Fighting the Fear

This past Tuesday was the second to last episode of The Biggest Loser and the contestants were presented a challenge where they had to "put the weight back on" and carry it across a golf course, dropping of their weekly weighloss at each hole.  Even though my weight loss is a quarter of what they have lost in 20 weeks, I took on this challenge the other day and walked to all of my errands (the library, bank, doctor's office, rec center, church, and grocery store = 5 miles total) with enough weight in my backpack to equal what I have lost thus far.  Over the course of my walking, I just listened some easy guitar music and reflected on who I am and who I'm trying to become.  The biggest concusion that I came to is that I am so fearful of everything it makes it hard to get anywhere!  Here are some examples of the things that I am afraid of:

-Sam dying without me getting a chance to tell him how much I love him and how much he has done for me.
-My parents dying.
-Being in a plane crash en route to or from Puerto Rico
-Being in a car accident
-Getting cancer
-Sam getting in an accident on his motorcycle
-Not being able to have children
-Never finding a career that fulfills me while paying my bills
-Not being remembered
-Possums
-Water I can't see to the bottom of
-Creepy looking guys
-Someone breaking in to our house when I am home alone
-My cat dying
-What's going to happen to my brothers

The list goes on and on.  And while I'm sure some of you were reading that list and thinking, "Well, Brittany, most of those are rational fears and struggles that we all deal with from time to time." But I don't think you understand.  Fear runs my life.  While reading a book on relationships, the author presented a list of all of the most common (emotional and mental needs) fears and I could easily check of 17 of the list of a little over 20. 

I've always been prone to worrying.  My mom can tell you a story about how I came home from school one day in tears because a little girl from Bosnia was pictured on the cover and she was missing an eye that had been hit by shrapnel.  I was so worried about her because now she only had one eye and was living in this awful, wartorn zone and what if that zone came to us?  Why didn't we have gas masks and a bomb shelter in our home?...I was 7. 

I have got to keep fighting the things that I fear.  I used to be afraid of losing weight because all I could remember was all the times that I had tried before and failed.  Now look at me!  One fear down.