I recently read an interesting chapter (watched a video) in a medical textbook (on TikTok) about a woman who suffers from emetophobia – the intense fear of vomiting. She had gone her entire adult life without doing it, going to great lengths to avoid ever becoming sick, and preferring to remain nauseous than upchuck. That is, until a few days ago, when she unfortunately got a bad case of food poisoning. As is implied with the ‘poisoning’ part, it didn’t go well. None of her anti-spew techniques worked, and her willpower was not enough to hold back the tides.
It was clearly a difficult experience for her to go through, but in the AVV (After Vom Video) she seemed more at peace than before, perhaps with some relief now that the worst had happened and she had survived. The genie was out of the bottle, as was decades of built-up vomit(I think that’s how it works).
Listening to this woman’s disgusting story, I realised I related to her, and to the lesson that sometimes you have to give in to letting your body do what it needs. I related because the last year has involved releasing a lot of my own body fluid – tears – in a way I never have before. In public.
I have always been someone who is prone to easily feeling embarrassed, and it’s my most hated emotion. As if afflicted with some sort of emotional emetophobia (I Googled, it’s called katagelophobia), I go to great lengths to try to avoid situations where I may be embarrassed, especially in public.
I think it stems from not wanting attention (which I never do), which stems from being a fat woman (which I am), and only receiving bad attention from strangers (who are mean), but I’ll leave that for now (until therapy). Crying in public is one of the things that I would never let myself do, for fear of drawing attention, and feeling embarrassed. It wasn’t something I actively thought about, but in retrospect I would stop myself, or take myself out of situations, or stay home, or whatever I needed to do to not let it happen.
I won’t go into gory details, but this last year has involved a lot of crying in public – kicking off when my beloved nanna died and I found myself crying at a Red Rooster at Brisbane airport. Glamorous. I shook it off, theorising that it’s pretty normal to see people cry at the airport. I didn’t yet know it was just the beginning of my Year of Tears (memoir title).
The last 14 months or so have included my girlfriend and I having horrible lengthy gastro Covid, my nanna dying suddenly, me having a months-long depressive episode for the first time, stressful job situations, and losing a friend tragically and my girlfriend’s nana within a couple of weeks of each other, which led into my girlfriend having a bipolar episode. The effects of all of the above coursed through my body like a dodgy tuna sandwich, and I was no longer able to hold back the tears. I didn’t have the energy, or the will, to be able to stop myself from crying if it came upon me. I simply had to cry in public, otherwise I would have never gone anywhere or done anything.
I was really embarrassed the first couple of times, but it started to lessen, and I began to just let myself go with it even when nothing really bad was happening. It turns out it actually doesn’t matter if people around you see you crying. There are a lot of reasons to cry in this crazy world, and in fact it’s weird to me that more people aren’t walking around in tears. I’ve cried walking down the street, I’ve cried at the cafe near our house so many times they must think I have a medical issue, I’ve cried at the doctor, in Ubers, on the bus, in the park, by a dam. I’ve cried eating green eggs and ham. Once I had a quick cry between levels 1 and 6 of our elevator, starting on the ground floor and pulling myself together by the top.
I was worried about being embarrassed or how people would react, but it’s often the case that people don’t notice – probably too busy wrapped up in trying not to cry themselves. This was helped by the purchase of prescription sunglasses, a ‘crying in public’ must-have trend for 2024. When people do notice, the overwhelming majority just send a sympathetic glance or vibe towards me, with some clearly ready to step in if needed. I don’t prefer crying in public, and don’t choose it over crying in private, but I am OK with it now. I don’t feel embarrassed about it, I really have zero choice when it happens, it’s what I need to do in order to get through the days.
It has been a difficult few years for many reasons, for many people. There’s a lot of grief and burnout and stress inherent in the current hellscape, and I encourage you not to add ‘stopping yourself crying’ to that list. Vomit out your emotions into the toilet that is everyday life – it might make you feel a bit better.
Rebecca Shaw is a writer based in Sydney
