How often do you encounter bugs or spiders, and how much of a burden on your life does this aversion impose? Is it getting worse, better, or neither?
Your reaction may be stronger than others', but that may not in itself be reason enough to invest lots of time and energy in self-modifying to not have this strong reaction. Especially if it's not getting worse over time.
Years ago I had a similar "yuck behaviour" regarding food, I would refuse to eat anything that had been in contact with even a small bug: for instance I'd generally turn down lettuce, which when purchased in heads almost always comes with a few "residents". (No screaming though.) It always turned my stomach upside down to see folks (e.g. my parents or my wife) do things like cut out part of an apple that had a worm in it and eat the rest.
Over the years and without doing anything special I just got over it.
Oops. Apparently "got over it" was wrong (or at best premature). Tonight my appetite has been defeated by a chinese cabbage riddled with holes, even though they probably cover less than 10% of any given leaf's surface.
Okay, so for several years, I've been doing a fairly good job of excising out most of my irrational beliefs and fears.
The one that remains, however, is my fear of bugs and spiders. I'll SCREAM if I see one, dead or alive. And if there's one in my food, then I'm going to throw the entire plate out.
Is it common for LWers to have irrational reactions to bugs and spiders?
I know that there is "desensitization therapy", as highlighted by a Scientific American Frontiers episode a decade ago (where gradual exposure to the stimulus - a spider) - can desensitize a person with arachnophobia over time. But this can really only happen in controlled settings. In uncontrolled settings, such interaction can give you nightmares.