I know for me, my stress level shows up as nausea. I can't throw up unless I have the flu & it just hits before I can control it because I had the flu once & threw up so hard that I broke all the blood vessles in my eyes & in my face. I looked horrible with the whites of my eyes completely red & red pin points all over my face. After that, everytime I feal nausea, I just don't eat so that I don't throw up. When my stress is really bad, I have had the nausea go on for months & months & months......to the point where I loose weight way below my safe lowest weight.

When I was hospitalized last year for this, my GP did about $60,000. of tests to rule out any possible physical problem. Everything was rulled out so they determined it was anorexia but they weren't willing to listen to the fact that stress was causing the problem. My blood tests came back anemic with malnutrition & had to be treated with a central line & TPN nurtition for several weeks. When the physical possibilities are ruled out, a good therapist is needed to work through any issues that might be causing the problem. I have to admit that it isn't easy to fine someone that can help with that because I found that all the therapists & pdocs want to pigeon hole the problem into anorexia & body image issues & aren't very open to other causes for the problem. That was what I found while trying to deal with the problem just last year. The hospitals pdoc told me that what I was dealing with was anorexia & I needed to be in a treatment center. The treatment centers I talked to said they couldn't help me because I wasn't dealing with body image problems & that I needed help to deal with the trauma that seemed to be causing PTSD symptoms that were ending up causing the nausea that was causing the extreme weight loss which looked like anorexia.

It's like being in a black hole with no way out at the time......until finally someone turns up that cares enough to listen & want to help with what is actually going on.

Hope your hypothetical case can find a good person to help work through the issues,
Debbie