TW: This post discusses emetophobia, anxiety, depression, and brief mention of eating disorders. Due to the nature of the phobia, mentions of vomiting will be included, as will terms such as ‘being sick’. If you are unable to read the article, but would like to be sent the resources, please email your Liberation Representative at katie.blackwell2@wlv.ac.uk. Your mental health comes first!
Emetophobia awareness day was first brought about in 2014, by the Thrive Programme. Its main focus is to raise awareness and progress the education about what they referred to as the ‘UK’s silent phobia’, so named because of the lack of available information, or people who were coming forward to talk about it.
Emetophobia, or the fear of vomiting - whether this is the individual being sick, feeling sick or someone around them being sick - is said to affect 1.5% of the population, though due to the fact it is widely unknown, this figure might actually be an under-representation. From what we do know, the phobia is more prevalent amongst women, with 4 women to every 1 man diagnosed with the phobia.
Despite the prevalence of the condition, many people are largely unaware of what it entails, how it presents or the ways that it can impact the everyday life of the person who suffers from it! So this year, for emetophobia awareness day, we wanted to share some information about this phobia with you!
What causes it, and what are the symptoms?
Not a lot is understood about the cause of emetophobia. Like most phobias, in some cases it is brought on by a trauma - for example experiencing an illness as a child, or watching someone around you going through an illness - whilst for others, the phobia simply develops without any specific prompting. For many people, it was developed at such a young age that they are unable to remember if there was a specific cause.
The symptoms of emetophobia vary greatly depending on the individual, and are mostly done as an attempt to manage the anxiety that comes from the phobia, rather than being a result of the phobia alone. They are often behaviours that are done to avoid being sick, or to avoid being around someone else who might be sick.
These behaviours include:
- Avoiding places that may be associated with vomiting.
- Not eating or drinking new foods and drinks, often sticking to safe foods.
- Only eating at places you trust, or only eating at home.
- Avoiding drinking, or being around those who drink alcohol.
- Avoiding public transport, or travelling long distances.
- Excessively monitoring your health, being hyper aware of any potential risks.
- Avoiding medication that may cause nausea.
- Hyper-vigilance around expiration dates, or overcooking food to ensure it is done.
And many more, which can be found here.
This phobia may also cause mental distress, and has been associated with conditions such as depression, OCD and panic attacks. If you are struggling with this, you can contact the University’s mental health team here.
Treatment
Currently, the only treatment for emetophobia under the NHS is CBT therapy, or exposure therapy. These can be accessed through your GP, or other NHS mandated mental health services.
My Experience with Emetophobia
I wanted to do something for emetophobia awareness day because it is a topic that is extremely close to home for me. I personally have suffered severely from this phobia since I was 11 years old. Perhaps even younger. I don’t actually remember a time in my life where the idea of being sick wasn’t enough to send me into a spiral.
It impacts every aspect of my life. Ever since I was young, I struggled with eating in restaurants, or trying new foods. I’d obsessively checked the best before dates on foods, and couldn’t eat anything that was past them - which coming from the kind of family that views best befores as a guideline not a rule, was extremely stressful. I would wash my hands so frequently that they were often dry, cracked or occasionally bleeding, and I panicked about germs all the time.
When I was 16, COVID hit. Suddenly, the behaviours that had been taking over my life, but I’d managed to keep mostly hidden were becoming front and center. I couldn’t leave the house even to go for a short walk (when we were allowed) because I was terrified of catching something. I could only watch things I’d seen before, because I needed to know if I was going to be exposed to sick in tv shows (why shows these days are obsessed with graphic vomit scenes I will never understand). I even stopped being able to watch zombie movies, because they sound like they’re gagging. But worst of all, I became almost completely unable to function.
Eating would make me nauseous, which made me anxious, which resulted in panic, which made the anxiety worse. So I would try to avoid eating, outside of my safe foods - which consisted mostly of bananas, rice and toast, because I once read that the BRAT diet was best for nausea. Except these things weren’t filling, and the hunger caused the same nausea, and the cycle would continue. It wasn’t until I was 20 that I finally told someone that I’d been struggling with eating, and I finally got assessed for ARFID. Speaking up about that was, to this day, one of the hardest things I’ve done, but I’m so glad that I did.
Still, to this day, I struggle to eat in public. And if I go somewhere new, I have to immediately locate all the bathrooms, and the nearest exits, so that if things go wrong, or someone is sick near me, I know exactly where to run to get away from it.
Whenever I’m around people who are drinking, my mind is on high alert. I’m constantly watching the groups, trying to see who isn’t looking too good, or who spent way too long on that last trip to the bathroom, or who is getting a bit too drunk. And usually, I spend so long worrying, I forget to have fun. Then I go home, where I have to scrub my skin in the shower, and then spend the night worrying I’d caught something, and am going to die in my sleep.
I have not been able to sleep without a bin by my bed since I was 13, even though I was 12 the last time I was sick. If it’s not there, my brain can’t slow down enough to sleep. I’ve had many panic attacks in the middle of the night whilst on holidays, or visiting home because my usual routine is disrupted, and that clearly meant something was going to go wrong - spoiler alert, it didn’t.
Throughout the years, I tried so many things to manage this anxiety. But whilst I’m yet to find something that works for me, one thing that helped me the most was finding someone else who has this phobia. To have someone there to tell me I'm not alone. And to finally have someone who understood the dark and depressing parts of having it. Because for the first time, I spoke to someone and they didn’t respond with something along the lines of ‘well no-one likes being sick’. (Side note, please stop saying this! We know! And whilst we know you’re trying to be helpful, all it really does is make us feel guilty, and we can’t control it!)
There’s nothing glamorous about this phobia. A lot of the ways you learn to cope are embarrassing, or shameful. And that is exactly why I’m sharing them. Because if just one person sees this and resonates with it, then I have done my bit to raise awareness. And I will continue to do so.
So this emetophobia awareness day, if you need someone to talk to, please reach out. This could be to a friend, your family or a doctor. It could be the university’s mental health team, or someone at the SU. But please know, you’re not alone. And I understand.
For more information about emetophobia, please visit:
Emetophobia - Anxiety UK
Coping with emetophobia | YoungMinds | YoungMinds
Emetophobia - OHSPIC