Fear of the week

As I mentioned last week, exams and coursework never fail to bring on a season of terror and fear for poor people who don't get to leave the house any more.

Yesterday I had to walk to the other side of town, past all sorts of people that might try to assault me at any moment. When I bumped into someone I knew the relief was so overwhelming I almost asked them to walk me home.

It's putting me in touch with some of the true terrors of my childhood. Hmmmmm...

• For a long time as a child, I was convinced that Jesus that lived in the window of our downstairs loo. If I missed the toilet then he wouldn't love me anymore.

• One for the Essex contingent: the giant in the Jack and the Beanstalk part of Never Neverland, Southend-on-Sea. Although in retrospect it looked uncannily like Zordon from Power Rangers.

• At the end of the local news on TV the slogan 'Closer to Home' came up on screen, but the slanty writing made it look like it said 'Closed to Home'. I was convinced that my arents would get taken away for intercepting military broadcasts.

• For much of my 11th year, I was gripped by an unassailable fear of Dover Prison.

• For as long as I've sat exams, Ive had a morbid fear I'm going to wee myself when I'm sat there waiting for it to finish. (why do so many of my terrors have to be urine-based?)

• Between the ages of about eight and eleven, every time I had a shower I was convinced that Attila the Hun was going to get me.

I'm not really sure at what point in the year I started using this column as a psychiatrist couch, but don't worry: I only have four issues left to purge my mind of this nonsense.

Next week: The priest, the vestry and my secret shame