Look at me not freaking out

you don't bother me, sucka!

A little over a year ago, this headline would have really freaked me out. These days, not so much. I read the headline, read the story, and moved on, just like I do with all the other stories in the paper. Folks, for me, this was a big deal.

For about four years, I suffered from a phobia called emetophobia, or fear of vomit (of others) or vomiting (myself or others). Like all phobias, it was irrational and consuming. The dictionary defines a phobia as: "an extreme or irrational fear or aversion to something." A phobia is more than a fear - it defies logic and explanations and attempts to assuage it, and can persist sometimes even more forcefully when you don't want it to.

I think the causes of this phobia were threefold: 1) seeing someone get really sick, 2) being on a Courtside trip to Lubbock (worst trip ever, Lubbock sucks) with basically half the band getting sick everywhere, including one of my roommates, and 3) having gallbladder disease and being sick myself daily for about 6 months. For whatever reason, this perfect storm brewed in my head and decided to become a phobia.

With this phobia, I would nearly hyperventilate when I thought about someone getting sick. I would want to skip class or a meeting or rehearsal or work or whatever if someone there was sick. If I heard that someone was sick, like they said "ugh I'm sick" on facebook or something, I would *have* to know the details to know what kind of sick and where they thought they got it and to make sure they knew that they are contagious for at least two weeks, etc. I told my boyfriend that I wouldn't kiss him for two weeks if he got sick. I wouldn't go to a great restaurant on a vacation because it was next to a college campus and probably had many employees from the college campus where there had been a bad sickness outbreak. I couldn't watch tv or movies without closing my eyes and ears if someone unexpectedly got sick. (I still don't get why that happens so much in movies - like Pitch Perfect, what is all that about?? That's not entertainment, that's gross, man.) I had nightmares and couldn't sleep. I carried around Pepto Bismol and Immodium constantly, and popped a ginger tablet or Pepto if I felt the least bit off.

Y'all, it was bad. Thinking about it now, I realize even more just how bad it was. I think it was a large, yet silent, resentful, un-talked-about element in the demise of my relationship, and I know it affected my job as a leader and student. I hate hate HATE that the thing people remember most about me from the last two years of college is this phobia. I am so much more than that.

I'm sitting here crying as I write this.

But I can gladly tell you that today, my phobia is down to a minute percentage of what it was. These days, I still wash my hands correctly, because most of the world doesn't and I think you're an idiot not to, especially when working in healthcare. I still wash fruits and vegetables, because you're supposed to. I still make sure my chicken and ground beef and pork is cooked to the correct temperature, because you're supposed to and I'm not a seasoned (pun!) enough cook yet to eyeball it. I still clean up the kitchen - not with a sponge! - after cooking with raw stuff, because you're supposed to. I still try to keep hot foods hot and cold foods cold within the correct span of time, because you're supposed to (I still don't understand how cream cheese icing works out in room temperature, but I love it and I don't care). I will always avoid going to the bathroom on a plane or charter bus, because they're gross and I don't feel like being jostled while I pee. I still like to take my shoes off, especially hospital shoes, when I come home, one because it's cleaner dirt-on-the-carpet-wise and two because I have a cat who lives on the floor and sleeps on my pillow. But I feel like, especially when compared to what I used to do, all those things are pretty normal, or are things that you're supposed to do to stay healthy.

I don't know what it was that made it go away. Prayer, for one. Being inundated with gross things working at a hospital, for another (my first day in acute care, I was doing a cognitive eval on a guy while a lady was throwing up her guts next to me. kept going, like a pro. bam.). Watching people vomit in a hospital. Making people vomit. Holding the basin while someone who hasn't eaten in two weeks vomits up barium. It happens.
Maybe the shock of being single and wondering how much this phobia impacted my relationship. Maybe just growing up. I don't know why, but I am glad that it is (mostly) gone. No, I will never think vomit is funny or like it and I will still groan when I have kids and one of them gets sick because I know we *all* will get sick and there's a lot of clean up work to do, but I don't think I'll ever have this phobia about it again.

And now you know.