Is My Pill Phobia Tied to My Autism?
For most of my life, I could hardly swallow any pills at all. Was that due to an autistic sensory sensitivity?
Ever since I was little, I have struggled to swallow pills. Luckily, it’s been less of a struggle the last couple of years, which is a relief because I take a ton of medications, supplements, and vitamins for my physical and mental health. But I still occasionally need to invoke my puking muscles to open my throat to swallow my pills.
Sorry if that sounds gross. There’s no actual vomit involved, but I’m not sure how better to describe it. Sometimes, the anxiety of swallowing pills makes my throat close up and refuse to open, so I’ve somehow learned how to trigger a vomit-type reflex that forces my throat open so I can swallow the pills.
In any case, I have never had an easy time swallowing pills, and there have been multiple times in my life when I physically could not swallow even the tiniest pill because my anxiety was so bad. I would sit there with my mouth full of water and a single pill, absolutely unable to swallow until I finally gave up and spit the whole mouthful into the sink.
I discovered that I’m autistic and ADHD a couple of years ago, but I’ve only just recently started wondering if my pill phobia is tied to…
