Dealing with emetophobia as a mum

Written by Amy Eade

I'm writing this just as we (fingers crossed) are coming out of the other side of my toddler's first sickness bug, something I definitely didn't expect to hit him so young especially as he's not at nursery yet and something I've been dreading since he was born.

I'm emetophobic; something I didn't know was actually a thing until I found other people on the internet with it and realised that it's actually a pretty common phobia (around 7% of women in the UK have a fear of vomit) so I always knew this situation would be something I would struggle to deal with.

Being emetophobic is something that does play on your mind when deciding whether to have children; I know for some people it stops them from wanting them altogether. For me, it never stopped me wanting them although it did add to the anxiety of both being pregnant and having children. There's the pregnancy, with which often comes morning sickness, then the simple fact that if you have children it is highly likely that they're going to be sick every now and again.

As it turns out, in the moment I simply got on with it because what else is there you can really do? It's the aftermath that's been the main struggle. Without a sickness bug happening I'm already always on high alert; I wash my toddler's hands before he eats without fail, I'm constantly on the lookout for potential germs and I don't particularly like to take him to really busy places due to the increase in risk of infection. So now that the sickness bug has happened everything has amplified.

We are currently 48 hours vomit free and my stomach is still in knots waiting for it to happen again; part of me wonders if this level of high alert is my norm from now on and I sincerely hope not. I feel like our whole house is dirty and despite everything having been washed on a hot wash I still want to throw away all the bedding and clothes that were soiled. I want to give my whole house a deep clean, but I don't really want to do it myself in case I come into contact with the germs and catch it myself.

I'm not entirely sure why I'm writing this apart from that I'm sure there must be other mums out there who suffer with emetophobia and I want them to know that they're not alone. Mentally it has hit me really hard and suddenly everything is overwhelming. That sort of statement probably sounds ridiculous to someone who doesn't understand what it's like to have this phobia, but to those who do, I understand.

Perhaps a bit of a niche thing to write about, but the whole point of Motherhood Unfiltered is that I want all mothers to feel seen and heard and this isn't really an issue I've seen discussed before and is an additional motherhood hurdle for those of us who are emetophobic.