What is Emetophobia?

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Emetophobia is a specific phobia of vomiting. It’s actually very common – it’s thought to be the 5th most common phobia! – and it tends to affect mostly women and adolescents (although obviously other demographics have it too!).

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Emetophobia is a tricky phobia to deal with because it’s impossible to avoid all triggers. Being sick is just something that happens in life, and you can’t run from it forever! It’s especially difficult to avoid others being sick – anyone could vomit at any time, which can lead to emetophobes being in a constant state of low level anxiety.

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On top of this, one of the physical symptoms of anxiety is nausea, which makes emetophobes panic even more, making them more anxious and therefore more nauseated, so they panic further… and the cycle continues. It can be extremely hard to break this vicious circle, and it’s easy to become trapped in its clutches.

Emetophobia can affect all areas of someone’s life, and cause serious detriment to their health and wellbeing. For that reason, it’s important that sufferers get the right help (such as exposure therapy or CBT) and find ways to cope with everyday situations such as going to school, travelling or eating out.

This blog aims to provide a collection of tips and advice for those struggling with emetophobia in order to help them to live as normal a life as possible until they are fully recovered. However, all posts are from the personal experience of a fellow sufferer and are therefore not professionally endorsed in any way, shape or form – they’re just from past experience of dealing with emetophobia for 9 years!