She’s a real barf-icionado.
If Sharisse Zeroonian feels stress, anxiety or premenstrual symptoms, it can trigger a multi-day vomiting bout that sees her throwing up as many as 15 times per hour.
Afterwards, her symptoms subside, but she returns to retching the following week for days at a time.
As the exhaustion and nausea from these episodes caused her to lose weight and work opportunities, doctors erroneously diagnosed her condition as migraine disorder.
“I was feeling like, I don’t want to live like this anymore. What kind of quality of life is this?” Zeroonian, 29, told TODAY.com.
The Massachusetts native recalled that her vomiting episodes triggered anxiety and suicidal ideation, but in a “Catch-22,” these thoughts also seemed to bring on the vomiting.
It took two years, numerous tests and several trips to the ER for Zeroonian to receive a proper diagnosis. In 2023, she was finally diagnosed with cyclic vomiting syndrome (CVS).
CVS affects 2% of the population and is more common in women, young adults and those with a personal or family history of migraines.
According to the Mayo Clinic, CVS is a chronic disorder of the gut-brain interaction. Signs and symptoms include:
- Three or more recurrent episodes of vomiting that start around the same time and last for a similar length of time
- Varying intervals of decent health without nausea between episodes
- Intense nausea and sweating before an episode
Other symptoms that can present during a vomiting episode include abdominal pain, diarrhea, headache, dizziness and increased sensitivity to light.
Triggers for CVS attacks include sinus problems, stress or excitement, certain foods and drinks, such as alcohol, caffeine, chocolate and cheese, menstruation, motion sickness, overexertion and overeating.
CVS is diagnosed by analyzing the patient’s vomiting episodes and ruling out other causes. Patients are commonly misdiagnosed with the stomach flu or food poisoning.
Zeroonian said she occasionally experienced digestive issues in childhood, but her symptoms really ramped up in 2021.
Initially, Zeroonian felt more ashamed than comforted by her CVS diagnosis.
“It was kind of embarrassing to me at the time,” she told TODAY.com. “The biggest thing was that people wouldn’t understand that it’s a disorder. They’d just think it was me being overdramatic … (or) using it as an excuse not to do things or to slack off at work.”
Treatment for CVS generally involves managing symptoms and implementing lifestyle changes to prevent the events that can trigger vomiting episodes.
Zeroonian’s management plan includes antipsychotic and anti-nausea medication.
Other treatments include migraine meds, medical marijuana, which can alleviate stress and nausea, and benzodiazepines, which have been shown to lessen symptoms of anxiety.
Zeroonian still experiences vomiting episodes every week, but these are milder and briefer, lasting one to two days rather than four or five.
However, in peak moments of pain, she can only stand to keep down vitamin-infused water and gummies and is confined to her home for fear of projecting in public.
Yet, Zeroonian has found a surprising upside to her upchuck episodes. She wrote and directed a semi-autobiographical dark comedy film, titled “Nothing Solid,” which she cleverly bills as a “vom-com.” It’s due out in August.
For Zeroonian, telling her story through film has proved to be a healing art.
“Being open about it and making this movie has helped so much because I think I suffered a lot more when I was not being open,” she said.
