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I firmly hold the belief that it is always possible to change. My view is you truly can train a seasoned creature, as long as the mature being is receptive and ready for growth. Provided that the individual in question is prepared to acknowledge when it was wrong, and strive to be a more enlightened self.

Well, admittedly, I am that seasoned creature. And the skill I am trying to learn, although I am decrepit? It is an important one, a feat I have grappled with, repeatedly, for my whole existence. I have been trying … to become less scared of those large arachnids. Apologies to all the other spiders that exist; I have to be pragmatic about my capacity for development as a human. The focus must remain on the huntsman because it is large, commanding, and the one I see with the greatest frequency. Encompassing a trio of instances in the recent past. Inside my home. Though unseen, but I’m shaking my head at the very thought as I type.

I doubt I’ll ever reach “fan” status, but I’ve been working on at least achieving a standard level of composure about them.

I have been terrified of spiders from my earliest years (in contrast to other children who find them delightful). During my childhood, I had ample brothers around to guarantee I never had to engage with any personally, but I still became hysterical if one was obviously in the same room as me. One incident stands out of one morning when I was eight, my family unconscious, and attempting to manage a spider that had made its way onto the family room partition. I “handled” with it by standing incredibly far away, almost into the next room (for fear that it chased me), and discharging a generous amount of pesticide toward it. The spray failed to hit the spider, but it succeeded in affecting and disturb everyone in my house.

With the passage of time, whomever I was in a relationship with or cohabiting with was, by default, the bravest of spiders between us, and therefore tasked with dealing with it, while I produced whimpers of distress and ran away. If I was on my own, my method was simply to leave the room, plunge the room into darkness and try to erase the memory of its existence before I had to enter again.

In a recent episode, I was a guest at a friend’s house where there was a notably big huntsman who resided within the sill, primarily stationary. In order to be more comfortable with its presence, I envisioned the spider as a female entity, a girlie, one of us, just relaxing in the sun and eavesdropping on us yap. It sounds extremely dumb, but it worked (somewhat). Put another way, actively deciding to become less phobic proved successful.

Regardless, I've made an effort to continue. I contemplate all the logical reasons not to be scared. It is a fact that huntsman spiders pose no threat to me. I recognize they prey upon things like insect pests (creatures I despise). I know they are one of the planet's marvelous, benign creatures.

Unfortunately, however, they do continue to move like that. They move in the utterly horrifying and almost unjust way possible. The vision of their many legs carrying them at that frightening pace triggers my primordial instincts to go into high alert. They are said to only have a standard octet of limbs, but I am convinced that increases exponentially when they are in motion.

But it cannot be blamed on them that they have unnerving limbs, and they have an equal entitlement to be where I am – possibly a greater claim. I’ve found that employing the techniques of trying not to have a visceral panic reaction and run away when I see one, working to keep calm and collected, and intentionally reflecting about their beneficial attributes, has proven somewhat effective.

Simply due to the reality that they are furry beings that dart around with startling speed in a way that causes me nocturnal distress, is no reason for they warrant my loathing, or my shrieks of terror. I can admit when I’ve been wrong and driven by unfounded fear. It is uncertain I’ll ever reach the “catching one in a Tupperware container and taking it outside” stage, but you never know. Some life is left for this veteran of life yet.