I was forced to overcome my fear of spiders

I've always had a huge fear of spiders.  I think it's the legs.  There are too many of them.  I was even afraid of Daddy-Long-Legs as a kid.  So of course, my brothers took every opportunity to put them on me.

I was pretty much forced to get past my fears because of a house.

I lived in a tri-level house in rural Iowa that was inadequately sealed.  It didn't help that there was a dirt-floored crawl space under the main part of the house.  Mice and bugs had free range of my house.

And spiders.  Wolf spiders. 

Doesn't it look creepy and scary?

My husband drove a semi-truck.  I drove with him from Iowa to the West Coast.  But I stayed home to take care of bills and house stuff while he drove to the East Coast.

So I was Alone.  With the spiders.

The first time I saw a wolf spider in the family room, I decided I would simply avoid the lower level of the house until my husband came home - in three or four days.

But there were no doors between the levels.  I kept imagining the spider crawling up the 5 steps to the main level of the house.  Every time my hair brushed my shoulder, I shrieked, convinced that the spider was crawling on me.  I realized I was going to be freaked out until my husband came home.  And I was scaring my dog.

So I took a can of wasp spray, because it sprays from a very long distance, went down to the family room, and sprayed the bejeebers out of that spider.  It was all curled up in a spider death ball, but I still trembled and cried when I used a massive pile of toilet paper to pick it up and flush it.

The next spider was a little easier, and the next after that.  I'm still creeped out by them, but at least I can dispose of them by myself.

And I no longer scare the dogs.