I have emetophobia, the fear of vomiting. After recently getting triggered, it’s been so prominent in my mind. I think about it like 50 times a day. The fear has become so debilitating that I’ve developed an aversion to food. I’m losing weight and I’ve gone practically vegetarian. Anytime I go out to eat with my girlfriend I only take 2 bites of food. I don’t eat any meat or anything due to the fear that it might be undercooked or that I might get food poisoning. I really wanna get better and get over this fear. It’s getting in the way of me enjoying my life. All I eat is ramen noodles, crackers, and pretzels. Can anyone relate? Have any advice?

This is my first time posting - I have a fear of throw up and I’ve been told it is cause from my OCD (repetitive thoughts) which makes sense because if someone gets sick it replays over and over again and I can’t get it out of my head. It’s gotten a lot worse in the past maybe two years. I’m always on edge that someone is going to get sick around me. I’ve heard the “best or most common” way to help with this is exposure therapy and OBVIOUSLY I don’t want to do that. Anyone have any tips or anything for this (or maybe have done the exposure therapy)?

hi im a fifteen year old girl with really bad ocd and emetaphobia nobody knows my fear except for my best friend and my sister. its so hard to even say the word or even type the word so i just say “sick” even typing this out makes my heart race and my hands sweaty. ive been really struggling with ocd for almost a year its gotten worst about every month. its always on my mind. i have a therapist but i cant even tell them about my anxiety and thoughts that go on in my head. my whole family is watching me fall deeper and deeper into this dark whole that i dont know how to get out of. its feels awful to see everyone around you watch you fail over and over again. please forgive me if this was graphic thank you

So I’m severely emetophobic but these past few weeks have gotten SO bad. I had a bad reaction to an SSRI that made me feel like I was gonna throwup, I stopped taking them over two weeks ago but ever since then the fear has got even worse. I haven’t left the house properly in weeks because I’ve convinced myself I’ll be sick. I feel nauseous even indoors a lot of the time (there are hours when I don’t, like for example this afternoon I was fine). But I challenged myself to go for a short walk this evening and omg it was so hard I really thought I might throwup. The thing is I KNOW it’s anxiety and not real nausea because it feels completely different to when I was actually nauseous from the medication. This feeling is more like a tight throat/sensation of a lump in my throat that makes me feel like I’m gonna gag. I also have RCPD (I can’t burp basically lol) so I just feel like I have trapped air in my throat that’s gonna make me puke. The phobia has gotten really really bad. I have started therapy recently but I’ve been scared of throwing up since I was a kid and I’m now 31 lol wtf. I remember last Christmas my mum said someone at her work had been sick and I was so scared my mum had caught it and would pass it on to me that I refused to leave my bedroom without wearing gloves and a mask and wiping everything with anti-germ wipes. But right now it’s so so bad because I have literally gotten to the point where I’ve convinced myself I feel nauseous pretty much 24/7 and I am taking anti-nausea meds almost every day. Has anyone else dealt with/has tips for this??? I’m literally desperate 😭