Emetaphobia ruining our lives - 8 year old won't eat

[Lubielou79]

My daughter is suffering with a fear of vomit - emetaphobia

It started after she had an awful vomiting bug last January. It has progressed to the extent that she is often refusing food for fear of being sick.

She was already small and underweight before this but is so skinny now. At 8.5 years she's 16kg and 118cm. She has low BMI and I've been told to increase it but it's impossible.

She's had terrible tantrums and complained last week she couldn't see. I managed to get her to have something sweet and she came round and vision improved. She said it was large floaty things blocking her vision.

We've had a urgent camhs referral done but the wait is 52 weeks. I tried a different route into psychology via our endocrinologyist (already being seen at children's for poor height and weight).. the letter came back that psychology department is over subscribed and they can't give a date

We have dietics next month so I'm keeping a food diary, maybe they can force something?

I'm also paying privately for her to see a psychologist once a fortnight but the eating situation is getting worse.

I'm wondering if anyone else is in the same situation or has any advice. I feel really helpless

Thanks so much

Haven’t RTFT but a friend’s daughter overcame it with Dr Rob Kelly

https://www.emetophobia.co.uk/about-rob-kelly/

Apologies if he has already been mentioned (negatively or positively) but am a bit tired - didn’t want to click, read and run

The main problems have been food (and epic tantrums associated with hunger). Plus also sleeping.. although listening to audiobooks to fall asleep to has solved that one.

She's more conscious of hand washing than she was but it's in a reasonable and sensible way so not too worried about that

She has been anxious at points to go to school especially after someone has been sick there but has only missed one day. She knows that she has to go and the pastoral support team there have been great

My daughter had this aged 11 and what helped was EMDR where they effectively reprogramme the response to the stimulus. It was hard to find a psychologist with experience and expensive but for us it was helpful

Can see it’s already been mentioned by a few but was coming to say EMDR therapy is your best bet here.

The good thing about EMDR is the child doesn’t need to re-live the traumatic incident/s, they only briefly take them back to it and then the eye movement starts to literally reprogram the brain. It’s expensive but so worth it and works fast, especially for children.

Find a therapist here https://www.counselling-directory.org.uk/emdr-search.htm

good luck OP x

Thank you for explaining re the meat. FWIW kids will grow on almost any diet, we need much less protein than we think. So I'd relax the meat stress.

Does she eat ice cream? That might help with your protein worries?

My DD stopped eating due to remarks at school, it was a very stressful time. Seeing a private psychologist was transformative- is there any way you can up it to weekly? I appreciate that's very expensive. Her diet is still not great but she eats enough, however I no longer try and direct her to a balanced diet, I just focus on enough calories.

Huge sympathy OP

Oh yes EDMR is amazing for kids.

Cured my daughters tricholmania (hair pulling)

Other things to try are individually wrapped biscuits, oatcakes for example come in a pack of six, or those ones you get with a coffee. And individual cereal boxes and so on. how can the germs get in to a sealed pack is the thing you need to explain to her
Might mean opening a new pack every meal time, but might mean she eats something

Same with drinks, fruit juice or fruit shoot, go for full sugar version, in 200 ml serves. Or even baby fruit pouches

They have ones that are juices for adults. Could be worth looking into if they have the same in the kids version

@Lubielou79
Hi there,
Just wondering how your daughter is now and whether you managed to find a solution?
My daughter is 8 years old and is going through a similar situation. She has been seeing a private psychologist for the last 3 months but not much improvement. I have registered on the Thrive website for the face to face coaching but waiting to hear back.
Wondering if there is anything else you found in the mean time that has helped your DD? Praying that she is better

I have completed the Thrive programme and it is truly life changing. I highly recommend it.

She's much better with eating and things have turned around massively.
I had to take her to a&e to force getting psychology support from childrens hospital but once we got seen everything started to get better. We've also done the thrive programme after being discharged by hospital.
She's not completely without worries but it's not getting in the way of living a normal life. I've sent you a message, happy to provide any support I can. Hang in there, it is so tough

Hi OP thank you so much for sharing your experience.
we are going through this with my 9 year old, she’s even been scared to drink fluids incase she’s sick. To the extent that the GP said she was 24hrs away from needing IV fluids.

Like your DD it was following an awful sickness bug.
I am minded to go into hospital too out of desperation. What type of therapy helped in the end? I am so glad to hear your DD is able to live normally now

It was CBT therapy via the psychology team at the children's hospital.

Good luck with finding your daughter help. It's a really hard situation but try and stay positive things can get better.

My dd has emet and ocd. She was diagnosed autistic at 17 years

It's extremely common in autistic girls and is about control and loss of autonomy so definitely keep that in the back of your mind for other signs.

My dd is somewhat better but is still very much needing to know how fresh food is. She won't eat out of date food at all.
She also started aged 8