrowing my fear of dolls.
So, the other day I took my friend to the thrift store and while she was shopping I was piddling around looking for unique, decorative boxes with lids. Most of them were jewelry boxes, so no problem. But the third one had an old fashioned doll in it with clicky eyes.
I dropped the lid and stepped backwards to muffle the scream that threatened to overtake me. My heart rate accelerated and my toes curled in my shoes. I had to find a seat to sit down and gather myself.
Needless to say I lost my desire to piddle. I couldn't get out of that store fast enough.
Because of these incidents I fear anything where art imitates humans. I don't like dolls, mannequins, robots, dummies, etc. Movies depicting these things give me nightmares.
Two movies that give me the shivers more than a horror story is Magic with Anthony Hopkins where the dummy takes over the ventriloquist and The Stepford Wives with Katherine Ross and Paula Prentiss where the husbands were automating their wives.
Creepy!
Well life or reality is stranger than fiction for sure.
What happened to your brother? Does he still have this mental problem? He tired to scare you and probably didn't realize the real affect of it who knows. Still, very bizarre behaviour.
That incident must have scarred you for life but I feel there might be just more to that than that- some deeply rooted problem. Because the fact that you are still afraid of the dolls because of that incident still feels superficial. Perhaps some hypno therapy is in order to get the real/underlying problem out in the open. They say these sort of problems typically lie in the unconscious mind and so if you are aware, then it shouldn't cause any problems - not to that point anyway but you are having problems. So maybe there's something more - something on the unconscious level.
I love watching horror movies but unfortunately they affect me and causes nightmares so I chose not watch those anymore.
It's surprising that he did that to me since I was always his favorite. He took me everywhere with him when we were younger, so I don't think he meant any harm.
I don't think it's in my subconscious or anything though. Everybody is scared of something. I guess dolls is it for me.
It's just strange that they bother me.
I don't make too much of it because once when we were talking about fears, my son expressed that he felt that dolls were creepy too. His reason? The clicky eyes.
I almost fell off the bed laughing. I told him that I knew he was my son after that and he's never had any experience with dolls.
I think it's bizarre. Nothing more, but funny actually.
I am sure he just wanted to scare you. Brothers can be like that. I have 3 brothers before me and when we were growing up, they'd give me hell all day since I was my dad's favourite. lol. But we are very close since our childhood - since we grew up.
Anyway, I am sure everyone has some kind of fear or fears even but yours seemed more like a phobia. Perhaps only my interpretation of your original post.
I find clowns quite creepy. Not sure why people think they are funny.