It's been a long time since I've needed to come here for support.
Early last year, I got myself a cleaning job at a nursing home, something that appeared to have helped my emetophobia, although I never have to clean sick (something the carers have to do fortunately) I've still had to go into clean the rooms of residents who have gotten ill, I've been in the room when they've been sick, in the, almost two years I've worked their, there has been several cases of residents getting norovirus, weaker immune systems, combined with many of the dementia sufferers often forgetting to wash their hands, it's become a common thing to come in to find that a resident has a stomach bug.
Since I started working their, I've not really suffered much in the way of anxiety, with the odd exception, I've been fine, the phobia hadn't gone away, but it was no longer ruling my life.
Until now.
So last Thursday, my younger sister came home from collage early, saying she felt sick, and that evening, she was sick, I was a little panicky, falling into a few old habits, obsessive handwashing, keeping a bucket in my room, eating less and so on, but still, nothing extreme, given how quickly my sister recovered, I just assumed that it wasn't a bug at all.
On Sunday, my older sister came over with her two daughters, everything seemed fine, my other little sister hadn't gotten ill either.
But today, my older sister mentioned that my nieces had both gone down with the bug, and my dad came home feeling sick, and was sick a few hours ago.
It's clear that its the norovirus, and the anxiety has really come back like a slap in the face, when its happening at home, it seems to be worse, I haven't felt this way in years, I really don't want to be sick, I'm not really sure where I'm going with this post, but I don't know, it's frustrating, I thought I'd be able to cope now if anyone in my house got noro, this phobia sucks, I thought I'd got over it, it's never going to stop, is it?
Sorry for the long post, I just needed to vent really.
Edit: Now my other sister has been sick... FML -_-