Here’s one for all the emetophobes out there, or people with chronic nausea…So, emetophobes. I’ve been feeling absolutely awful for the past week, bu considering the circumstances (no antidepressants eep) I’m doing pretty bloody well. Food has been my best friend and worst enemy. My hypnotherapist gave me a task to eat a quarter of an apple each day. I hate apples when I’m feeling nauseous so I actually started eating salads, sandwiches, and soups, so in the end I didn’t have to do the apple challenge and she told me that she was impressed with my ‘rapid progress’. Jokes on her I just hate apples.

I’ve gone into yet another funk and am feeling so nauseous so I set a new challenge: one salad everyday. I’ve been keeping that up but that’s all I’m really eating each day. I’m sleep deprived too. Nothings changed but I’m getting 3-5 hours sleep each night which is giving me headaches, jaw aches, migraines, eye socket aches, I see, smell, hear things daily, and worst of all, my damn anxiety has SKY ROCKETED. In my experiences though, I’ve found a few things that help nausea for me. These ideas are based around anxiety nausea, they may help real nausea but who the hell knows which is which anymore.

The top one for me is Mr. Moo. Wtf is a Mr. Moo right? Well, he is a cow wheat bag. Ryan bought him for me from a farm in Tasmania a couple of years ago. He’s really comforting because who doesn’t have a little plushy to keep them company? The bonus is that, since he’s a wheat bag, he’s pretty heavy. There’s this massive heavy blanket you can get that supposedly reduces anxiety due to it’s weight (it’s roughly $250 before you get excited) and Mr Moo has that effect on me. You put him in the microwave for a couple minutes, plop him on your belly, and nausea seems to leave me almost instantly. I think he may help real nausea too because it helps whenever I have nausea from a migraine. General wheat bags will work just as well by the way, I just like this one because it’s a cool cow.

Gum/mints are my number 2 choice. They help a lot if you have hunger pains too, but obviously it’s best to eat proper food first. Gum is great though because it distracts you and gives you something to put your excess anxiety energy into, but doesn’t require a lot of effort. Mint has also proven effective for nausea. There are peppermint sprays where you sniff the peppermint and it goes away. I’ve got some but haven’t used it yet. Sometimes nausea or hunger gives me a yucky taste in my mouth which makes me feel worse, and the gum and mints helps a lot with that. I find that it just makes your body feel cleaner and somewhat healthier.

Distraction is good for ‘curing’ any bodily aches or mental worries. I’ve gone through 8 seasons of the Simpsons in the past 3ish weeks trying desperately to distract myself, but hey, it works. You get so involved with what’s going on in the story that you can just temporarily forget all your problems. It can obviously be really difficult if you’re in the middle of a panic attack, but the beauty is that you can distract yourself with something more physical to release the energy like cleaning or exercising. It’s different for every person and what distracts them best, so there’s a lot of trial and error but it pays off well.

The complete opposite of distraction also helps me. Really thinking about what I’m feeling and just learning to accept that it’s there and will pass. I do this by meditating and doing hypnosis. This is most helpful during a panic attack, and it really lowers anxiety levels. The downside is that it took years of practise and saying ‘it’s not working’. It’s been so worth it for me and I think hypnotherapy is the biggest factor keeping me sane right now. There are apps on the app store which can help you as well which I use daily.

Finally, anti emetics are my saviour. I take Ondansetron and it gives me so much piece of mind when things get really tough. I’ve proven to myself also how well I can cope. I started off taking the tablets in halves, but have now switched to quarters, and realise I’m coping fine on about 2 quarters throughout the day. People will often not advise to go for anti emetics, but they’re harmless and I’ve been much more willing to push myself when I do have them.

So those are the 5 ways I conquer nausea. Different things work for different people, but I hope this may have given just a few people some new things to try out.

Thanks for reading!

Larne