Unrelated Sensory Processing problem?

[Guest guest]

I was reading a book about things like SID and it reminded me that I developed a

fear of heights when I was 10 years old. As a younger child I was fearless of

heights and could stand at the top of a dangerously high cliff and look over.

Luckily I never fell (gasp).

But at age 10 my family travelled up an elevator in San Francisco which had

glass walls and was on the outside of the building. I was pushed up close to

the glass as the elevator got higher and higher. I remember being scared - I

could see almost straight down and we were soon many floors high.

I feel that the experience of being pressed against the glass, without any

*visible* barrier in front of me, triggered a fear of heights which continues to

this day. If I stand at the handrails at a scenic lookout, I begin to feel

unsteady - as though I am about to catapult over the rail and fall to my death.

It is an unpleasant feeling(!), and I have to back away from the handrail.

It is interesting that this fear had a similar onset to 4S: a memorable event

when I was in late childhood or puberty, marks the start of a sensitivity that

has lasted throughout my life.