Do we ever grow out of our childhood fears?

Will Gore wonders how he can help his children overcome their anxieties, when he has yet to beat his own

Gore Jnr is no fan of the pike (Getty/iStock)

My son is afraid of pike. The fish, not the pointy weapon of bygone times – though he might be fearful of both if he knew of them.

I blame myself really. For one thing, having failed to pass my obsession with Arthur Ransome onto my first child, I redoubled my efforts with the next. And it paid off. Tristan will happily watch the 1974 film adaptation of Swallows and Amazons in the afternoon, be read Pigeon Post before bed, then listen to an audio version of Winter Holiday as he goes to sleep.

Ransome knew all about pike. In the first of his adventures about the crew of the Swallow, he has Roger – the youngest of the Walker family – catch a fish of such mammoth proportions that he thinks it must be a shark. “Do you think it’s really safe to bathe in this place?” asks Roger worriedly, as the pike slips off the hook and darts back to the depths of the lake.

In The Big Six, another huge pike – this time caught successfully by the wannabe pirates aboard the Death & Glory – becomes a crucial plot device: an alibi for the boys when they are accused of setting boats adrift all around the Norfolk Broads; but an alibi that is useless unless they can track down the man who witnessed the catch.

Although I no longer imagine frightening figures emerging from beneath my bed, there are times when I do find darkness unsettling

My son then, knows from Ransome about these gruesome beasts, which can grow to well over a metre in length and which have a multitude of ferocious teeth. But it wasn’t until he saw a large fish in our local stretch of the Grand Union Canal that knowledge of pike turned to terror. Whether it was actually a pike or not is by the by; it was big, and it looked like a monster – that’s really all that matters.

We have chatted it over, and I have explained that pike don’t seek out humans to eat – even small boys with sweet smiles. And they definitely don’t ensnare people who are on dry land. But Tristan read somewhere that occasionally these fishy behemoths have been known to leap out of the water to grab onto the necks of passing water birds – and if they can do for a moorhen, who knows what untapped killing potential they might have.

The upshot is that family walks by the canal are banned at present. And if by bad luck there arises the need to walk over one of the bridges that crosses it, Tristan will do so only with his eyes closed, guided by a parent.

It’s irrational daftness of course, and I tell myself it’s merely a phase. Just like the few months last spring when Tristan suddenly became terrified of dogs – only to be cured when we spent a week in Cornwall next door to a couple who had a gentle and friendly spaniel.

But then I think of my own childhood fears, from the absurd to the existential: dogs, slugs, the dark, my death, the death of my parents, worms, being left alone, bigger boys, shouty teachers, and all sorts of monsters that might have been living under my bed. And I realise once again, that perhaps I only have myself to blame: the apple evidently having fallen not far from the tree.

What’s more, I begin to worry that my son’s fear-of-pike phase may not necessarily be short-lived. After all, my slug phobia affected me well into my teens, and I still occasionally dream that I am confronted by a morass of giant specimens. Dogs I’m generally down with, but bouncy ones make me decidedly nervous. I’m still wary of bigger boys.

And although I no longer imagine frightening figures emerging from beneath my bed, there are times when I do find darkness unsettling. I want to be like one of those people who write books about wandering through woods and wildernesses in the dead of night, enraptured by the still wonder of the night. But the truth is, whenever I have been out alone in the countryside after dark has truly set in, my main thought has been to get home as quickly as possible.

Maybe I should conquer my fears. I have conquered some of them. But there will always be something that disturbs us, whether rationally or otherwise; it’s part of our condition. Managing our worries is often more important than trying to beat them. The last nine months have shown us that all too clearly.

When it comes to Tristan’s pike angst, therefore, we’ll give it plenty of line for now – and reel it in when he’s good and ready.