Ways my parents scarred me... FOR LIFE.. 3

This scarring is probably more directly related to my DNA inherited and combined personality..

Let me tell you 2 facts about myself that have proven themselves true repeatedly in my life.
1.  I am extremely gullible.
2.  I am easily spooked.

Today, we're going to talk about #2.. what with Halloween coming/being celebrated this past weekend for the most part.

I'm not sure which parent to blame for this spook problem I have.  Neither of my parents ever seemed jumpy to me.  It also wasn't usually a goal in our house to go around trying to scare someone.  Surprise them every once in a while, accidentally come up behind them and not make enough noise to let them know you were there, these things were more acceptable.  But purposely scaring someone just wasn't something that really happened when I was growing up.

I don't generally like scary movies.  Halloween is only a good "holiday" because it involves copious amounts of sugar, chocolate, and other treats.  Dressing up is hard because if you're a woman and don't want to dress up as a "slutty something" it's pretty much impossible to find something at a costume store.  I'm also probably jaded because I don't really live in areas where there are lots of trick-or-treaters.  /sadface.

But this story has nothing to do with Halloween.  This has to do with being scared out of my mind.

Let me preface this with the fact that I have moderately good to very good hearing.  Or maybe I just notice more stuff than others, whatever.  I can tell the difference between people who walk up the stairs at Teh Dad's house, I wake up when I hear Phil stand up to resituate himself during the night, I wake up when it starts raining, I hear when someone puts their hand on a door knob type stuffs.

When I lived with Teh Dad while I was in high school, he used to come in and wake me up/make sure I was awake for school.  Usually, I was pretty good about being aware of my surroundings when Teh Dad would show up, but one morning, things were different.

I slept through his hand hitting the door knob, I slept through his hand turning the door knob.  I slept through his ankle-popping footsteps into my room.  I did not sleep through him breathing, apparently.  I opened my eyes and saw someone standing over me....  and SCREAMED LIKE I WAS DYING.

Teh Dad was unprepared for this reaction.  My scream scared him.  HE YELLED LIKE SOMEONE WAS TRYING TO KILL HIM.

Teh Dad's yell re-scared me and I immediately stopped screaming and started sobbing.

So that would sound something like this:
(high pitched) AHHHHHHHH!!!  (more baritone) AHHHHH!!!!  *Sound of someone starting to sob* (I can't find an accurate word description of the sound)

It would look something like this:

I probably looked like the girl, but had hair like the mom. (image)

Teh Dad's reaction.

My re-reaction.

Teh Dad told me he was going to turn on my lamp.  I sobbed out an acceptance (I don't do lights first thing after waking up because it gives me a headache).  Teh Dad pulled me up in a hug, where I was still sobbing and starting to laugh, which confused him.  He clarified if I was crying or laughing and I manged to tell him both because the situation was funny, even if it was terrifying.  He, too, started to laugh.

This whole process took less than an a minute but it's one of the most memorable minutes of my life.

After a few minutes, I had calmed down and Teh Dad assured himself of my mental stability and we went on with our normal morning programming.


We'll talk about #1 another day maybe.