I Shaved My Head and Survived on 500 Calories Because of Emetophobia: But it Didn't Win!

15/09/2025 44 min
I Shaved My Head and Survived on 500 Calories Because of Emetophobia: But it Didn't Win!

Listen "I Shaved My Head and Survived on 500 Calories Because of Emetophobia: But it Didn't Win!"

Episode Synopsis

In today's episode, Melina discusses her experience with severe emetophobia. Melina’s anxiety began at a very young age and after 10 different diagnoses of mental health issues, Melina finally discovered her true struggle of emetophobia. This had been missed due to lack of knowledge and understanding. Once discovering that she wasn’t alone, Melina began her journey to becoming emetophobia-free, and has never been happier! Melina’s diagnosis struggles After her Arfid diagnosis, Melina hoped for a better future. However, in reality, it all just became worse. As a result of several medical interventions, Melina began struggling with body dysmorphia. From here, OCD, obsession and an incredible amount of unhelpful thinking began taking over Melina’s life. Melina would avoid eating out, socialising, and consuming more than a tiny amount of food per day.  Melina touches upon a number of catastrophic events from this period of her life. In her own words, ‘emetophobia made me do some crazy things!’ At one stage she even shaved her own head due to her fear. Discovering the programmeMelina initially found the programme in 2022, and completed it independently. Despite understanding what was happening, she maintained her unhelpful thinking, and ultimately her emetophobia. Melina recognised some partial improvements, but knew that she needed some support to fully overcome it! As a result of being brave and trying again, Melina pushed through, found Coach Lauren, and overcame her emetophobia completely! Overcoming emetophobia Melina, now emetophobia-free, maintains her habits of completing the actions from the programme, which are enabling her to Thrive even further into the future! She has transformed her thinking completely, recognises her unhelpful beliefs, and is in full control of her eating. Melina now lives present in the moment, enjoys life, feels powerful and most importantly, is kind to herself! Rather than being her own critic, Melina is now her biggest cheerleader. She overcame her emetophobia, and decided to take back control of her life..the rest as they say is history!Find out more: https://www.emetophobiafree.orghttps://linktr.ee/emetophobiaConnect with us at the links below:Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/emetophobiafree/Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/emetophobiafree​TikTok: https://www.tiktok.com/@UCF6vCMhoF98TKKe7DKBlfgw Thanks for watching :)------------------------Emetophobia is the fear of vomiting/sickness: either yourself, other people, or both. Research suggests 0.1 to 8.8% percent of the population have a fear of being sick (Hout & Bouman, 2011). Emetophobia is a debilitating phobia, which significantly impacts your life: sufferers are chronically anxious and go to great lengths to avoid encountering anything sickness-related, which provides temporary relief but often results in a rollercoaster of anxiety, fear and exhaustion. Issues associated with emetophobia include: OCD, eating difficulties, anxiety-related gastric problems, phagophobia, tocophobia and more. Our goal is to raise awareness of this severe phobia and provide a solution for sufferers and their families. You do not need to live with Emetophobia - you can COMPLETELY overcome it. The Thrive Programme for Emetophobia (also known as Emetophobia-Free) is the single most successful and predictable method for getting rid of your emetophobia. It has helped over 20,000 emetophobes around the world overcome their phobia.You can study the programme at home by yourself wit...

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