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Hello everybody, and welcome to my new podcast, I guess.

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My name is Jay, I'm 24 years old, I'm from Australia, and I've been dealing with emetophobia

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for the last four years pretty heavily.

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So I've had it my whole life, I can tell just by looking back and noticing the anxiety I

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felt as a child around situations like this, but it never really came to like its full

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sort of power, I guess, until I was about 20 years old.

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And ever since then I've had to learn a lot, I've had to do a lot of research, I basically

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started with nothing, I didn't even know there was a word for it, I didn't know anyone else

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had something like this, so it's been a journey.

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But I am where I am now, and I would like to offer my support to those who may be in

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need.

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I have no professional background, it's all just my own advice or my own words from just

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me, so I'm not going to claim I have any like, you know, qualifications in anything, I don't,

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I'm just a normal guy, I've had emetophobia for a long time, and I've had to deal with

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it for a long time, and I think I've learned a lot of ways, and a lot of good coping strategies,

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also a lot of bad ones, and there's a lot of both, but I hope to offer those and offer

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support, save space for anyone that feels they need something to listen to, to, well,

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listen to.

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So mine all started really about, yeah, four years ago.

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A lot of things were going on in my life at the time, I had just lost a job that I was

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pretty passionate about, I had a car that I really loved, it got wrecked in a car park

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funnily enough, someone in a big truck came by, hit it, and I didn't have that car for

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about three months, four months, which doesn't seem like that long, but I live in a small

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town, it's a bit of a drive to the city where I worked, so not having a car obviously kind

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of, you know, made it really hard for me to get to work, there was no public transport

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I could have taken, at least none that I knew of, so it was a pretty bad situation, and

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among that a lot of other things happened that I'll get into one day.

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But it all sort of collided together and exploded in a panic attack I had one night, and I remember

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it was the entire night from about 12am to about 7am in the morning that I was just panicking

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and I was freaking out, and I'd had panic attacks before that, but nothing like this,

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nothing I knew of that was a panic attack either, you know, I didn't really think this

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was a panic attack, I thought a panic attack was like when you're nervous about going on

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stage in like a school concert or something, I don't know.

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So I actually thought I was dying, I was like damn I'm gonna get sick, I'm gonna die, like

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it's not gonna stop, something is gonna happen, I don't know, but I spent the majority of

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the night just freaking out, shaking, and ever since then it never seemed to end after

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that, and it progressed worse, and it got to a point where I couldn't leave my house anymore,

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and the only real reason I would leave my house is to go to the shop if I could, but

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sometimes I would drop my groceries in the middle of the line and just leave, and mind

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you this shop is just a local shop, you know it's good for the essentials, it's about

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two minutes down the road, so a little two minute drive, not that long, easy, but I couldn't

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do that anymore, you know, as the months progressed it got to the point where I couldn't even

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really get the mail, and it was really hard for a long time, but I had enough dedication

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in me to continue moving forward, although I didn't see much purpose in doing so, I

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really thought it was sort of the end of everything for me, I thought I would never get better,

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I thought I would never improve, I thought this anxiety that I felt every day that I

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woke up from the minute I opened my eyes to the minute I closed them, it was just it,

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and it was bad, it's hard to talk about now even, it was a really sad, depressing, dark

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time in my life, and I'm not going to lie, I'm currently in a similar situation right

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now, you know, but I have the knowledge I've gained, the skills that I've learned, the

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coping strategies, the healthy ones at least, I've still got a few bad ones, I still like

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to have a lot of mints, a lot of antacids, I was pretty bad on anti-nausea medication

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for a long time, you know, like I wasn't like overdosing it or something, I was just taking

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a lot of it like because it really helped me, but not in the right way, you know, it

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made it easy to leave the house because I didn't feel sick anymore, but it also made

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me feel really dizzy, really tired, and it was just like I don't want to rely on something

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like that, I want to just rely on me and healthier ways, but anyway, sorry for getting sidetracked.

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I basically, to start dealing with that, I would, I started this thing where I'd walk

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down the end of my road, and it was hard a lot of the time, but I did that every day

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for a couple months, I did that, just the end of the road, it was a minute walk, it

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took very little time, it was a very little amount of walking to do, but to me that felt

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like the biggest challenge I could have faced at the time, but I continued doing it, I didn't

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really know why, there was just something in me that pushed me to do that because I

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just needed to go outside, I needed to see if I could do this today, you know, and there

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were days where I couldn't do it, there were a lot of days where I couldn't do it, there

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were days where I came home after doing it and felt like shit because I didn't feel

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better, but it still was a step, albeit a very small one, but it was a step in the right

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direction, and it got a little easier over time, I started walking a little further,

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and then I got a bike, and I started riding that, and then that caused a whole lot of

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panic attacks because I would ride so far compared to how far I walked, it was really

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hard, but it got easier with that as well, and then I started driving back down the street

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again, and there were times where I turned around and went home at the end of my road,

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and I would give up for the day, go lay in bed, have a panic attack, eat a bag of mints,

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not eat any actual food for the rest of the night, but one day I sort of realized it's

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going to sound pretty stupid, but I realized that I could try again, directly afterwards

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if I wanted to, half an hour later or six hours later, I could try again, and then when

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I realized that, even though it took me a while, I'm a bit slow, it made it a lot easier,

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and I had more determination, because I could attempt it as many times as I wanted I realized,

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I had my entire life to do it, so I started doing that, every time something failed, or

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I took something as a failure because I couldn't do it, even though it's not, I would come

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home, I'd reevaluate myself, I'd calm myself down, and I would try again, and nine times

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out of ten I did it on the second try, sometimes I needed a third try, sometimes you need a

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fourth in that day, but if you keep trying, you will succeed.

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There's a lot of things that go into it, like mindset, and a lot of other things that I'm

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forgetting too, but we'll get into that one day, one day very soon, but my point here

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is that this sort of thing can be overcome, because after I started doing those things,

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I got to the point where I got my first job that I'd had in two years, and it was good,

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I started working again, I started coming out of my shell, I made some new friends,

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I signed up for a gym, first in my life I'd ever been to an actual gym, and I started

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even traveling a little further, you know I had to drive from my small little town,

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my little bubble, to a city, a massive city, one of the biggest cities, if not the biggest

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city in Australia, two hour drive, just for a work thing, and if I'd asked myself if

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I would have done that two years before that, I would have said no way, I'd rather die,

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there was absolutely no way I would have been able to do that, but I did it, I had a panic

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attack there, took a breather, had a mint, calmed down, and I was fine, like unbaffled

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that I could be able to do something like that, after such a hard two years, I'm probably

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rambling a lot, sorry it's my first attempt at this, I do work in retail currently so

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I should be better at talking to people, but you know, I'll learn, but just my whole point

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realistically is that like, I know what it's like to be in that dark place, and I've been

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there a couple times, a couple separate times for a while at each point I've been there,

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I know what it's like, I know the hopelessness, the fear, that just burning sensation inside

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you, you know that just pure anxiety and pure fear, the restlessness, I know all of it,

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I've been there, you know, and I want to try and offer my support, my advice, even if it's

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just a story about something that I went through, or something that could help, I want to be

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able to share those things with anyone that wants to listen, but yeah, probably going

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to cut this one here, I will be planning on making a lot more of these very shortly, and

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I will link socials below so if anyone wants to ever ask me any questions or even just

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chat to me, you'll be able to do so, yeah, so until then, thank you for listening, I'll

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see you next time.

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Hey, sorry I just wanted to add on to the end of this, sorry if I rambled a lot, and

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sorry if the things I said didn't make any sense, my story is complicated as is all of

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ours and I sort of wanted to fit as much in as I could in the littlest amount of time,

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but I will go over these things more in depth and my own story more in depth in the future,

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definitely plan on making more of these, I'm excited to sort of start this journey, and

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hopefully anyone listening finds support in the things that I have to say, I hope to offer

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the best advice that I have and share the, you know, best stories, I guess, I don't know,

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thank you again though, see you later.