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Autism and phobia of being sick/anyone else being sick

Chelsie

Hi, my 10 year old daughter has just this week been diagnosed with autism. She has lots of fears and phobias but the main one is herself or anyone else being sick. A girl in class at school was sick this was back in may and she hasn’t been to school since then because of this. Her anxiety has since then became 10x worse, around 4 weeks ago my daughter was poorly during the night, she felt sick didn’t say that but I know her too well. Anyway since then she now won’t sleep upstairs and I’ve been sleeping on a mattress downstairs with her. I’m absolutely exhausted. Has anyone else had anything like this before? I’m at a loss with what I can do to make things better. She has therapy once a week already with someone from cyps, but my daughter won’t even mention the word sick or speak about it, she’s terrified. So it’s limited to what we can speak about other wise she will just shut down. Any advice would be greatly appreciated. 

Parents

  • Oh boy!

    10, you say?  I'm 57 and I am massively identifying with her. In fact, it was my body/ medical phobias which crescendoed into the crisis which led to my belated and recent diagnosis.

    Ok, so we're all different so I can't promise you that her problem is exactly like mine, but I can try to relate it to mine if it might give a clue or two..

    Firstly, I have - and she may- have massively amplified internal body sensations that are not like an NT's. She may be feeling things more violently or differently inside and be completely unable to interpret or describe them and be finding them disturbing. My own H___ beat freaks me out to a max, for instance. And my sense of pain swings between none when I should have some, to extreme when there should be none. Yet I can't describe pain to a doctor.

    Even the external cues to such things; pictures or the words to denote these bodily reactions may be too much to bare. It takes me a lot of courage to even type the names of some body parts.

    Or it may be that she's worried about what being sick will mean for her...doctors, illness etc. And she may have fears about that.

    As for the answer...I'd like to think that had anyone cottoned on when I was 10, there might have been some hope for me. They say occupational therapy can help; a gradual desensitization to the triggers. 

    I'd also love the answers anyone else can come up with on this, - at 57 I'm still searching- so thank you for posting.

    Meanwhile, just know you are a good mum doing your best. Give her as much reassurance as you can and listen for the clues she's struggling to give you.

    God bless you and your lovely lass.

Reply

  • Oh boy!

    10, you say?  I'm 57 and I am massively identifying with her. In fact, it was my body/ medical phobias which crescendoed into the crisis which led to my belated and recent diagnosis.

    Ok, so we're all different so I can't promise you that her problem is exactly like mine, but I can try to relate it to mine if it might give a clue or two..

    Firstly, I have - and she may- have massively amplified internal body sensations that are not like an NT's. She may be feeling things more violently or differently inside and be completely unable to interpret or describe them and be finding them disturbing. My own H___ beat freaks me out to a max, for instance. And my sense of pain swings between none when I should have some, to extreme when there should be none. Yet I can't describe pain to a doctor.

    Even the external cues to such things; pictures or the words to denote these bodily reactions may be too much to bare. It takes me a lot of courage to even type the names of some body parts.

    Or it may be that she's worried about what being sick will mean for her...doctors, illness etc. And she may have fears about that.

    As for the answer...I'd like to think that had anyone cottoned on when I was 10, there might have been some hope for me. They say occupational therapy can help; a gradual desensitization to the triggers. 

    I'd also love the answers anyone else can come up with on this, - at 57 I'm still searching- so thank you for posting.

    Meanwhile, just know you are a good mum doing your best. Give her as much reassurance as you can and listen for the clues she's struggling to give you.

    God bless you and your lovely lass.

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