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Why Am I So Scared of Being Sick? Emetophobia Explained · Moving Minds Forward

• 0:10
  Gary Johannes: Hello, and welcome to Moving Minds Forward. Today, we're talking about Emetophobia, the fear of being sick. People aren't broken, and whatever they're carrying, there's always a way forward. I know, because I've lived it. I left school at 14 with no qualifications, one of nine kids.
• 0:33
  I joined the Iran Air Force at 16, and then spent years in sales before going on to run nightclubs and bars and restaurants. Not exactly the typical route into mental health. But in my late forties, I met a hypnotherapist, and everything changed. And everything I thought I knew about myself turned out to be a lot more flexible than I'd assumed. I retrained and started inspired to change.
• 1:04
  And at 60, I finished my MSc in Psychology and Neuroscience of Mental Health at King's College in London. I'm Gary Jahannes, Solution Focused Hypotherapist, founder of Inspire to Change, and a lecturer at the Clifton Practice Hypnotherapy Training. One condition per episode. What's going on? What's keeping it going?
• 1:29
  And what actually helps? Before we start, a quick promise. I'm going to talk about the fear in this episode. Not the thing itself. No graphic description.
• 1:44
  So if you've got a metaphobia, you can listen to this safely. Plenty of people live with this, and most of them never mention it. Some quietly dread texts from school saying they've had a bug going around. Some seem to have a reason not to eat out. Some read the date on every packet in the fridge, and then read it again.
• 2:13
  None of them are weak. None of them are daft. They're just carrying a fear that's got too big and too good at doing its job. So if you've ever turned down a meal, a trip, a night out because what it might mean, what might happen, or felt your whole body go into a high state of alert when someone near you says they feel a bit off, then this one's for you. Stay with me.
• 2:46
  Let's get into it. Picture it. You're on a train home. It's busy. Somewhere behind you, someone coughs, and then you hear someone say, I don't feel great.
• 3:00
  That's it. That's all it takes. Your stomach drops. Your heart's going. You're already working out the distance to the door, how many stops are left, whether you can get off.
• 3:13
  At the next one, you're scanning the faces. You're holding your breath without realizing. Nobody else in that carriage has noticed a thing. But for you, the whole journey has changed. Here's the thing I want you to hold on to.
• 3:30
  This is not a flaw in your character. It's not being dramatic, and you're not being silly. What you're feeling is a survival system doing exactly what it's built to do. It's just aimed at the wrong target. And here's the part that matters.
• 3:48
  Character doesn't shift, and misfiring alarm does. That can change. Let's be clear about what this episode is and isn't about. Nobody enjoys being ill. Not wanting to catch a bug, washing your hands, giving the dodgy looking prawn a miss, that's normal.
• 4:12
  That sense. That's not what we're talking about. What we're talking about is the fear that decides what you eat, where you go, who you'll sit next to, and whether you'll say yes to the thing you actually want. If you dislike being ill, but it doesn't shape your life, you probably haven't got a problem. For those people whose fear is making the decisions, we're going to look at what emetophobia really is.
• 4:45
  What's actually in your brain when it fires? What causes it? And what keeps it going? And what actually helps? If you find this useful, hit subscribe wherever you're listening.
• 4:59
  There's a lot more to come. Let's get into it. So what is it really? Emetophobia is a specific phobia of being sick. For some people, it's being sick themselves.
• 5:13
  For others, it's seeing or hearing someone else being sick. For a lot of people, it's both. And here's what surprises people. It's often not really about the sickness at all. It's about losing control, being caught out somewhere you can't get away from, being seen.
• 5:33
  The fear sits on what it would mean, what it would feel like, and what people would think. It can look like a lot of different things from the outside. Picky eating, not drinking, never going to parties, always sitting by the door, a lot of hand washing, checking on the kids every time one of them says their tummy hurts. It often gets mistaken for an eating problem or health anxiety or OCD. Sometimes it sits alongside those.
• 6:08
  Often, it's simply this, hiding in blind sight, and you're in a lot more company than you think. An NHS specialist service in Oxford estimates it affects around eight percent of people. Around nine in ten of the people living with it are women, and it usually starts in childhood, around 10 years old, which surprises lots of people who've never had it. So if you've been sat there thinking that you're the only one, you're really not. This is common.
• 6:46
  It's not a character defect, and the embarrassment that often comes with it only makes it louder. So what is actually going on up there? Deep in your brain sits a little alarm. Think of it as a smoke alarm. Its whole job is to spot danger and act before you've had time to think.
• 7:11
  And it can't tell the difference between smoke from a fire and smoke from the toast. At some point, your alarm learned that being sick is one of the most dangerous things that can happen. So now it watches for it all of the time. A cough and a train, a new story about a bug, a strange feeling in your stomach after lunch. Each one sets it off.
• 7:38
  When it fires, it floods your brain with adrenaline. Your heart races. Your breathing goes fast and shallow. Your mouth dries. And here's the cruel twist.
• 7:52
  When the alarm goes off, your body shifts blood away from your digestion, because digesting lunch isn't a priority when you think you're in danger. So your stomach churns. You feel queasy, and the alarm reads that queasy feeling as proof. There. It's happening.
• 8:13
  So it fires harder, which makes your stomach churn even more, round and round. Like, stomach churning isn't a warning. It's your fear's fingerprint. And while all that's going on, the thinking part of your brain, the bit at the front that weighs things up and knows the odds, gets pushed to one side. That's why someone saying, you'll be fine, doesn't touch it.
• 8:44
  That's why you can know perfectly well that you're very unlikely to be sick, and it makes no difference whatsoever. The alarm isn't listening to logic. It's not built to. None of that is a character flaw. It's a learned pattern, and a learned pattern can be unlearned.
• 9:07
  So where does it come from? For a lot of people, there's a moment being ill at school in front of the glass, a bad bug as a child that felt frightening and out of control, watching someone else being very poorly. The alarm took one look at that and said, never again. For others, there's no single moment at all. You might have grown up around someone who was frightened of it too, and you learned it the way children learn everything, by watching, or it crept in later during a stressful stretch of life, and that's where the stress bucket comes in.
• 9:50
  Every pressure in your life pours into the same bucket, work, money, relationships, the kids, the whole lot. Sleep is the tap that drains it. When more pours in than we drain out, it overflows. And it tends to overflow whenever your alarm is already primed for you. That might be your stomach.
• 10:17
  Here's the reassuring bit. You don't need to find the calls to move forward. Plenty of people never find it, and they still change. One quick, honest word. If the fear has started to narrow what you eat, or is getting in the way of medical care you need, have a chat with a GP.
• 10:39
  Not because something's wrong with you, just so you've got proper support in your corner. So why does it stick around? Three things mainly. First, avoidance. Every time you skip a restaurant, leave a party early, or stay off the train, you feel better straight away.
• 11:01
  That's relief. That relief is real. But your alarm learns one thing from it. Good job we didn't go. That was close.
• 11:11
  So next time, it fires a little earlier. The thing that feels like it's protecting you is keeping you stuck. Second, the safety behavior. The check-in, the washing, the mints in your bag, the seat by the door, asking people again if they're feeling alright. But each one quietly tells your brain the danger is real.
• 11:40
  And here's the twist. Because people with emetophobia take so many precautions, they're often ill less than most. The fear doesn't notice that. It just takes the credit. Third, the scanning.
• 11:57
  When you're constantly checking your own stomach for signs, you find them. Everyone's stomach makes noises and has odd moments. Yours just gets read as a warning every time, and it tends to rope in people around you too. The partner who stops suggesting a curry, the kids who learn that a tummy ache means everyone goes on red alert. Nobody's doing anything wrong.
• 12:25
  The alarms just got a bit bossy. Round and round it goes. But here's the good news. The cycle that feeds itself can be broken. That's exactly what we work on.
• 12:40
  So what actually helps? The solution focused approach doesn't start by digging through the past. It starts with a question. What would an ordinary day look like if this fear wasn't running the show? Not a perfect life, just an ordinary Tuesday.
• 13:00
  You'd meet a friend for lunch and order what you fancy. Someone at work says they feel a bit rough, and you notice, and you carry on with your day. One of the kids say their tummy hurts, and you give them a cuddle and a glass of water instead of going into lockdown. The brain moves towards what it focuses on, so we give it somewhere else worth going. Then we use the three pillars.
• 13:29
  Positive interaction, time with people you feel safe with, and maybe one day soon, a meal out with one of them. Positive action, doing things, a walk, a bit of exercise, something you're good at, something you enjoy. Actions lift serotonin, and serotonin helps the alarm calm. Positive thinking, noticing on purpose, the evidence. The bug went round the office, and you were fine.
• 14:02
  The train was busy, and nothing happened. Your alarm has been keeping a very one-sided record. This helps balance it. And we look at the bucket. Because if work, sleep, or worry are filling it to the brim, the alarm stays twitchy, whatever we do about the fear itself.
• 14:25
  Draining a bucket calms the whole system. This is where solution focused hypnotherapy comes in. And for a lot of people, it's a real alternative, especially if the thought of being made to face your fear head on is exactly what keeps you from getting help. With solution focused hypnotherapy, you don't have to go anywhere near the thing you're frightened of. You don't have to talk through it in detail.
• 14:56
  You don't have to relive anything. We spend the time on where you want to go, not where you've been. Trance isn't sleep. You're not under anyone's control. It's a relaxed, focused state where the thinking part of your brain stays switched on.
• 15:16
  And in that state, you rehearse a different response, the busy train, the restaurant, the text from school, and you walk through each one calmly in your own mind, at your own pace. The brain doesn't sharply distinguish between vivid rehearsal and real experience. So each rehearsal strengthens a new route. And because trance is deeply relaxing, it helps the brain to drain the bucket too. This isn't wishful thinking.
• 15:54
  Researchers at Stanford, led by professor David Spiegel, have shown that hypnosis is a real, measurable brain state, not a stage trick. And the wider science of neuroplasticity is clear. Brains change with what we repeatedly do. Your alarm learned this fear. What's been learned can be unlearned.
• 16:22
  What's been learned can be learned differently, calmly, comfortably, and without white knuckles in it. Before I close, one thing you can take away today, just one. Next time your stomach starts to churn and the alarm kicks in, pause and name it out loud if you can. Oh, that's my alarm, not my stomach. Then breathe.
• 16:51
  So the out breath is longer than the in breath. In for seven, out for 11, or whatever count feels comfortable, as long as the out breath is longer, and do that for a minute or two. Here's why it works. Naming the feeling brings the thinking part of the brain back online and turns the volume down on the alarm, and the long out breath tells your nervous system it's safe to stand down. When that happens, blood goes back to your digestion, and the churning eases.
• 17:29
  Your stomach settles because the fear settles. Every time you do it, the brain learns that the feeling can pass. So let me speak to you directly. If this is you, you're not broken, and you're not weak, and you're not alone. However long it's been around, and whether or not you've ever told anyone, this isn't a verdict on you and who you are.
• 17:57
  It's an alarm that's learned one lesson very well and has been a bit overkeen ever since. The same brain that learned this pattern can learn something different. That's not me being kind. That's neuroscience. Understanding what's going on is where it starts.
• 18:20
  You've just done that. This episode has helped. Subscribe wherever you're listening, and leave a review if you fancy. It helps the next person find it when they need it. One condition per episode.
• 18:35
  What's going on, what's keeping it going, and what actually helps. And if you'd like to find out whether Inspire to Chains can help you with emetophobia, we have a nationwide network of solution focused hypotherapists right across The UK. You can find your nearest therapist, read more about the work we do, and book a free initial consultation at inspiretochange.biz. The link will be in the description below. See you on the next one.