Handle Emetophobia

About Handle Emetophobia

If you’ve happened upon this show, there’s a decent chance you’ve Googled something like… ‘Am I going to throw up?’ or ‘How long until I’m in the clear?’ …or maybe you’ve just spent way too much time trying to not feel nauseous. And if that’s you… We just want to say—you’re not crazy…and you’re definitely not alone.” This podcast is called Handle Emetophobia. And it’s not gonna be about avoiding triggers, it’s not about staying safe, and it’s definitely not about finding a way to never throw up again. It’s about retraining your brain and learning how to actually LIVE… even when your brain

Publisher

Momming with Emetophobia and OCD

Category

health & fitness

Language

en

Explicit

No

First episode

15 Apr 2026

Latest episode

30 Sept 2026

Latest episodes

23 episodes in the feed.

1. 

   30 Sept 2026

   Would You Lick a Toilet? | Exposures, Experiments, & The Emetophobia Trap with CBT Therapist David Kaneria Ep. 22

   Why can trying SO hard to feel safe actually keep emetophobia alive? This week, we're joined by CBT therapist and emetophobia specialist David Kaneria for a deep dive into what keeps the fear cycle going—and what recovery can actually look like. David gives us a particularly interesting perspective because he treats emetophobia but has never experienced the phobia himself. We ask him what nausea and vomiting feel like to someone who isn't afraid of them, why emetophobia can feel so different from other phobias, and what he sees again and again in the people he treats. We talk about safety behaviors and David's brilliant “barking at the postman” analogy: when we do something to prevent the thing we're afraid of and then nothing bad happens, our brains can mistakenly learn, “Good thing I did that!” instead of learning that maybe the safety behavior wasn't protecting us in the first place. We also dig into exposure therapy vs. behavioral experiments, why exposure sometimes feels like it “didn't work,” nausea and anxiety, acceptance and willingness, OCD vs. emetophobia, setbacks after actually getting sick, and the dreaded thought: “Okay, maybe I was fine all those other times…but what about THIS time?” David also answers some of the questions we hear constantly: Why is nighttime so hard? What if I stop my safety behaviors and get sick? How do I know if something IS a safety behavior? What if I can't afford therapy? And should someone with emetophobia ever intentionally make themselves throw up as an exposure? Then we obviously make things weird with some emetophobia Would You Rathers involving toilet seats, handrails, sketchy food, public embarrassment, and strangers throwing up on you. 😂 David's final message is one we hope you'll remember: Emetophobia is treatable. Keep trying. The goal isn't to learn that you need to be safe. It's to learn that you can handle it.

2. 

   23 Sept 2026

   Why Won't Anxiety Just Go Away!? The Emetophobia Recovery Goal You might Be Getting Wrong | Ep. 21

   “I can't handle it.” If you have emetophobia, you've probably thought it. I can't handle vomiting. I can't handle my kid throwing up. I can't handle feeling nauseous. I can't handle that level of anxiety. But...what exactly does “handle it” mean? In this episode of Handle Emetophobia, Katie and Ally start with that question and end up challenging one of the biggest assumptions we can bring into recovery: That recovery means eventually we won't feel anxious anymore. What if you do ERP, practice exposures, reduce your safety behaviors, and make enormous progress—but then your child wakes you up at 3 A.M. saying their stomach hurts and your heart STILL starts racing? Did you fail? Or can you be anxious and still be handling it? We talk about why crying, shaking, panicking, or feeling afraid doesn't mean you've failed; the difference between controlled exposures and real-life vomiting; and how safety behaviors can teach our brains that discomfort is something we need to escape. We also explore the “sneaky agenda” that can hide underneath acceptance: “Fine. I'll accept my anxiety...but I'm doing it because I eventually want the anxiety to disappear.” Maybe there's another goal. What if recovery is learning that you can experience anxiety, nausea, fear, uncertainty, and discomfort—and continue living anyway? Katie and Ally discuss ERP, response prevention, acceptance, attachment, the OCD fear cycle, “pain + resistance = suffering,” and the things about being human that we simply can't control. And Ally shares a recent middle-of-the-night trigger that illustrates what recovery can actually begin to look like: The anxiety was still there. But it was lighter. She could carry it. That's the shift. Not becoming a magical person who never feels anxious about vomiting. Learning that you don't have to organize your entire life around making sure you never do. You can feel uncomfortable and keep living. You can be scared and still handle it.

3. 

   16 Sept 2026

   You Don't Have To "Get Through" Stomach Bug Season | The Season Is Not The Problem | Ep. 20

   Back to school means backpacks, homework, packed lunches...and for a lot of people with emetophobia, one giant thought: HERE COMES STOMACH BUG SEASON. Someone throws up in your kid's classroom. A child comes home saying their stomach hurts. You hear that a stomach bug is “going around.” Suddenly you're asking questions, checking who was absent, counting 48–72 hours, changing handwashing routines, monitoring your kids, avoiding activities, or lying in bed wondering: Is tonight going to be the night? But what if the problem isn't stomach bug season? What if it's the way we've learned to live during it? Or should we say "avoid living" during it? In this episode, Katie and Ally talk honestly about their own back-to-school fears, kids vomiting at school, anticipatory anxiety, the desperate desire for a “crystal ball,” and all the ways emetophobia convinces us that if we just prepare enough, monitor enough, or avoid enough, maybe we can finally feel safe. Except...there's going to be another September next year. And another one after that. So instead of spending September through spring trying to “get through” the scary months, we're asking a different question: How do we actually LIVE during them? We talk about radical acceptance, uncertainty, dropping safety behaviors, magical thinking, the “and then what?” exercise, resisting 48–72 hour countdowns, letting our kids go to school, and accepting that sometimes we can do everything “right” and still get sick. And Ally gives us a new name for stomach bug season: The season of letting go. The season of opportunity. The season of challenging ourselves. The season of retraining our brains. Because our kids only get one childhood. We only get one life. And we don't want to spend most of it waiting for the next person to throw up. The goal isn't to stay perfectly safe. The goal is realizing we don't have to.

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Spotify

5.0 / 5

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Guest appearances

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