Not as bad as you perhaps, but I have this. I never give blood; I'd be happy to, but find it takes too much out of me emotionally. When I have to give blood at the doctor's office, I always lay down and look away.

I'm getting better at it, but a phobia is exactly what it seems to be --- an irrational, disproportional fear.

I took a first aid course recently, and this wasn't as bad as I had feared.

From infrequent accidents, etc, I think that the reaction in a crisis situation is harder to predict. Adreneline kicks in, a sort of (hopefully mild) kind of shock takes over. Particularly if I'm the victim; part of me inside is hollaring, but I've found that I'm able to cope and take reasonable action when I'm bleeding a lot.

Like you, my concern is more about how I'll do if I have to be the caregiver. I'm pretty sure that answer is that I will dislike it more than average, but that I'll cope.

I think it's possible to develop a sort of mental attitude that helps us better deal with (not necessarily eliminate, but deal with) phobias.

I know that I can be a sort of emotional vampire (gads, that sounds awful) when it comes to fear situations. Many years ago in parachute school in the Army I found that I was *less* scared than some other fellows about jumping out of a plane, and while the contrast didn't make me not-scared, it made it much much easier to cope, and of course to show the external macho image that we males sometimes feel required to present (particularly at that age <g>).

In any event, good luck with it!