I’m ashamed to admit I’ve been a tad obsessed with looking at disturbing pictures of things containing a cluster of holes. My Internet search cache is littered with such searches. From one of those searches, I learned about  Trypophobia, “an intense, irrational fear of (organic) holes,” according to the Urban Dictionary.

There is also a sub-Reddit specifically dedicated to it. A quick cringe-y visit reveled a lot of disturbing pictures of, you guessed it, holes. Pictures of organic things with clusters of tiny, perfect holes and things tucked into those perfect holes e.g., lotus seed pods; pictures of things disfigured with deep, asymmetrical holes e.g., skin; and pictures of people photoshopped with an outrageous number of gory holes (sometimes with teeth in the holes­–gotta love people with Photoshop).

I was headed down a down a hole of my own.

I get an uncomfortable, creepy, wig-y feeling looking at things with a cluster of holes. Some of the really disturbing ones make me want to scrub off my own skin. So, why do I keep coming back to these images? After a fairly superficial soul search into this fascination, I know now it’s not a phobia I suffer from–it’s depravity (thanks for enlightening me RL*).

I want free of this depraved obsession.

This weekend, I vow to . . .

• clear my ‘fear of holes’ Internet search history
• not bring up anything to do with holes during lunch with a friend tomorrow.
• not to follow through with my intention of photoshopping a picture of my dog, Griffin with a cluster of holes. This one is proving to very challenging for me. I really, really want to. Give me strength.

Sorry MM!

*RL is my beacon of reality

Related articles

• The Inside Story On The Fear Of Holes (psychologicalscience.org)