TV star avoids drink in case he gets sick
THIS Morning presenter Eamonn Holmes has never been drunk.
The 59-year-old says he has a phobia of being sick.
And the condition – called emetophobia – means he barely touches a drop of booze.
Eamonn said: “I ask myself sometimes why I don’t drink, because people think it’s odd.
“The amount of people who tell my wife: ‘Oh I went on a pub crawl with your husband, we got lashed, we were floored, we were this, we were that.’
“And Ruth knows it never happened because I don’t drink. I can honestly say I’ve never been drunk in my life, I’ve been maybe tiddly a couple of times, but I’ve never been drunk or out of control.”
Eamonn, who will be celebrating his 60th birthday in December, said he has control issues. He added: “You say ‘why?’ Well, one day I was on Radio 2 and I was interviewing a psychiatrist, and he said to me: ‘Do you drink?’ and I said: ‘No, I don’t,’ and he said: ‘That’s because you don’t like to be out of control.
“I said: ‘No, it’s also because I have a fear of vomiting – emetophobia – a real fear.’
“I would do anything, I would have a sore tummy for years, I don’t care what end it comes out as long as it doesn’t come out of my mouth.
“He basically said that’s a control thing as well. He said: ‘You do not want to be out of control.’ When you’re throwing up you’re out of control.”
Eamonn, who worked in a bar as a teenager, added that seeing school pals sozzled also put him off.
He said: “I went to a boysonly school and they all wanted to get rat-a**ed and drink and I thought: ‘I see nothing attractive about this, they’re lying in the corner throwing up, that’s what they’re doing.’”