Extreme Child Phobias: More Than Fear, Sometimes Dangerous, Even Deadly

A child absolutely refuses to leave the house after a dog bite; another won't leave her room if a cat is in the building.

In 2005, an 8-year-old U.K. girl in may have starved to death because she refused to open her mouth after a traumatic visit to the dentist.

Yes, children can have phobias too. By definition, a phobia is an extreme, life-disrupting fear, but experts say a phobia in a child can pose special challenges that make them harder to detect and perhaps more detrimental.

"I think we tend to minimize it because we say, 'oh they're just being a kid, they'll grow out of it,'" said Jennifer L. Hartstein, a child adolescent psychologist in New York City who specializes in treating anxiety and depression.

"Yet, the earlier you intervene, the better the prognosis is," said Hartstein.

Below is a list of extreme child phobias, with expert advice on how to recognize and help children facing debilitating fears.

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Childhood Phobia: The Dentist

British authorities started an inquest this week into the 2005 starvation death of Sophie Waller, according to reporting by the Daily Mail.

Her parents say Waller developed a phobia after a dentist accidentally cut her tongue during a routine visit when she was 4 years old.

By age 8, Waller was still afraid. According to the Daily Mail, her fears were so extreme that she refused to eat for three days when she learned that she had to go to the dentist again for a cracked tooth.

Her parents and doctors decided to send her to the hospital to pull the cracked tooth, but Waller's parents told the Daily Mail that the doctors decided to pull all eight of her remaining baby teeth at the hospital, instead of the one.

When Waller awoke, her parents said she would not open her mouth to speak or eat and had to be fed with a tube. She continued to refuse to fully open her mouth after she was released. Two weeks later, Waller died in her bed from starvation and dehydration, according to a local pathologist.

The tragedy of Waller's life may be twofold; perhaps the proper medical intervention could have kept her living, and perhaps a therapist could have treated her phobia.