Fear Of: Being Attacked by a Suburban Creeper in the Middle of the Night

I've always had an inherent fear of the night time since I was little. Not a terrified I hate everything to do with the night, but definitely a "I'm not sure what could attack me in the darkness, so let's turn on every light in sight." The origins have never been totally clear, but I'm going to guess an over-saturation on bad vampire lore, my brother locking me in the basement, reading goosebumps (because yes, those books honestly terrified me), a round of terrible nightmares in college and other general random bump in the night things.

So after the 6 hour long drive from LA back to San Francisco, I arrived at my mom's suburban sanctuary (seriously, if you saw her backyard garden you'd agree), I was totally amped to lie in my own bed and cuddle up to the best teddy bear in the world. If there's one place in the entire world where I (usually) feel safe, it's definitely my room at my momma's.

But, as I'm standing in the bathroom brushing my teeth, out of nowhere I hear this scratching in and then ostensibly yelling coming from the backyard. At which point, I promptly proceeded to freak out, call el bf-ers, and decided to find the nearest bat-like appliance to ream a dude in the face if he tried to attack my beloved mother and our home.

When I was a teenager, I can remember this utterly paralyzing fear developing where the slightest sound or scratch on the skylight of my bathroom, would stop me in my tracks. For about 10 seconds, I would stand there clutching the sink, too afraid to look up or out the window next to me in the event that I would see a man peering in with a devilishly evil grin on his face. The same satanic-faced man would appear in awake-mares throughout my adolescence, while I was lying in bed unable to fall asleep at night, while I was washing dishes in an empty house, or while I was running downstairs to grab the last batch of laundry before I headed off to bed. Regardless of time, place, or situation, if there was night involved and me being alone involved, I suffered through an interminable panic attack. But, as the years have gone by, I've gone from being completely frozen in place at the slightest indication of someone outside, to a more courageous bat-wielding banshee who will take you out at your left temple if you try to mess with me.

Suffice to say, the night man outside never turned out to be a situation of any merit. After acquiring the bat and finally turning on the back porch light -- and maybe yelling out "i'll kill you!!!!!" a couple times before I looked outside -- there was not a soul to be seen.

The first ever phobia of the day is: alone-in-house-and-shanked-by-rando-phobia.