phobia is controlling my life. I did something awful because of it! advise

[skyler390]

Emetophobia is controlling my life. I think i have the worst case of it . It all started when i was four years old. I would get sick and throw up all the time , but being a little kid thats normal. Once I turned six I never threw up throughout my whole childhood and teenage years. Thats 15 years without ever being sick. My fear disapeared when I turned 12 due to a eating disorder. I would not throw up but I starved myself and wished to be sick since I was to afaraid to do it myself. I had this eating disorder from 12 years old to 17 years old.

Well im 19 and now My emetophobia is back in full force. It returned once i was 18 . I had this infection and was gave antibiotics the meds made me sick. That was the first time i threw up in 15 years! anyways so my anxiety got real bad so i was put on zoloft . after six months of zoloft i got off of it due to weight gain. I didnt tamper off i just went cold turker. BIG MISTAKE . got horrible withdrawls ,and had depression, suicidal thoughts , panic attacks. these withdrawls made me feel sick for six months straight. So my phobia at this point took control of me. Every time i felt sick i would cry , have a panic attack, start shaking and pacing back in forth. These panic attacks would last for days , weeks! I begged to be taken to a mental hospital how insane my attacks were making me feel. I wanted to kill myself .
So from there I was put on prozac and welbutrin. Its helped my depression but not anxiety or panic attacks.

heres where i did something awful . So i got pregnant after this mess. I was terrified . First thing to pop in my head wasnt " what am i going to do, how will i raise this baby if im only a teen myself " But oh no im going to get morning sickness!!then reality hit me and i knew I couldnt go through with it plus I was horrified of being sick so i had a abortion.
To this day I wonder if I had a abortion just because of my phobia or because i really didnt want a kid . But i have guilt and think about everyday what ive done.

My phobia is getting worse and worse everyday . I dont even leave the house anymore except for work. I take tons of anti sickness meds everyday . I dont excercise because im afraid of being sick , i dont go out with friends because im afraid they have germs and will get me sick.


PLEASE PLEASE someone help me! HOW DO I OVER COME THIS BEFORE IT OVER COMES ME

[deeendnamtoe]

I'm so sorry to hear about what you've gone through We are all here to support you. I know how you feel. I'm currently going to therapy, and it's just the beginning so I haven't made a significant amount of progress, but I have made small progress which is something. After starting therapy I realized that everyone should go to therapy! It just helps to have an outsider put things in perspective for you. You'll learn what your real issues are, for example, I've learned that I have issues with control (which is a big reason why v* scares me, it's something I try to control but can't). I highly recommend you find someone. I'm currently getting Emotional Transformation Therapy, and I really like it. I know others on here have tried other therapies as well, so you should find what works for you.

You are not alone, and we are in this together! You'll be okay

[wanted]

I'm so sorry to hear this :/
I also advise you to go to some therapy, sooner it's possible.
I hope you will and that will help you! I don't know what else to say cause it's easy to say, for example, to not afraid of going out, cause I'm not in that hard possicion where i'm afraid of that like you and i know it doesn't help..

[out_of_order]

I agree with the other posters and strongly urge you to get yourself into some kind of treatment specifically for emetophobia. Medication alone won't work. You may have to try a couple different types of therapy but the right one for you IS out there. You remind me of me, I had suffered from horrible emetophobia for YEARS and thought my case was SO bad, worse than anybody else's, that there was no way I would ever recover especially because I had tried so many things: medication, CBT, hypnotherapy, etc. And then I finally found a treatment program that worked beautifully for me. So there IS hope.

About the abortion, I understand what you're going through with that too because I'm ashamed to say I myself had an abortion, not because I didn't want the baby, but because with that pregnancy I started having morning sickness and as soon as that started, all I could think of was, "I have to terminate this pregnancy" because that was the only thing in my mind that would make the sickness and all the crazy anxiety that goes with it, go away. After the fact, I too struggled with a lot of guilt, especially because I had already had a baby (no vomiting with that pregnancy). Look, girls/women choose abortion for many different reasons, is one reason better than another? I don't think so. Those of us who have made this awful choice did so because at that time in our lives that was the only choice we had, whether or not anyone else in the world agrees or not. You're not a terrible person, you're struggling big time with an awful debilitating condition that makes many of us resort to something as drastic as abortion. I know for a fact me and you are not the only two emets who have had abortions just because we were terrified of morning sickness. I hate to reduce it to this but abortion is just another horrible "symptom" (for lack of a better term) of emetophobia in some cases, unfortunately, and it goes to prove how extreme this phobia can really be.