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Going on a trip next month

M

Misty Avich

Hellooooooooooo!!!
V.I.P Member
I'm so scared I'm going to suddenly feel sick or get diarrhoea whilst travelling and on the trip. This seems to be a regular occurrence now when I'm out. I feel so anxious about being sick or having diarrhoea in public, that it suddenly happens (nausea or diarrhoea).
I always try to distract my mind from this anxiety and enjoy myself but it still doesn't help much. Although I have a strong stomach and hardly ever vomit, I still worry that there's always a first time and that I might have really picked up a stomach bug this time and am going to vomit in public, or be unable to control diarrhoea before getting to a bathroom. Especially now that people keep puking on the buses at work and I have to keep cleaning it up. I get so paranoid.

On the trip I am thinking of getting myself armed to prevent any nausea or diarrhoea. I seem to have immunised myself to antisickness pills, as I can still get vertigo when taking them, although I'll still take one. I'm also going to have a bottle of water with me, to prevent the dry mouth that I sometimes get when travelling (which can cause me to gag). And I'll make sure I have bands around my wrists for antisickness acupressure. And I'll make sure to take indigestion tablets (like antacids), as I heard they can settle the stomach even from anxiety or vertigo. I don't like ginger, and I've found it doesn't always help anyway. It makes me feel sick because I dislike the taste.
Do you think I'll be armed enough to prevent nausea or vertigo? The only thing is, how do i prevent diarrhoea? And no, I don't want dietary advice, as the sudden diarrhoea I can get in public places can happen no matter what I eat, although I could constipate myself up by eating loads of bread and chips. I don't suffer with IBS by the way. What I do suffer with is vertigo, emetophobia and anxiety.

Please, need advice, but no rude or humiliating comments please.
 
When travelling to unfamiliar locales, it can be helpful to have something on hand like Gastro-Stop (Loperamide hydrochloride 2mg.) Rapid acting. Don’t know if you need a prescription where you are (a pharmacist can dispense it here), but a doctor should be OK with giving you one, if needed. If it is severe and doesn’t respond to this, the next step up is something like azithromycin 500mg. You will need a prescription for this, and it is generally only needed for severe cases.
 
It's good that you're planning in advance to consider what you may need to make yourself comfortable, and to consider ways to potentially mitigate concerns that may arise.

I'll defer on medications aside from stating that an antacid (like pepto-bismol) and allergy medications (anti-histamines) are always good to have.

Two things you may wish to consider getting if you don't already have them:
A sunflower lanyard (or button) to identify as someone who may have hidden access needs
https://hdsunflower.com/
A radar key in the event that you find yourself needing use of restroom facilities
https://shop.disabilityrightsuk.org/products/radar-key
Consider also if you have any comfort / safe foods and either bring some with you and/or identify places where you can get them.

Of note, when going somewhere new, a chain store or restaurant you're familiar with may also provide a sort of safe space should you find yourself overwhelmed.
 
I'd give the following advice:
- As to medication, you seem to have it under control. I'd suggest something like loperamide for cases of diarrhea, but note that you should only take it when you have no access to a toilet, e.g. during a long bus ride or a flight. If you have access to a toilet and truly have a stomach bug, it's better to get it out of your system, and taking loperamide or similar often prolongs the duration of your symptoms. For nausea, I usually take Vomex (dimenhydrinate) but it usually makes me very tired, so be careful there. There are similar products that make less tired whose names I don't remember now, you could ask your doctor or a pharmacist.
- If you can, try to stay hydrated by drinking water and, if you have trouble eating, maybe add a bit of sugar. Low blood sugar can also induce nausea.
- If it calms you, keep a plastic bag in your bag, just in case you start feeling ill - it might calm you, knowing that it's there, just in case.
- Try to eat small but more frequent meals during your trip, try to not get too hungry but also not too full, and maybe stick to safe foods. I sometimes suffer from motion sickness and during long bus rides, I don't eat anything fancier than a cheese sandwich, crackers, banana and dry cookies. My future sister-in-law, a very small and thin girl, very probably autistic, often feels nauseous if there are changes in her plans, e.g. during a trip or also during uni. The key for her is to have familiar snacks with her always and eat them at regular intervals. Once she starts feeling sick, she can't eat anymore and gets so worked up in feeling sick that the nausea only gets worse and worse.
- If you're in an exotic country, stick to the "cook it, peel it or leave it" rule. Don't eat anything you don't feel comfortable with.
- The best way to prevent stomach bugs on trips is good hygiene - washing your hands after going to the bathroom, try not to touch your face while outside and wash your hands first thing when you have the opportunity. If you're thorough with washing your hands, you don't even really need hand sanitizer. However, try to not get compulsive about it, which might be hard with such fears.
- Sometimes chewing a chewing-gum (within limits) helps me to prevent nausea. However, sometimes it makes it worse, so be careful there.
- Try to keep yourself busy and distracted during a trip. Whatever works for you and doesn't induce nausea - listening to a podcast, an audiobook or music, reading, watching a movie. Try to keep your thoughts elsewhere.
- Maybe try breathing techniques to relax. Deep breathing often helps me against nausea, too, and it might also help you to calm down.
- If you're somewhere new, first thing check out where the bathrooms are. So, just in case something happens, you know where to go.
- There are apps that show where the nearest toilet is. I know from people who have IBS or chronic-inflammatory bowel disease. I don't know them, but you could check such apps out.
- Lastly, I know that's crappy advice, but try not to focus your thoughts on it. Nausea and diarrhea are also heavily psychosomatically influenced. If you think you're going to feel sick, you probably will. If you stress yourself enough about getting diarrhea, you probably will. Try exercises to get yourself out of worry spirals, and if you have a therapist, this might be a very good point for you to work on together.

Good luck, and I hope you'll enjoy the trip, too!
 
Thanks guys and girls.

Can vertigo count as a disability?

We're not going anywhere exotic, just by the coast in the UK. I'm not sure how long the car ride is. I'll be travelling with my family.

The thing is, I always used to travel and had no trouble at all. Sometimes me and my husband would drive all the way up to Scotland, which takes about 6-7 hours. I never got diarrhoea, and I took antisickness pills but I still never got vertigo so much.

I think it's because I'm suffering emotional trauma from the norovirus I had 6 years ago. I hadn't thrown up for 17 years until then. I caught it from the care home I used to work at, where there was an outbreak. I did all I could to be hygienic (hand-washing, gloves, masks, etc) but I still somehow caught it. So now my anxiety of vomiting has worsened.

Often though, the more I eat the less nauseous I feel. But it's the diarrhoea risk that panics me. I have a fear of having diarrhoea in a public bathroom. It's so embarrassing.
 
This might seem like a stupid question, but do you have a therapist? This sounds like something that could respond well to therapy with a skilled therapist.
 
Misty Avich said:
No, I don't have a therapist.
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That might be something to think about. It sounds like a very specific fear/phobia with a clear cause/situation when it started, and you say that it has only started a while ago and you remember it being different before. That's actually quite a good goal to work on with a therapist. It might really be worth a try.
 
AuroraBorealis said:
That might be something to think about. It sounds like a very specific fear/phobia with a clear cause/situation when it started, and you say that it has only started a while ago and you remember it being different before. That's actually quite a good goal to work on with a therapist. It might really be worth a try.
Click to expand...
If I do go to therapy it's a very long waiting list so I don't think I'll be seen and cured by April.
I've had therapy before for my scopophobia (fear of being seen by strangers) but it became difficult to fit around my working hours. They don't seem to provide therapy at weekends or evenings unless you pay, which I couldn't afford.
 
Misty Avich said:
If I do go to therapy it's a very long waiting list so I don't think I'll be seen and cured by April.
I've had therapy before for my scopophobia (fear of being seen by strangers) but it became difficult to fit around my working hours. They don't seem to provide therapy at weekends or evenings unless you pay, which I couldn't afford.
Click to expand...
No, it wouldn't be a short-term solution, that's true. But it could help long-term.
I'm sorry, I get those problems, and I can't think of a solution for them at the moment. I really hope that the trip will be okay and that you will enjoy it. Please feel free to update after if you want.
 
AuroraBorealis said:
No, it wouldn't be a short-term solution, that's true. But it could help long-term.
I'm sorry, I get those problems, and I can't think of a solution for them at the moment. I really hope that the trip will be okay and that you will enjoy it. Please feel free to update after if you want.
Click to expand...
That's okay, thanks for being compassionate.
But I'm just worrying about being ill whilst on vacation. It happened when I went to Poland for a vacation. Two days before we were due to fly out there I started coming over feverish and immediately thought "oh no, covid, what do I do?" But I took a covid test and it came back negative. Then the day before we were flying out I began getting all sores come up in my mouth - something I've never had before. I thought they'd just go after a couple of days so I tried not to think anything of it. I kept treating it with medicinal stuff for mouth sores but it didn't seem to help, and I kept gargling with warm salt water but that didn't help either (I hate doing that anyway).
I couldn't eat anything at all, as it was too painful to even move my tongue. My gums had swollen up over my back teeth and my whole mouth became covered in white and red sores, and even down my throat. Most of the vacation we spent looking for the right medicine to treat my mouth but nothing seemed to work. I was unable to eat anything, and could only sip water, so I ended up getting anemic and weak from lack of sugar. I was in agony, even when I took painkillers. But at least they lowered my temperature.
In the end we found a dentist and they cleaned my teeth and gums for me. It helped a bit but the sores were still there. I tried to ignore it and still went on our booked excursions but the whole time I was panicking about being sick. I knew I wouldn't have diarrhoea because I hadn't eaten anything so I didn't poop much all week.
I felt a bit better when we were flying home but as soon as I got back I booked an appointment with the doctor and she gave me some special stuff to put in my mouth after each meal for a week, and diagnosed me with oral thrush. It started to finally go and I was back to normal again.

I've never had oral thrush before, and I've never had it since. I reckon I'd made myself ill like that because I kept on fretting and panicking about getting covid before or whilst being away (this was back in 2022). I just don't want to make myself ill like that again by worrying about getting ill.

Would that oil stuff you can put on your tongue to help calm you help me? I've tried it before but I don't know if it worked or not. I'm a sucker for placebos.
 
My, that sounds really uncomfortable. (Amongst others), oral thrush comes from a low immune system. That can surely come from chronic stress, but something like that normally shouldn't happen again if you're overall healthy.
But I understand that it's scary to be ill at a foreign place. I just had a bad stomach bug whilst being in an exotic country - fortunately there was a well-equipped pharmacy and a small store nearby, but it's always very uncomfortable to not be at home in your familiar surroundings when you're ill.

Unfortunately, I don't know what you're referring to by that oily stuff.
 
AuroraBorealis said:
My, that sounds really uncomfortable. (Amongst others), oral thrush comes from a low immune system. That can surely come from chronic stress, but something like that normally shouldn't happen again if you're overall healthy.
But I understand that it's scary to be ill at a foreign place. I just had a bad stomach bug whilst being in an exotic country - fortunately there was a well-equipped pharmacy and a small store nearby, but it's always very uncomfortable to not be at home in your familiar surroundings when you're ill.
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That's what I'm afraid of happening to me. I have emetophobia so that makes it even worse.
I remember one time I was on a coach trip in Cornwall and we had an ice-cream. Then after we had eaten our ice-creams my mum suddenly said, "did the ice-cream taste a bit sour to you?" I absolutely panicked, because although it didn't taste sour to me, I still panicked because we were due to travel home on the coach the next day and the thought of having diarrhoea from food-poisoning when traveling on a coach with other people was absolutely terrifying. I heard dairy products that aren't contained correctly can cause weeks of severe illness.
Luckily it was fine. But my mum just had the same paranoia I have with food.
AuroraBorealis said:
Unfortunately, I don't know what you're referring to by that oily stuff.
Click to expand...
I can't remember what it's called now. Tea tree oil or something. I used it years ago when I kept having emotional outbursts, before I went on Sertraline (Sertraline doesn't help with anxiety but helps me control my behavioural reaction to anger).
You put a few drops of this stuff on your tongue and it's supposed to help with calmness or something.
 
Misty Avich said:
The only thing is, how do i prevent diarrhoea?
Click to expand...
Don't eat any food that wasn't boiled, baked, fried properly or packaged like Coke or cannned food. Boil water from the tap. Don't drink unbootled water in restaurants - they serve unboiled tap water. Eating while on vacation and not getting sick from the restaurant food is a challenge, it's true :/

As for nausea and vertigo, I think you mentioned everything possible. Also, you can try to sit in the front of the bus if you travel by bus or next to a window and look outside.

I'm sorry that you have to deal with the anxiety :/ And of course with gastric issues. I hope everything goes fine.
 
I very seldom get diarrhoea. But when I do, it's at very random times and only once. One time I suddenly got diarrhoea when out shopping, and I had to find the nearest bathroom - which was in a McDonald's.
 
My aunt said I can sit in the front of the car as we travel, and the twins (my two aunts) don't mind sitting in the back.

I'd like to Bluetooth my phone to the car stereo so that I can have myself in control of music, which might distract my thoughts from nausea and wouldn't need my headphones (my headphones are Bluetooth because my phone doesn't have a wire slot thing for some reason, but Bluetooth headphones don't last long between charging and it's a pain to have to keep charging them).

But I worry that wanting others to listen to my music might make me egocentric. People seem to object to listening to music that isn't their's, but whenever I listen to music it's always on my own and I'd love to share my music with others. My music is the sort that everyone are likely to enjoy, a mixture of different genres and a very good beat. I express my music, art and writing on my own and it feels so lonely. Is it egocentric for me to want to show my music to others, as in sharing my music with others?
 
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