After years of living with a severe fear of vomiting, one woman has shared how she finally began to loosen its grip after realizing it was affecting how she cared for her child.
Brooke Caitlyn, 26, said the turning point came when her son picked up a stomach bug at nursery and she found herself unable to hold him while he was unwell.
“My son is one of the big reasons why I knew I had to sort this,” she said.
“If I had any suspicion that he was unwell, we were not going anywhere that day. And it could have been that he was completely fine, he might have just looked a little bit funny to me that morning, or he might have coughed a little bit. I would say, nope, we’re not going anywhere.”
She explained that when her emetophobia was at its worst, she would isolate herself at home whenever someone in the family was sick because that felt like the safest place to be.
The condition, which is defined as an intense fear of vomiting, influenced far more of her daily life than many people realized.
Brooke said she spent around $700 a year adapting her routine to avoid anything she believed might make her ill, from steering clear of public transport to stocking up on anti-sickness medication.
“I would happily burn my hands on sanitizer because I believed it was getting rid of everything so that I couldn’t catch anything,” she said, detailing how extreme the fear was.
“I wouldn’t touch door handles, I would never eat chicken at a restaurant. No way. That was too risky.”
The mom added: “I would never go anywhere without water and a whole bag of tablets that were all tummy medicines.”
Although she had therapy for general anxiety two years ago, Brooke said much of her progress with the phobia came through self-exposure.
Detailing one step she took to address the phobia, she said: “I would force myself to go to the grocery store or the gym on my own, and I would force myself to stay even when I felt sick.”
Another major change involved gradually removing the items she relied on for reassurance.
The mom, who runs an ear care clinic, explained: “I started to limit my comforts in my bag. So the medicines that I had, even if it was not going out with one that day, I would put it at home and leave.
“It got to the point where I would build it up over a couple of years where I could leave my bag in the car, and I could go in the grocery store without it.”
She also said one of the most helpful decisions was to stop constantly searching online for reassurance about symptoms.
She said: “I stopped Googling, I stopped Googling every symptom.”
According to Brooke, it took about two years to get to a better place, though she says the fear no longer controls her life.
“I still probably have moments where I will panic, but it’s not on my mind all the time,” she said.
Emetophobia is considered one of the more common phobias in the US, with research suggesting that the condition affects a significant proportion of the population. The point prevalence—the percentage of people currently experiencing the condition—is estimated at around 5 percent. However, lifetime prevalence rates can reach up to 8 percent or higher, meaning more people will experience emetophobia at some point in their lives. Notably, despite being less common than phobias like fear of heights or spiders in the general population, emetophobia is disproportionately disruptive; it accounts for approximately 20 percent of specific phobia cases among people who seek professional treatment, making it the most prevalent subtype among treatment-seeking patients.
Studies indicate that women are overwhelmingly more likely than men to develop emetophobia. Recent meta-analytical research shows that approximately 91 percent of people with emetophobia are women, though some studies estimate the female-to-male ratio at around 4 to 1. Experts suggest this gender disparity may be related to differences in disgust propensity, with women potentially more prone to feelings of disgust, as well as different socialization patterns around hygiene and attitudes toward vomiting. Interestingly, the condition typically begins in childhood, with an average age of onset around 9 to 10 years old, though it often goes undiagnosed and untreated for decades.
Emetophobia is frequently accompanied by other mental health conditions. Research indicates that the most common comorbid disorders are social anxiety disorder, generalized anxiety disorder, and depression. Additionally, people with emetophobia often experience hypervigilance toward bodily sensations and may develop avoidant behaviors that significantly impact daily functioning, from avoiding certain foods and public transportation to limiting social interactions and travel.
CBT, or Cognitive Behavioral Therapy, is widely regarded as one of the most effective treatment options. Randomized controlled trials have shown that CBT produces significant improvements, with approximately 50 percent of patients achieving clinically significant change after 12 sessions. The therapy typically involves exposure to feared situations, cognitive restructuring to challenge anxiety-provoking thoughts, and response prevention techniques to help people resist their safety behaviors—the very avoidance strategies that tend to maintain the fear.