My fear of sharks scared me offline.

I was trembling with shock. The last place I expected my phobia of great white sharks to affect me was during an Uma Thurman chick flick.

Now I know its normal to be scared of sharks, I'm sure anyone would be if they were swimming and found out one was nearby, but my fear of just looking at great white sharks affects me going to the cinema or even watching TV.

Despite it being a children's film, watching Finding Nemo was the hardest movie I've had to sit through at the cinema. I was scared throughout because there was lots of intense music which made me think something bad was going to happen to little Nemo swimming out in the middle of nowhere where anything could have got him. In one scene his dad Marlon and friend Doree start bleeding which sets off a group of sharks. Bruce, the great white shark character is too lifelike for my liking, the film makers made him glare and jump so close up to the screen I had to close my eyes. I couldn't wait for the film to finish, I was only thankful it wasn't in 3D.

Because Finding Nemo went so bad, I refused to watch Shark Tale, even though I think I would have been fine with it because judging by the advert the sharks do look convincingly cartoon like. Though I don't plan to see it. If I've seen a shark film once, like Deep Blue Sea [with Samuel L Jackson and LL Cool J] and know what is going to happen I'm okay, but the first time I watched it I was shaky. I refused to see it at the cinema to my family's disappointment.

I cannot watch a film or even an advert if it features water , even if its without a shark theme just in case, because things have caught me out, like a scene in the Uma Thurman [My Super Ex-Girlfriend] film which shook me up. No, I did not expect a shark to be thrown at the screen with its jaws right close up and it happened so fast I didn't have a chance to cover my eyes. Ace Ventura is another one, I watched that at home, my family could only laugh at me because I was on a cushion on the floor and jumped out of my skin when a great white jumped at the screen in a scene where Jim Carrey was in someone's house.

“Why don't you get scared of whales or crocodiles?” People ask me, and I know my odd fear comes from watching Jaws at four our five years old.  The famous theme music scares me to this day and I blame my older sister for my phobia.  I can't sit properly watching TV if any scenes involve water, or even footage of dangling legs of people in a swimming pool are shown, I have to have my feet curled up on the couch. When I was younger my sister would sing the Jaws theme and tell me the shark would get me if I didn't put my legs off the floor and she also teased me when we went swimming that there was a shark in the pool so I would run out crying.

My sisters have always found it amusing. One time, I turned on the family computer and as it loaded, the desktop theme picture had been changed to that of a giant size great white shark head which was superimposed with a really huge mouth open and sharp teeth, a man bathing in a boat about to enter the mouth. I actually fell back and almost off the seat. Both of my sisters burst into fits of laughter.

I have learnt to control it. When my little sister tags me on Facebook in photos of angry looking sharks to make me jump, I am ready, and look at it at an angle where I can't see it properly. I just scroll and untag myself! And In the last year my little cousins found out about my phobia and were delighted in bringing up shark videos on youtube on their new I-Pods and I would shrug and pretend to watch it to their disappointment. So to cope with it I did stop telling people in case they think its weird or tease me but now I refuse to let my phobia drive me away from the cinema or going online! 

Just don't expect me to swim in the ocean.