The Trauma Never Ends! 12 of The Creepiest Things We Remember From Childhood

When you’re a child you somtimes experience things that traumatise you for the rest of your adult life. Whether it’s watching your first horror film or realising that the Easter Bunny is in fact a gigantic creep (who breaks into people’s houses and leaves chocolate eggs behind, seriously?!).

These memories tend to stay with us as we grow older. Sometimes they manifest themselves as full –on phobias and other times, they just make us feel a little... unsettled if anyone mentions them in front of us.

Today in the Her.ie office we got talking about the creepiest things from our childhood. Here are the 12 things that freaked us out the most...

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1. Santa Claus:

Sure he used to leave us loads of presents but every Christmas Eve we went to bed a tiny bit terrified. There’s something deeply traumatising about the idea of a grown man sneaking into your house via the chimney in the dead of night and bringing a herd of reindeer with him...

2. The Wheelers From Return To Oz:

If you grew up in the 80s/early 90s chances are you were subjected to this film at some point. Billed as a sequel to the Wizard of Oz, Return to Oz was like the Wizard of Oz’s deeply disturbed teenage brother that was going through a goth phase. It featured headless evil queens, talking pumpkins and, worst of all, the Wheelers. They were TERRIFYING. 

3. Goosebumps Books:

 

Reading these books left us petrified of dolls, toys, cameras, mummies and a host of other things. Oh and it also taught us a valuable life lesson: never go into the basement. Ever.

4.  CatDog:

This insane creation came to us via Nicklodeon and left us all wondering the same thing: if its head is a cat and its backside is a dog HOW DOES IT GO TO THE BATHROOM?! We fretted over this for years. Oh and you know, a catdog is just weird. What monster would dream of engineering such a thing? It goes against the laws of nature!

5. Furbies:

Furbies were a strange phenomenon. We saw an advert for them on telly during the run-up to Christmas, we begged our parents for one and when we finally got one we showered it with love and spoke Furbish to it non-stop. We also let it feast on our fingers (that was how you fed them like).

But then, we started to realise that Furbies weren’t so great. In fact they were made of PURE EVIL. They always wanted to listen to music or blather on about something in Furbish even at 4am on a school night. Furbies left us creeped out, a little scared and majorly sleep-deprived.

One day we took the batteries out and shoved our Furby into the depths of our wardrobe although we still get anxious that we’ll hear some Furbish coming from that wardrobe some night. Shudder.

6. The Are You Afraid Of The Dark? Theme Tune:

As soon as you heard the opening strains of music for this show, you started to feel a little disturbed because you knew that the next hour of your life would be terrifying. We’re still afraid of campfires.

7. Greenclaws:

Maybe you’ll remember this show, maybe you won’t but either way it was creepy as f**k. Greenclaws was a huge, green monster who lived in a greenhouse. Every episode featured a freaky plant, some bizarre riddles and Owlma (a mechanical owl). It was creepy and taught us never to spend prolonged periods of time in a greenhouse. Oh and to never trust owls. Especially when they’re made out of metal.

8. Bananas In Pyjamas:

They were life-sized bananas that wore pyjamas and regularly broke into song. Enough said.  

9. The Child Catcher From Chitty Chitty Bang Bang:

The Child Catcher was a creepy looking man who ran around the place snatching children and imprisoning them. The dude STOLE children. It was common for mammies to mention the Child Catcher when you were being difficult and wouldn’t eat your vegetables. Once his name was dropped, you bet your ass you ate every last bit of broccoli that was on your plate.

10. Tamagotchis:

These were creepy because of the emotional anguish associated with them. You began with a cute little electronic blob. You fed it, you played with it – you cleaned up its poo the whole time. You started to bond with that Tamagotchi and just as soon as you had become BFFs with it, the stupid thing would die and you’d curse yourself for being a bad Tamagotchi parent. There was nothing more terrifying than waking up in the morning and seeing that your beloved Tamagotchi had died in a pile of its own poo.

11. Crocodile Dentist:

Our young, frazzled nerves just couldn’t cope with this game. Every time it was your turn, you prayed to God that you’d get that tooth pushed down without having the Crocodile eat your finger. It was just too much. Also, it was creepy because it effectively encouraged our young, impressionable minds to seek out crocodiles in real life and shove our hands in their faces.

12. Trap Door:

From a talking skull to “the thing upstairs” this show left us traumatised on a weekly basis. We can still remember the theme tune...