What if They Find Out?

Do you suffer from FobFo? Are you afraid of being "found out"?

If you're a FobFo sufferer ("fob-foe"), you possess generalized feelings of fear, anxiety, and a sense that not only might you become 'found out' but that once you are found out, that everything will fall apart. You fear this chaos. You have the fear of being found out!

This feeling follows you everywhere. The fear of being found out is especially strong at work, but exists in your relationships, at home, while you're out running errands, and it exists during most of your interactions with other people.

Continued...

COLD SHOWER

I was in seventh grade, twelve years old. After school I always took the bus home with my best friend, Mara. We took the city bus, the only one that went up the windy hill to our houses. My house didn't really have a back yard, just a hill that sloped down to the street, a very steep hill with a drop off and lots of trees -- eucalyptus and redwoods. On this particular day, Mara got off the bus at my stop, rather than ride another mile to hers. We were going to hang out at my house. We were in a silly mood. We decided to climb the hill instead of taking the stairs.

We kept slipping and dropping our book bags, grasping onto trees and branches, falling, falling. It was fun, and we were laughing each time we slid down. We were pretending to be in a movie, that we were on a mission, had to climb the hill, in order to save the queen of the village (or at least I was pretending that).

But, suddenly, a car horn sounded. It was my stepmom, home early from work. She was waving at me.

I said to Mara, "Oh my God! Go!" She ran, and I scrambled up the hill to the house. I was full of fear. I'd been found out. I wasn't doing what I was supposed to be doing. Oh no, oh no.

I ran into the house, threw my book bag into my room, and ran into the bathroom. (The bathroom was always a refuge to me.) I stripped off my clothes and got into the shower. I had turned on only the cold water. I sat crouched in the shower with cold water pounding on my back. I was punishing myself before my stepmom could.

My stepmom knocked on the door, then came in. She wondered if I was OK, and what was going on. She couldn't figure out why I was in the shower. I said, "I don't know. We missed the bus and had to take a late bus. Mara needed to borrow my math book." I was lying. I didn't have permission for Mara to come over.

The crazy thing is, I was surprised that I wasn't in trouble. I didn't get why it wasn't a big deal that I was playing around and having fun. I had let my guard down, shouldn't I have been punished? I was taking a cold shower and shaking with fear...thinking, oh no, oh no, oh no....and I didn't know why.

FEAR IS A DRAG

What does your FobFo look like?

While talking with a small group of people that includes some strangers, do you fear that someone will ask you a question and you won't know the answer, and that a spotlight will be shined on you, and that everyone will start laughing and suddenly think that you're much, much dumber than they'd realized?

Do you have strategies for covering up what you don't know? (I do.) Do you find it very uncomfortable to admit that you don't know something, particularly when it's something that you were supposed to learn in school and that everybody else learned in school? (I do.)

Are you afraid that your boss or someone at work will 'find out' that you've been doing 'something' wrong, and that they will expose you and that you will get into 'big trouble'?

If you were to take the time to write down or explain to a caring friend what you think getting 'found out' would look like for you, you'd realize it's highly unlikely that the scenario you have in your mind will ever become a reality.

FEAR OF GETTING INTO 'BIG TROUBLE'

That kind of fear of exposure and "big trouble" is directly tied to our childhoods.

We all have had the experience of our worlds turning upside-down very suddenly and without any explanation. Because of that fact and because it happened to us when we were so young, in some cases before we learned to talk, we now live in fear of a recurrence of a traumatic event every day of our lives.

That's why we can't explain exactly what we think people will "find out;" FobFo is a general fear based on an early experience. The fear of being found out is based on a reality we once knew. However, what we need to learn is this: our fear of being found out is in conflict with our present reality.

That's why it's so hard to shrug it off. Our fear is old and, well, maybe it's even comforting at some level.

Being a FobFo is like wearing very ancient armor. It's armor we once needed, but do you need it now? Isn't it rather heavy to still be wearing in your adult life?

FOBFO IS A FOE

Here's the deal. This fear sucks, and we all know it. I doubt I have to do much to convince you all that it's something that we wish would just go away. Evaporate.

FRIENDS OF FOBFO

FobFo has friends, or allies.

Our fear of being found out couldn't exist if we didn't have a need to control our environments. We've got control issues. Our fear also couldn't exist if we had ample self-confidence. It couldn't exist if we fully accepted ourselves, as we are, and without apology.

If you had ample self-confidence, you wouldn't worry about being found out. If we were confident more of the time, not just in spurts, it wouldn't bother us if we didn't know something.

THE CURE FOR FOBFO

The cure costs nothing, it's free. It's in you, me, all of us.

Keep developing your self-confidence and keep working on detaching from a need to control your environment and other people. Eventually your fear of being found out will simply....depart.

RELAX YOUR SHOULDERS & LOOK THE DAY IN THE EYES

You're OK. Just remember that. You are okay. You are your center, your home, and your most caring mentor. You are OK!

Comments

[Gina]

it's like a weight in the back of your head, sometimes it's so heavy you actually feel the pressure physically manifesting itself against the back of your head and shoulders. like something is actually pushing down on you, literally pushing you into the ground. it's what makes it hard to take criticism it triggers the same feeling you had as a kid when your parent decides something you did was wrong, it wasn't wrong before but it's wrong now and you don't know why. so we learn to control everything we can at least in ourselves if not everything else around us because any moment now something is going to get seriously out of control.--gf

[AngrySar]

I have this too, it is one of the strongest lingering things from my past for me.
For instance, right now my bf (also with ACoA characteristics) are staying with his folks after we fell on hard times with a house fire... I find I interpret things COMPLETELY wrong, I panic if I think his folks (most of all, his mom, my future MIL, for some reason) don't like me or will "find out" I'm stupid, childish and otherwise not worthy of their son or their family.
The other day, in fact, I was moving my car as they'd asked me too and freaked out when she honked her horn at me... thinking she wanted me to hurry up or I'd screwed up... I was so devastated I went in to my room and just started crying. I told my bf I was sure they thought I was a moron because I couldn't tell she was actually wanting me to give up on moving the car, that they could get out anyway. I remember feeling very ashamed of myself, that they'd find out I'm so vulnerable & out of control of my emotions.
Yep, its a horrible feeling, and I could go on and on with childhood memories that gave me the same feeling, involving being downright TERRIFIED of my dad punishing me for not being perfect.

[Elaine]

I'm still stunned that each entry applies to me. Part of me is still in denial. But I'm so grateful for each moment of recognition. This post is one of them.