Let me start by saying that I feel the same way as the OP - I hate turbulnce, and generally hate flying.

All the people who above said that turbulence is nothing to worry about probably failed to look in the news as to what happened to the airfrance flight that got down last week. The plane entered the area of severe turbulence, which most likely happened due to the storm.

So if you say bumpy ride in the clear blue skys - it is one thing. If you are taking off during rainy gloomy morning and you fly through the rainy dark clouds - its is another case of "bumpy road". And I do not beleive for a second that anything is safe while you are up in the air. And don't tell me about the car crashes and other statistics, I know it all, but none of it really helps my fear of flying.

To the pilots that might be reading this thread - it really helps nervous passengers to hear pilot speak - not only when we hit turbulence, but also periodically during flight. I would prefer pilot taking 10 seconds of his time and acknowledge that flight is going well, no issues, how much time left until we land, every hour and a half or so.