yes, I admit it...I get in a cold sweat, heart starts pounding and I start cursing in my head to the child playing with a balloon in anticipation of it popping! Don't let it touch the tree, it'll pop! Don't let it hit the ceiling, it'll pop! Stop squeezing it, it's gonna POP POP POP! The mylar ones are fine, its just the rubber ones that make that horrible loud bang that makes me jump and colorful four letter words fly out of my mouth.

Most of my family laugh about it, my nephew taunts me with the inflatable f*****s, my son however is considerate and when offered a balloon at places like McDonald's he politely says 'no thanks' knowing that I worry it'll pop in the car as I'm driving causing me to have a wreck due to the sudden loud BANG. I don't mind them being about at parties, happily floating on their strings tied to chairs and such...I can walk past them only with a hint of concern. It's mostly when they are on the floor or kids are playing with them, punching them, biting them, etc. Distance also plays a part. The closer the burst is to me the bigger my reaction. If its a good bit away and therefore not as loud, sometimes I'll have a little jump or even nothing at all.

I know its not a very rational phobia because, other than a child choking on a bit of rubber from bursting a balloon in their mouth, they do not pose a real threat to me or others. I think it began back in elementary school when on the last day we had 'field day' and played all these team games. One of which was a relay race where we had to run to the end and sit on a balloon until it popped before tagging the next team member. Everything was going well till I got one that would just not pop! I kept bouncing on it and bouncing...when is it going to pop?! and when it did it scared me because I had gotten used to it not popping. A year or so later I had my birthday party at Burger King and of course there were BK balloons and one of the employees thought it'd be funny to show my friends how to pop a balloon by sticking them up in the ceiling fans. I ran into the restroom until it had stopped.

It is so strange because I clearly remember, as a kid, blowing up balloons and playing with them with friends and even doing that dreaded trick where you put tape on the balloon then slide a needle into it and it not popping (although sometimes it did!) so its obviously built up over the years. Normally I'll only handle a balloon on certain circumstances like when my son 'made' me a heart shaped balloon that said 'i love you' and when I was drunk at Tavern on the Green in NYC and held their cool tie-dyed balloons to my head (you could see in the photo I was clearly drunk).

So to my fellow balloon fearers, hello and hugs to all