- Do you obsess about cleanliness and personal hygiene?
- Do you worry about socialising, just in case you or someone else might be sick?
- Do you avoid eating out and obsess about food hygiene?
The Emetophobia Recovery Systems is a doctor recommended course. It is designed specifically to show you how you can overcome this condition and start a new life without any fear of vomiting.
Oh and by the way there is a 100% water tight money back guarantee.
Imagine what it would be like to be free to do exactly what you want, when you want, and not have that “pit of the stomach” anxiety when there is any change to your routine. A lot of the routines you have developed to cope with condition
How does Emetophobia affect you?
Have your eating habits changed?
- You avoid eating out in restaurants
- Never buy exotic or spicy foods or food types with a reputation for being problematic if not quite right e.g. shellfish are avoided
- Portion size is meticulously controlled
- Alcoholic drinks are avoided, or consumption is severely limited
Do you avoid social and group meetings?
- Clubs, bars and social gatherings are avoided
- You don’t like pubs or food related gatherings such as barbeques, cheese and wine parties, and dinner parties are avoided
- You avoid people with children for fear of picking up a virus that may induce sickness
Do you have personal rituals to “be sure you won’t get sick”?
- Obsession with cleanliness to avoid bacteria and viruses that may cause vomiting
- Extreme scrutiny of sell by and use by dates on food purchases
- More extreme rituals can develop, for example, sufferers convince themselves that sickness will be avoided if certain things are done in the “right order”. “I can’t open the fridge for more than 4 seconds or the food will be contaminated and I will become ill”.
Is home the only “safe place”?
- Travel by boat, airplane or car is avoided, especially if you are not a good traveller anyway
- Theatre type venues such as gigs or cinema is avoided
- Foreign holidays where your immune system is not prepared for local bacteria and viruses
Lifestyle choices changed?
- Pregnancy is avoided for fear of morning sickness and subsequently having to deal with baby vomit or a nauseous child
- You avoid certain situations such as visiting friends in hospital, or going out before you know the streets have been cleaned from the previous night
Emetophobia can be linked with other obsessive behaviours
There is an element of chicken and egg here. What I mean is do some conditions make people emetophobic, or does Emetophobia make people susceptible to other anxieties?
The sufferer may develop agoraphobia, which is the fear of the outdoors or going out. We have already seen that home might be a safe haven to many emetophobics.
Anorexia is sometines linked where the avoidance of being sick is so severe it influences eating habits.
Obsessive-compulsive disorders (OCD) about cleanliness and food hygiene can also develop.
Clearly these are just some of the things that need to be considered when starting to think about treating and curing the condition. Each person may present some combination of the above to greater and lesser degree. Here is a real personal account of what it is like to have this phobia.
So, What Are The Causes?
There is relatively little research available. At a basic level, there will be people who have a general tendency to nervousness who are at increased risk of becoming emetophobic. It just takes one vomit related event or incident to trigger this particular phobia. This may be true for other phobias for those who are of an anxious or fearful disposition.
What makes someone tend to be nervous is a huge question, which starts with considering genetic make up and experience in the formative years of life. Were parents of a nervous disposition, which could be linked to learned behavior? It’s the basic question of “nature or nurture”. Was the sufferer born with a propensity to be fearful, or taught to be through early experiences and observations as the personality develops.
But let’s be clear, anxiety and fear are perfectly natural responses to some situations. They are part of the basic “fight or flight” instinct that many animals have. It seems to the author that Emetophobia is a condition where these basic instincts are over-focused on the single action of vomiting or seeing vomit.
Often the fear of sickness or seeing vomit is the tip of the iceberg that masks underlying fears such as loss of control, self-esteem issues and perceived public humiliation. Also there can be the fear of, again perceived, a disastrous set of follow on events.
The impact can be considerable
The effects of this debilitating disease, because that’s what it is, on both the sufferer and others surrounding them cannot be underestimated.
Emetophobics may be secretive, hiding the conditions from friends, loved ones and work colleagues. Where the phobia is not severe, the sufferer can lead an apparently normal life. However the behaviours generated by hiding the condition may be looked upon by other as strange, antisocial (“why don’t you ever want to come out with us?”) or worse. Also, of course keeping secrets from a partner or close friend can have serious knock on impacts and cause trust issues in a relationship.
Sometimes suffers will feel guilty about keeping this secret. This further fuels feelings of anxiety, which increases phobic behaviour.
Treatment and Cures
Hypnotherapy
Hypnotherapy is a known effective treatment for Emetophobia. Often an analytical approach is taken where hypnosis is used to identify the root causes of the fear and use this as a basis for resolving the problem.
Exposure Treatment
There are those who believe that exposure to sickness or vomit (or whatever is the specific vomit related fear of the sufferer) will demonstrate the irrational nature of the fear and that nothing bad will happen. This approach has been largely discredited.
Medication
Medication can be an effective treatment, depending upon exactly how the Emetophobia presents itself. It could be argued that medication treats only the symptom rather than the cause. However, breaking the cycle of anxiety about being sick and feeling nauseous can be valuable.
As with all medication, side effects are a consideration which may be of differing significance depending on the circumstances of the individual.
Natural Treatment
Natural treatments in some ways mirror the approach of hypnosis where root cause analysis is used to train your mind to think about being sick in a different way.
It then seeks to deconstruct the fears and associations with vomiting. So this type of treatment will give a structured walk-through to help the sufferer overcome their fears.
Benefits of this approach is that it can be done safely, without prescription medicines and at home, which may be of great benefit to suffers with agoraphobic tendencies.
So, let’s be very clear. This condition, whether it’s about actually vomiting or seeing someone be ill, is both treatable and curable.
Click here now to discover the simple four step technique you can use to instantly end your anxiety about vomiting