How Well do You Understand Your Yuk Factor?

[Tyghress]

I'm pretty okay with animal carcasses -- for the same reason as Emm -- but three things from those days still skeeve me: maggots and pigeon flies and eye operations. Give me a dozen cat abcesses over one eye issue.

I'm majorly yukked by stuff on the sidewalk -- especially spit.

[Wombat]

Wombat, can I add graphic descriptions of vomit to my Yuk list, please?

Sure can. Anything goes here so long as it's real.

I gotta say though, the choice by Dub and I.D. of chamomile tea really took me by surprise. I was expecting to be taken by surprise, but that was an especially surprising surprise.

[djm]

This is good. I couldn't think of anything that really honestly bothers me, but reading over othes lists has made me stop and reconsider. I have a really poor sense of smell. The fact that I'm congested most of the time probably has something to do with this. As a result, I only notice really strong smells. Of those really strong smells, the one that really is yuk to me is the smell of vomit in an enclosed space, like being the next one to catch that particular cab.

Its more interesting to me that the sight of vomit should bother JES, especially considering that his favourite literary figure is Huck-Huck-HUCKleberry Finn.

djm

[dubhlinn]

Dub - you wouldn't maybe have any allergies? Chamomille is "known" as a cross allergy species - for instance if you are allergic to ragweed, you may also show symptoms to Chamomille.

To the best of my knowledge I have no allergies. Chamomille tea is the only thing I have ever been exposed too that had a negative effect on my system. The taste does not bother me in the slightest, just the choking sensation a sip of it produces.

Maybe I'm allergic to the tea?

Slan,
D.

[gonzo914]

Maybe I'm allergic to the tea?

Maybe your body is kicking it back because it wants real tea made from real tea leaves, a hearty breakfast tea, perhaps, or some Early Grey, manly teas, and not something made from flowers.

"Chamomile" -- such a sissy word, stirring up connotations of maiden aunts in sensible shoes and smelly lace doillies and wan and frail Emily Dickenson types.

[fearfaoin]

Pickled beats. I can put them in my mouth, but then my throat refuses
to accept them. Something about the smell. My father has the same
problem with mushrooms.

I have no problems with the regular gross stuff, as I had 3 younger
brothers. My wife talks about Vet stuff at the dinner table, and it
doesn't bother me.

[jsluder]

I have a bigger problem with smells causing a yuk factor than sights. I can look at just about anything and I will probably find it interesting rather than disgusting. But if I have to smell it, then I have a problem. I honestly have no idea why smells bother me more.

This is my case, precisely. I've never encountered a visual stimulus that gave me the yuks, but odors...

- The smell of carnivore excrement (i.e., cow crap doesn't bother me).
- The smell of rotting flesh.
- The smell of my dog's ears when he has an ear infection. (For some reason, this one turns my stomach worse than excrement or rotting flesh. It makes me so nauseous that my wife gets stuck with dog ear cleaning duty.)
- The smell of most perfumes/colognes. (Plus, they often give me headaches.)

[emmline]

Maybe I'm allergic to the tea?

Maybe your body is kicking it back because it wants real tea made from real tea leaves, a hearty breakfast tea, perhaps, or some Early Grey, manly teas, and not something made from flowers.

"Chamomile" -- such a sissy word, stirring up connotations of maiden aunts in sensible shoes and smelly lace doillies and wan and frail Emily Dickenson types.

Or naughty Peter Rabbit types who have to drink it after they catch cold escaping from Mr. MacGregor's garden.

[Nanohedron]

Baby poo.
Dog poo.
Cat poo.
Toe cheese.
Decaying chicken leftovers.
Pretty much any kind of poo, now that I tink about it.

I used to eat raw oysters, but later developed a gag reflex to them for some reason. I am not proud of that.

At Kieran's you can order a bowl of cream of wild rice soup. It's tasty, very thick (I would call it a hyperchowder more than a soup), contains bits of carrots and other interesting things, too. I call it "the dog's lunch" to the chagrin of my fellow sessioners.

[chas]

Vomit... especially the kind that has peas and spagetti in it.

Way to maintain that classy rep, Mr Smith.

Wombat, can I add graphic descriptions of vomit to my Yuk list, please?

Where's vomitbunny when you need him?

[Redwolf]

Mine are rather weird, but here they are:

VISUAL

Worms. Specifically earthworms. And I'm highly suggestible when it comes to worms too...I remember when I was 10, I was eating a piece of birthday cake when one of the other kids said "Audrey's eating worms," and I got horribly sick right then and there!

Guts. Yes...intestines. I have no problem with any other aspect of internal anatomy, but guts get me. Maybe because they look kind of like worms.

Hair in conjuction with food. The mere sight of a hair in or on food will put me off eating for hours...and if I happen to get a hair in my mouth when I'm eating, it's ralph city.

OLFACTORY

Formaldehyde. I had trouble doing dissections in high school and college, not because I was grossed out by the dissection itself (I was even fine with the guts in that context), but because I kept having to take vomit breaks thanks to the formadehyde. I'd make a horrible mortician!

Redwolf

[Innocent Bystander]

Ha!
Apart from the Chamomile Tea, which is despised by all upstanding persons, I'm probably so yukky that most obvious things don't bother me.

However. This gets all Autistic now, I'm afraid:

Can't stand people touching me (except in those properly intimate moments). It's hell on the tube and train.

Can't stand persistent recurring noises. Other people's headphones turned up (far too) loud going Tss tss tss (or worse) give me the screaming abdabs. Dripping taps are my nightmare.

Can't abide three or more people talking to me at once. This is might well result in a foetal crouch with fingers in ears. Or diving through the window. Hard to explain to a customer, or an employer.

Apart from that, I've dealt with a lot of poop and puke in my time, so unless it's really gross, I can usually manage. Recently I broke an egg which was so far gone that the yolk was green. It took me three goes to get that egg safely disposed of. I can't even remember how I did it.

For those interested in exploring, there is a page on the bbc website Science section which will quiz you on your Yuk factor. I can't post the link, as work does not approve of the BBC. (at least, during working hours).

[izzarina]

1. Bananas...no matter how hard I try to like them, they make me gag and wretch every time I even smell one. Really gross

2. Red Raspberry leaf tea....I had this one time when I was really sick with morning sickness, and the cup I had drank ended up in the toilet. I can't even take the smell anymore at all. Brings back too many icky memories

3. Bugs...I really just can't take them near me. I don't mind seeing them from a distance, but if they are near me, or more importantly ON me, I go really ballistic.

4. Gin....I can't get past the smell to even see if the taste would be a major yuck for me. I got past the smell once. That one time finished it forever for me.

[Wombat]

For those interested in exploring, there is a page on the bbc website Science section which will quiz you on your Yuk factor. I can't post the link, as work does not approve of the BBC. (at least, during working hours).

Thanks IB. I'll see if I can find that site as soon as I shrug off the work I'm doing. What I was going to try to do when the list got long enough was to try to classify and explain the different kinds of yuk people came up with. Most aren't too hard when you start to think about them but a few are quite a challenge. But if the BBC has already beaten me to it, I won't bother.

What I don't think I have much chance of doing even before I try is to find an explanation of why people differ in the ways they do about what is or isn't yucky. But if there is a good taxonomy of different kinds of yuck, people might find that it illuminates their own patterns. Anyway, it'll be fun to try. I think that most of us, me included, are pretty blind to why our yuck button gets pressed just when it does.

[Nanohedron]

Just for clarification, Wombat, are we narrowing this down to "gross", and not taking into general account anything that makes us uncomfortable?

Judging from the thread's title, I'm assuming so.