Okay, I’ve suffered with this essentially my entire life. As a young child I was paralysed with a fear of eating in restaurants (after a case of food poisoning) and over 20 years later I have never thrown up from a bug or food poisoning (I have literally forced it down). I also had a period of my life from the ages of maybe 7-23 where I never even NEEDED to throw up so I didn’t have active daily emetophobia thoughts as I felt pretty invincible.
As I hit nearly 30 and after a tough few years of daily crippling emetophobic thoughts, I’m ready to seriously fight this head on. I tried NHS CBT a few years ago and I really didn’t resonate with it. I also tried hypnotherapy which didn’t work for me (but it was virtual during covid and I think I felt insecure doing it over a zoom call)
Now, I’ve started reading Ken Goodman’s emetophobia manual in bed. I’ve heard good things. Should I supplement it with therapy? Any recommendations? I’d be worried about anti anxiety medication as I fear I’d be reliant on it for life to feel like I could tackle things.
All advice welcome! Thank you!!
Edit: I’d really appreciate your stories and experiences and how you’ve tackled things and made progress or even cured your phobia!