Submitted Photo Shannon Kulpa, who was born and raised in Sheridan, is starring on this season of the reality TV show “Naked and Afraid XL” on Discovery Channel.

This isn’t being in your shower and seeing a spider that just won’t flow the stream of water down the drain, oh no — this is “Naked and Afraid” on a whole other level.

Born-and-raised former Sheridan resident and Silver Creek graduate Shannon Kulpa, who now resides in Utah, took on the “Naked and Afraid” challenge on Discovery Channel first in 2015, and returned as a veteran to “Naked and Afraid XL,” where former participants go back and do it all over again for 40 days — 19 days longer than before.

The premise of “Naked and Afraid” is relatively self-explanatory. Participants are taken to a desolate, dangerous environment and, while some similar TV shows leave you with the descriptor, “with nothing but the clothes on their backs,” “Naked and Afraid” leaves you with even less than that — just your birthday suit.

Kulpa was first made aware of the show in 2015, when she was on an airplane with her two children flying back from Costa Rica, and saw the show on a screen on the back of the seat in front of her.

“I don’t watch television. I haven’t had a television in, I don’t know, about nine to 10 years, but my kids and I were coming back from a trip to Costa Rica, and we came back and on the plane I saw it … and I was like, ‘Oh my gosh! This is my show; I could totally do this!’ So I threw it out there into the universe and six months later, I’m naked in the jungle,” Kulpa laughed.

While there were many things in the jungle that Kulpa could have been afraid of, the things she was nervous about were things of a hypothetical situation. A lot could have happened to Kulpa physically, and, while they didn’t, the potential was there.

“My biggest fear was coming back with some kind of crazy disease from being eaten alive by bugs,” Kulpa said. “There’s so many weird things. I got pretty nervous about that for sure.

“That’s the thing, that’s probably the most difficult obstacle, because having that fear of having diseases because of insects, and (having clothing is your) protection right there. It leaves you so vulnerable to the elements… and getting eaten alive by insects and … the temperatures drop quite a bit at night,” Kulpa explained.

But while there were many physical worries, there was one, the most obvious, that one would think would be a problem, but wasn’t — the actual, physical interactions between yourself and a dozen other naked people.

While it may have been weird, that’d only have been for about half a second, since there were many other things to contend with and worry about. Between the bugs, the cold, Kulpa’s night terrors, the lack of sleep, and the constant struggle for survival, being in the buff was the last thing on anyone’s mind. Kulpa was up from 6 a.m. to 6 p.m. almost every day with her allotted knife, pan and firestarter, distracting herself with a constant list of things to do and keeping busy.

“My first episode, my partner and I took two or three hours to find our camp and build our shelter. …We’re in the rain season, so there’s so much more to focus on. We definitely were not worried about thinking or looking; there’s really no thought of that at all — for me, anyway,” Kulpa laughed. “It was all about focus and getting stuff done, and it was like that for all of that, pretty much, for me. …I had my list and did the things I needed to do all day long; there really was no down time for me.”

There was another thing Kulpa didn’t have to be concerned with — the opinions of her two children. She has a daughter, age 8, and a son, age 14, cheer on their mom while sitting right next to her at home, watching every episode.

With that experience, her kids also get to hear some behind-the-scenes information, and the comfort of knowing that whatever crazy experience their mother is going through on screen, she gets through it without harm, and got home to sit home safely next to them.

“My son thought it was cool,” Kulpa shared. “They know exactly what happened out there. They know how it’s edited and they know what’s going on. They realize, I came home, I’m fine, tip-top condition. … I figured out how many hours I’m out there — 900 hours condensed into 40 minutes (a week.)

“They have no reason to be shocked about what happened out there; they’re like me, because they wonder how the production team is going edit it,” Kulpa said.

So why, after Kulpa’s first attempt on “Naked and Afraid,” did she decide to join the other show’s veterans on “Naked and Afraid XL?”

“If I hadn’t done it, I would probably regret not doing it, because despite how horrible my (first) 21 days (on ‘Naked and Afraid’) were — it was worse than I could have even thought — it made me push myself to a point where … it’s something most people can’t even understand or grasp, that’s how miserable the situation is, being out there,” Kulpa said. “As hard as it is for people to grasp, I went out there the second time — if i hadn’t done it, I would have been possibly watching it on television right now and going, ‘Oh my gosh, I could have totally done that, why didn’t I do that?'”

But while, mentally, it took a toll on Kulpa for most of her time there, she would definitely recommend the experience to anyone — because life is short, and, as Kulpa says, a bus could hit you at any moment — so what are you going to do with your life?

“Obviously, I did feel like there was definitely danger there, although you kind of block it out, so you’re not really living in fear — kind of like life,” Kulpa said. “You realize, well, any moment I could get into a car accident. But you block those things out and try to push through it.

“I would definitely, definitely recommend putting yourself out there, because that’s what living is. To challenge yourself. … The opportunity came, and I threw it out into the universe and it came back at me. I couldn’t say no. I was like, how did that happen?

“But its definitely something that makes you appreciate life and family, but also just the fact that you’ve done it — you put yourself into the arena. Uou put yourself out there and you’re the one doing it; you’re not sitting there and wondering, ‘Could I do that?’ You actually know whether or not you’re capable. There’s nothing you can’t do or can’t try,” Kulpa said.

According to Kulpa, the show focuses a lot on the resiliency of the human spirit — trying to stay positive during tough situations, and showing what kind of person someone becomes when they’re faces when stressful, terrifying situations.

There were, indeed, some positive experiences for Kulpa — from learning to rise above, to a life-changing epiphany that she’s excited to see played out on this evening’s episode.

“When I was out there and I was having a miserable time out there … I had this epiphany, and I’m wondering how they’re going to show it in the next episode. It was basically like, I don’t want to do this anymore,” Kulpa said, regarding her life as a stone mason outside of her reality television ventures.

Kulpa said she has an idea for an adventure travel company that she’d love to get off the ground, and even though there are a ton of details she’d have to work out, it’s similar to her Naked and Afraid excursions, with more clothing, and with a bit of a more vacation-y feel.

“I’ve been working on starting up an adventure travel company … I don’t want to do stone masonry for the rest of my life. I hurt. I’m in pain. … (But) I am kind of one of the (few])people in the world that has been in that type of environment for as long as I did. The tropics, that type of amazon, the trinidad is similar to the amazon. I definitely got a lot of experience and survival in that environment, so my adventure company would kind of take that experience and teach survival skills and dip your toes into the Naked and Afraid experience — take the survival aspect, but make a fun vacation and … that’s my goal,” Kulpa shared.

So what is Kulpa afraid of — naked, or otherwise?

“I’m really not afraid of anything in a physical sense; there’s not a whole lot of things I would not try or do, but the reality is, I’m as vulnerable as anybody else; I’m vulnerable to what people think of me, or what people say about me,” Kulpa admitted. “I fear how the (edited show) is going to make me look. I fear things like that because now all of a sudden, 3 million people have seen me at my worst.

“You learn that everything is a lesson. Ride the bus and realize that you’re the one that’s done it. You’ve experienced it, and nobody can take that away. I do have bigger fears in life; that’s what life is. Vulnerability. To love, and children, and stuff like that, but you know, basically, you learn to either rise above or you’re not going to live. I’ve learned to not fear,” Kulpa said.

“Naked and Afraid XL” airs Sunday nights at 10 p.m. on the Discovery Channel.

The next episode featuring Kulpa’s adventure will be on this evening at 10 p.m.