Hi, mtd. ^^

Thank you for your input - it answered a lot of questions, and gives me a sense of hope. I, myself, have, similar to you, tried to simply repeatedly confront my fear(s) with varying degrees of success.

One I mentioned in my original post, my fear of ladders, I confront regularly by climbing ladders despite the fear. That one tends to lighten once the task is complete, but has never dissipated entirely. Nevertheless, it has been much worse in the past.

Most recently, my troubles center around oral fixations, i.e. my fear of food/eating, and my fear of vomiting. I know that within the context of my abuse there was a great deal of oral copulation (me as the giver, him as the reciever), and I can hazzard a guess that this part of my abuse is the underlying culprit of the phobias. However, knowing this does not ease the phobia, and eating is so difficult at times that sometimes I won't eat at all, or will only eat specific foods.

Case in point, there was one episode where I would eat nothing but plain bagels with cream cheese and mashed potatoes with butter - period. And, of that, I usually only ate once a day. I was (and still am) constantly worried that what I was (am) putting in my mouth was (is) "tainted" and would (will) make me ill.

As of late, I force myself on a daily basis to eat, but it doesn't alleviate the fear. It's there everytime I think about food, and everytime I touch it, look at it, etc. I wonder if I am poisoning my family when I prepare a meal (though I have never failed to feed them food I have made, and so far, none have become ill from my cooking), and have actively avoided preparing food when the fear is intense (my husband cooks in my place).

It's very troubling, and the reason behind why I am a very thin person (5'8" and 110-115 lbs.) as well. But, it seems that facing this particular fear regularly is doing little if nothing to help alleviate it.

I eat to stay alive, and that is all. I would like to regain my former ideals regarding food...before all these phobias popped up...

At one time, eating was a pleasure to be enjoyed, not a task to be endured.

If you, or anyone else, has a way to overcome this particular phobia, a way that perhaps I am not seeing, the advice would be greatly appreciated.

Thank you again, and do take care.