Fear of sickness!

[november90]

Hi everyone!
Not sure if this is the right place to post, but after some advice.
Ever since I have been little I have had the most intense fear of sickness bugs imaginable. It has massively plagued me my whole life, whenever I hear of a tummy bug or am exposed to one I breakdown. I can't think of anything I'm more scared of. I'm now nearly 3 and have a 3!year old and a 19 week old baby. I know I'm going to be facing tummy bugs a lot now with having young ones and I don't even know how I'm going to cope! My son went to nursery today and they said he was a bit tired and I've been panicking so much about him being sock I feel sock myself and have a headache 🙈 When my youngest wakes up during the night I fear my eldest waking up being sick. It's so intense! I need to deal with this but in no way can I afford counciling etc as I'm a single parent!
Anyone been here or have any advice? I don't want my sons to pick up on this or not be able to be there for them when they are poorly!

Please excuse all typos. I'm nearly 30 not 3 and my fear is not about socks it's sickness 🙈.

But I suppose I'm mainly wondering can the gp help with therapy etc or minds matters? I am desperate to get over this! I don't want it to spoil my motherhood :(

It sounds like something that cognitive behavioural therapy (CBT) could help with, which aims to help you manage and overcome unhelpful and anxiety inducing thought patterns like the ones you describe. I don’t know if that is something you can get on the NHS but it is definitely widely available privately if that is something you can afford. It’s something I looked into recently for a friend, a number of therapists mentioned helping with phobias and their sessions were more reasonably priced than I expected. Sickness bugs are an inevitable part of parenthood so if you can seek help it would make that side of things much easier for you. Good luck.

Sorry, just noticed that you said you couldn’t afford private counselling. But you should definitely speak to your GP and think about how you can present the severity of this phobia and it’s impact on your life so that it doesn’t get dismissed.

Hi OP

I had an extreme sickness phobia since I was a child and received successful treatment last year (am now 31). You can 100% do this.

In many areas you should be able to self refer to talking therapies on the NHS and bypass the GP. The main therapy the NHS offers is CBT. x

@Cheeseoncheese that's amazing! I'm so pleased for you it must be amazing to say that! I honestly feel like it consumes me and I just want the fear to go away. I'm not scared of having a cold or a migraine so why am I like this??!! So how did your journey begin... did you self refer to minds matters or another place?
I've put off going to the go because I don't want to just be given medication for anxiety or anything!

@Himawarigirl thank you for the replies! If I don't get anywhere I will absolutely make it a priority to get some help privately but with being on Mat leave I just can't afford it at the minute :(

@november90 it does really feel amazing to be so far from the place I was in for the last 20 odd years! I'm not gonna lie, I'm always going to have to work at it, but the difference now is that I can, it doesn't rule my life and I believe in my ability to cope! I didn't believe it was possible and I put off getting help for so long but it was possible! The therapy process was quite tough but very positive overall. My key motivation - and what made it different from when I'd tried in the past - was to be able to look after my kids without fear of them being sick/when they might be sick and without passing on my fears, and for me that was the biggest motivator there was It seems illogical, but that's exactly what phobias are, and the fear is so real. For me I managed to link it to something that happened as a child, which my therapist helped me to sort of reprocess in my mind which was really helpful! So it may be that there was a triggering event, or it could just be completely random! I self referred to our local service as a first step, which was really easy. Like you I really didn't want to just be offered medication (I know it's really helpful for many people, but I just knew it wasn't right for me) and didn't want to have to 'justify' myself to the gp. After I self referred I got a phone appointment within a few weeks as an initial assessment and then a face to face assessment about 6 weeks after that with my appointments being offered about 4 weeks after that! I know that sounds a bit lengthy but the most important thing is to get the ball rolling . I have heard that appointments are prioritised for women during pregnancy so I don't know if you might also get a quicker service post-partum?

Oh my, long post, hope some of the info may be helpful for you x