Last week, I read a story about a 34-year-old British woman who is extremely afraid of met

al forks. Shes been using plastic ones for 17 years because the sound of a fork rubbing against a plate gives her a panic attack. Strange, right？ But shes not alone. While popular phobias(恐惧症)about snakes and spiders might get all of the attention, there are a wide variety of not-so-obvious horrors that make people nervous. While some phobias might seem a bit silly, they can cause serious emotional distress. My coworker Magda is terrified of pigeons, a phobia that is taking over her life. She wont walk in certain parts of the city and runs screaming from the subway when one of these "rats with wings" finds its way onto the platform. Another friend is disgusted with cheese. Once I saw her run away from a slice of it. So where does an irrational fear of cheese come from？ Are phobias something we inherit from our genes or do we acquire these unusual anxieties over time？ Ever since I can remember I have been unreasonably frightened of elevators. There was no terrible childhood experience and I am fine with confined spaces, but something about elevators makes me nervous. And so, when my boyfriend and I found ourselves trapped in an elevator last year — because these sorts of things always happen eventually — I was anticipating the worst. While he gave me a suggestive eyebrow raise and proposed we " take advantage of the situation," I began screaming uncontrollably. I was far from turned on by the whole facing my worst nightmare thing. However, after the fear subsided(消退)I realized that, yes, this was my greatest fear come true, and yet — it wasnt all that bad. Nervous and inconvenient maybe, but terrifying？ Not so much. Liberating yourself from a deep-seated phobia can be a long and difficult process, but sometimes it can be as simple as confronting it head on.

The 34-year-old British woman is extremely afraid of metal forks because______.

A．she is afraid that they may hurt her

B．she couldn"t bear their sound on plate

C．she has been injured by them before

D．she has never used them before