Emetophobic anxiety spiking, please talk to me rationally

[Elephantina]

We had visitors yesterday evening, and we all had takeaway pizza. They were all here for a few hours then left.

This morning, one of the visitors reported having been up all last night vomiting and feeling dreadful. One other person who had the same pizza topping as them was ok, as were the rest of us who didn't have that topping.

I am now convinced, as is the way with emetophobia, that the sick person was already incubating a bug when they were at our house, as it can't have been the pizza. And that they have shredded virus here that I or DH might pick up, and I have a really busy, really stressful week ahead and I'm going to get sick and wreck the week and let everyone down.

I can't seem to settle the panic down. Can anyone help me to see things more rationally? I don't mean as in the "don't worry" sense of being rational, that boat sailed and fucked off long ago, but as in the reasonability of fearing catching something!

I think I'm panicky because of my stressful work week, otherwise I might have been a bit more dismissive.

The possibility that the sick person is exaggerating is minimal but not impossible.

Edit - they are not exaggerating, they are still unwell with muscle pain and fatigue now. So, def a bug then.

Excellent, I'm going to be on countdown just as I'm staying away from home and doing multiple presentations.

Do wash your hands, soap and water. Clean surfaces and light switches, toilets taps and sinks.

Don't worry. I am a nurse but also massive emetophobia which I try not to let it get on top of me.

DH had norovirus last year and I barrier nursed him and no one else got ill which was amazing. just keep stuff clean, but normal clean. I never antibac at home and only bleach toilets because we do need some bacteria to keep immunity

Well, it's too late because I didn't know they were ill until this morning - so already used towels they'd used, bathroom they used etc. But they werent ill here, it was hours afterwards.

Most of these bugs are ably infectious via vomit/faecal contamination and therefore not transmittable before the person has symptoms. I am emetophobic too, but also a microbiologist by training. These circumstances would barely make me anxious as the possibility is so negligible

Only not ably!

Aaaaahhhhh a microbiologist, mnxnt42 you soothe my very soul!

Many moons ago it wouldn't have occurred to me that anything was transmittable before becoming symptomatic, but I'm sure I read something somewhere about viruses being contagious during incubation. Maybe that's the common cold!?

If a microbiologist and fellow phobic is relaxed about this scenario then I think I can wind the anxiety down a notch. But I'm still going to change the towels and bleach some handles.

God it really is such a selfish fear isn't it, the poor person is feeling very poorly. I had a unilateral version many years ago (other end) but the joint pain and dreadful ill feeling was memorable.

Yes, colds, chicken pox and lots of others are. D&V not so much. It’s droplet borne rather than airborne. So until there are um, droplets, it doesn’t really get passed on

I was about to say the same as the other poster. I am the same as you and would be sweating slightly but realistically you're going to be ok OP.

Yes that does confirm my understanding. The anxiety hasn't completely faded but it has definitely improved since your post! Thank you!

Feeling a bit stronger now Foraminute, a scientific approach is often very reassuring!

It's so bloody ridiculous isn't it. And so many of us have the Fear. I've given up believing I'll ever be free of it, I just take my meds and keep going.

Balls. Logged on to MN this morning just in time to see a thread about bugs and how long it takes to wipe out every member of a family.

I know it is not relevant to me in that a) the sick person was not ill here and only got sick at their own home hours later, b) I can keep myself relatively protected from the bugs out there by hand washing (and not eating or drinking so I can't ingest anything), and c) if I do get it I tend to only get it unilaterally at the other end.

But I'm so stressed at work this week, I just can't handle this on top. I'm away from home for two nights.

Just take precautions now. Wash hands, wipe surfaces, wash towels on high heat etc....just in case they were contagious when at your house. But if it were a bug that you could catch, you probably would have caught it by now. For example, when I had dinner at my in laws during the christmas period. I was not showing any symptoms of being sick until a couple hours after dinner (by then I retired to the basement guest room where we were staying). I thought it was food poisoning. My husband was fine. But the very next night, my FIL and BIL also caught the bug and were sick etc. However, my MIL and DH never caught the bug (this was 6 years ago :) ) So you can be contagious before showing symptoms....as I managed to spread it to them before I was sick etc. However, that being said I have two young DC and every time they have vomited or had a bug in the last 7 years...my dh and I managed to stay healthy and clear (knock wood!!) and this is after being vomited on, vomited next too, cleaning up vomit etc. Emetephobes tend to have better immunity against vomiting I think. I went to see a specialist and they said most emetephobes rarely ever vomit. I have gone 25 years with out vomiting...until I caught that bug 6 years ago (have been find since!). My son was sick 10 days ago with a vomitting bug going around their school. He was sick 20 times at least. I bleached and dettoled the house, washed everything on super high heat. He was the only one sick and everyone else stayed healthy (DD who is 7, me, DH and au pair). And it was me, DH and au pair dealing with my son. I kept my dd well out of the way, as kids catch things easier. So it is possible to manage to avoid these things. And early on when my dc were younger, I was not so careful or crazy about hand washing, bleach etc. As I was not so fearful that their vomiting was caused by a bug and again, my dh and I have always been fine. But since they started school every time (which is once or twice a year) if one of them gets sick I will panic and assume its the norovirus and wash hands like 20 times a day, bleach the house where i can etc.

I don't think sanitising now is going to reduce my anxiety, because I didn't find out they were sick until 12 hours after they had left.

Also, where did you read the mumsnet article spreading through the family? I would like to read it.

Better late then never with the cleaning I think. Also, when one of my kids are sick I reduce what I eat for the week.

I understand the stress of it all. My dd was sick last year the night before we were due to fly on a 10 hour flight (just me and my DH). My sister was watching my dd. I was so scared if I caught the bug and would be sick on the flight or during holiday. I was fine and my sister has no fear of this (she knew I was thinking of canceling the trip, so she was like GO!!!!). All was fine, my dd was fine when she was w my sister. My ds avoided it and no one else got sick.

It's madness, I know I'm being irrational but that the definition of a phobia isn't it!

The thread was called "Vom Watch", it was in active earlier this morning. I absolutely should not have clicked on it.

I might have a whizz round with the bleach shortly, I'm supposed to be working on my multiple presentations.

Yes, this phobia can cause one to become mad. For example, we were flying on a holiday. On the airplane, I smelled this strong perfume smell and straight away thought, this must be a cover up smell for when someone vomits on the floor or on the seat! Tried to keep myself calm. When we left the plane, the smell traveled with me and I thought omg, I must have put my bag in the spot someone vomited. We got to the holiday house, I emptied bag (wiped those things in the bag for fear if some how the germs got inside the bag!) and put the bag outside. But that perfume smell seemed to linger in the room. I drove myself nuts with worry the first night. Until, I realised the perfume smell was not a vomit deodoriser at all. It was from a new hair brush my daughter had gotten, which I put in my bag and it smelled of perfume. The happiness I felt when I realised all was okay and it was just the hair brush....That just goes to show you how crazy this can make us sometimes!!

Oh the happiness and relief when you discover there was no risk!

I keep praying that the visitor turns out to have had vomiting as a symptom of flu or something else, rather than a bug. Or even that they were making it up trying to get out of a planned activity they weren't keen on the following day - I've ruled that out because if they were embellishing, they've kept the story going for no discernable reason well after the planned event was over.

Ridiculous.

Once when I was pregnant, me and a colleague hand lunch together, we even shared some of the meal (dipping shrimps into a sauce). A couple hours later she was vomiting in the office toilet (I did not know, as already went home for the day because I was heavily pregnant, always left right on time). Anyway, she text a couple days later to ask if I was okay because she had been so sick. This was when I was not as worried (prior to kids). So I just thought, poor her and I was just fine and nothing happened. I was not even worried either. Now the horror would make me so scared knowing I shared a meal with someone who was sick and (especially if you are pregnant, your immune system is not as strong so you can catch things easier).

And btw, do you know your blood type? For a while, I was wondering if I might somehow be less susceptible to tummy bugs, because growing up I was never sick (once I passed the age of 6). I NEVER washed hands before eating and even after using the school toilets sometimes I would not wash them (the horror to think if my children did the same! lol). Anyways, even when living in London, I would be on tube etc touch things, or bus and eat with out washing hands. Then I became more sensitive and scared about it after kids so started washing hands like crazy. Anyways, some research I learned people with B blood type seems to have better immunity, and that is my blood type :)

Actually I have no idea of my blood type, I suppose I should!

One year about 6 of us from a party of 50 came down with a stomach illness after a Christmas party - and some of the sick people's partners and children, who were not at the party, subsequently went down with it later, so it was clearly a virus.

Of the 6, four people vomited violently for hours, one just felt dreadful with no D or V, and I only had the lower end although I also had muscle pain, felt so awful I couldn't even read or watch TV, and felt so sick I almost wished I could vomit and get it over with.

So although I don't believe (daren't believe) that I'm immune, I suspect I generally swerve the vomiting element. Contrary to popular belief, you don't need to "vomit up" a bug - they multiply in your intestines which triggers the vomit centre in the brain, but you only vomit until your own antibodies have taken over to eliminate the virus. It's nothing to do with vomiting or pooing it out, any more than sneezing or blowing out a cold.

It is, of course, different if you have ingested a poison or spoiled food - then I accept that that is going to make a reappearance.

My emesis centre is generally offline. Until I travel backwards in a bus that is...

Yes, I agree that you do not need to vomit up the bug for sure. And some people are more easy to vomit if not feeling well. People with emetaphobia, tend to not vomit and will just feel dreadful!

I read that when a test was done (people injected w norovirus) that 20% were immune to it and out of the 80% of the people who got it, only 70% went on to show symptoms (d and/or v).

Those are very interesting stats! It goes to show than when the world and his wife are talking about bugs being rife in the community, you are really only hearing about a tiny sample - it just seems more horribly prevalent because people are talking about it. If you hadn't bumped into those two people mentioning it, or someone you knew vaguely hadn't said they'd been ill, you never would've heard about it at all. I've had a visitor be ill after leaving, and seen one thread on MN and I'm in a right state.

It was the epidemic of 2007 that pushed me over the edge and lead to my manic handwashing and anxiety about infection.

By way of an update - the visitor is much better today, and has eaten. That surprises me if it was norovirus - even if you've stopped vomiting and pooping you're normally poorly and loathe to eat for a day or two afterwards aren't you? I had a mild variety and didn't touch anything for 3 days, and I wasn't even vomiting.

Part of me wonders maybe it was something they had eaten, but not necessarily that night - could've been from the day before. But realistically it sounds more like a virus than anything.

No happy relief for me as a false alarm then!

I am sure you will be fine. What epidemic are you talking about? It seems every year these viruses go around. But it is also more easy to hear about it. People love to post on FB if their kids vomit. And online you can read about it in the news and on forums etc. Schools can email parents now to let them know a bug is going around. Parents let each other know on whatsap groups. Would be a lot better if we just did not know!

My kids vomit often. I rarely catch it, and if I do I don't throw up