Phobia help...?

Question

This is hard for me to talk about but, here goes..

I have emetophobia. Which is a phobia of throwing up. (I have trouble saying the 'v' word). I worry about it a lot. I don't eat take aways much, I make sure meat is cooked completely, I wash my hands a lot, I get very panicky when I feel sick.

Anyway, I can't trace a moment were the phobia started. I havn't had any traumatic experiences involving this as far as I'm aware.

I've had many bad experiences involving needles, but I have no phobia of them. Experiences such as fainting, dizzyness, injured nerves, having a needle scraping across my eye to get sand out, multiple attempts at finding veins, but I'm not scared or fearful of them.

So what I'm asking is, why am I so afraid of throwing up?

Answer 1

In my experience, phobias are the way we avoid dealing with what is really bothering us.

"I can' t admit I hate my mother, so I'll worry about spiders."

To get around this phobia, the easiest solution would be hypnotherapy. I'm 1/2 decent at it, and I could fix it for you in 3 or 4 30 minute sessions. A pro could do it in 2.

BUT... eventually you might develop another phobia until you deal with... well, what ever is the real problem. I've seen people swap symptoms before.

Get the hypnotherapy, and see someone to get to your root problem before you swap symptoms is my advice.

Answer 2

Maybe it was a traumatic childhood experience. Like, when you were young, you got very sick and couldn't stop puking, or you witnessed that happen to somebody. If your phobia affects you that severely, you should probably see a therapist to help you get over your phobia. Phobias are irrational and don't really follow any set rules. You may have had bad experiences with needles, but luckily you don't fear them. Unfortunately, the same is not with vomiting. Don't think you are alone. Many people have the strangest phobias. I myself
have some weird phobias. I cannot take a bath in soapy water. That is a strange result of watching Jaws when I was little, and it turned a fear that Jaws was going to come into the bathtub(see, that is worse than your phobia) into a habit. But like I said before, if your phobia is that bad, you should probably seek professional help to get over it. We're not going to be that much help.

Answer 3

I understand this. I am not as extreme as you with my eating habits, however, over Thanksgiving my 15 year old nephew took ill with a stomach virus. I didn't eat good for 3 weeks just in case I got it, I didn't want alot in my stomach. So you are not alone honey.

Please take care and start eating. Your worrying is making matters worse and will actually make you "V". Relax. It is a natural thing and we should thank our lucky stars we have the ability to even do that. If we didn't, we would get very very ill.

I'll keep you in my prayers. I know what it is like to be afraid of something.

Answer 4

I think most people have this fear or anxiety of throwing up.I think the gagging and acid reflux are also a factor.It is similarto people saying they can't swallow pills and quite often the pill is much smaller than the food we swallow.It is a fear of gagging and choking. The trick is to not think about it.I used to faint every time I would get a needle.The needles didn't hurt but I would let the anxiety build up so much I just fainted.You just have to learn little techniques to help you cope with it.

Answer 5

I have experienced severe claustrophobia for several years which has forced me to seek counselling as it was affecting almost everything i did and influenced most of my thoughts. I had several panic attacks along the way also. They're not funny are they? I "desensitised" my problem, which meant writing down all the things that made me anxious, then i listed them in priority and worked on each problem situation one at a time... Anyway re your problem i would advise you to take the first step and speak with your doctor who would be able to recommend a counsellor. Take one step at a time and congratulate yourself at each hurdle you cross. You WILL make progress if you try and stay positive but these things take time. There is always light at the end of the tunnel, best wishes.

Answer 6

haha then there should be a phobia of people asking is the a phobia of phobias the list goes on

Answer 7

lol you are not alone. i have the same habits as you. making sure everything tastes fine and if they are properly cooked, washing hand. and whenever i feel sick, i will press the area slightly below my wrist (something about accupressure).
it seems to me that some of my family members think that i'm anorexic cos i dont eat much and i am quite skinny.
my phobia started/ or got worse this year. i was in sch when i felt sick and i was begging my teachers to let me go home. in the end, nothing happened to me, but the phobia got a lot worse than before.

Answer 8

if you belive in reincarnation the anwer is easy. It's mainly due to a past life experience. I'm a buddiht andI believ it. btI guess some Christians belive it too. i read two books by a very famous American psyhologist where he omes across a past life experience with one of his patients under hypnosis. He didn't believein reincarnation too b4 this. Well anywys there he lady ha a lot of fear like beingafraid ofth dark and afraid of eight and drowning. And under hynosis (I'll give one example) he uncovers that in a past she had died in a flood and now she is afraid of water and drowning in this life. There werestories of many other patients too in his othr book. This is the truth, bt you have every right to believe. t I tell the total truth. never the less you can overcome the fear don't worry. in those books the patient is totally cured of her phobia once she sees the incident under hypnosis, her phobia is totally cured. And I must add that these are actualy true incidents. Well anywayz I hoped I helped.

Answer 9

I kind of have that too. I can't touch raw meat or I have to wash my hands a billion times and when I get sick, I freak out. I can't look at throw up, or see anyone getting sick. I don't know if I have this.

Maybe it is because throw up is really gross.

Answer 10

I think it is just that you have knowledge of the consequences of uncooked meat and not washing your hands..You know that you can get very sick and the "v-word"-ing is a symptom of many diseases, some fatal...There fore its not a matter of fear, its a matter of understanding which causes you to get anxious