If you have this phobia, please skip over this post and move on to something else.
So, hippomonstrosesquippedaliophobia is the fear of long words. It's suggested that this might come from mispronouncing words and therefore being anxious or unable to face long words when they come up again. If you tried to take the whole phobia name on at once, you might get it also, so be careful there. Triggers could be long words overall, or obscure words, or even longer common words.
Some consider this to be a 'joke phobia' because the name is something that those with the phobia wouldn't be able to face, and also because it isn't a recognized phobia medically. Or if it is, then it's only very recently. Studies show that somewhere between 3-15% of people have this phobia to some degree, feeling embarrassed or nervous when faced with a new long word, and I can understand that, but it's also something of a marvel to me because I like words, and finding new ones.
I want to close this out with something I came across a while ago: There should be a hotline we can call to try pronouncing new words we've read for the first time, with a nice person on the other side to tell us what it's supposed to be.
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