To find what’s happened to Michael Mosley quite anxiety provoking

@Rockschooldropout - so sorry for your loss and of the other previous posters that have lost loved ones suddenly, recently or longer ago.

I think it’s most awfully sad and although Claire said they drew comfort from the fact he so nearly made it - for me the thought of my loved one so close to help and lying undiscovered for so long would tear me up. I wish them well in the months ahead. I lost both my parents relatively young but never a sudden death which I think is really really sad.

There are unavoidable deaths - the wrong place at the wrong time. But the thought of an avoidable element to it is awful and certainly on the face of it, poor MM’s death seems to have some level of avoidability. I don’t think it’s in bad taste to feel that.

Yes, definitely. I'm gutted about Michael's death. I had a cry about it when it was confirmed.

Yes, it has rocked me. Life is precious. He was taken too soon :(

I want to turn this around.

I’ve seen parents and loved ones have agonising and unforgiving deaths (Lewy Bodies Dementia anyone? Hallucinating murderous armies outside your care home?), or many years of bad health and surviving really shit stuff. The human body doesn’t give up easily.

its a given we all have to go somehow. I for one would prefer a fabulous holiday with loved ones, feeling healthy and happy, and dropping dead before I even knew it to the endings I’ve seen.

I think it’s very fitting because the ‘just one thing’ idea is to stay as happy and healthy in your life as long as possible.

I’m sad he was relatively young for that, but if you’ve seen relatives lose their ‘selves’ during long years of decrepitude you might see it differently.

I read in the Telegraph that it was confirmed he died of heat exhaustion this evening.

It’ feels closer to home when it’s someone we’ve seen on tv .. someone who appeared the picture of health , advising us how we can become better healthier versions of ourselves .someone whi you certainly wouldn’t assume would be dying anytime soon ... I had recently downloaded his deep calm podcast as I’ve been suffering terrible anxiety since my father quite literally dropped dead two months ago .
His voice had a calm and reassuring manner ..
it seems inexplicable that a healthy man in his late sixties who should in theory have had many years left .. can due in such a tragic way so I do understand that awful feeling of “bloody hell if it can happen to him , it can happen to anyone “

But I do agree that older men often mistakenly feel like they’re still physically invincible (more so than women do, I think, maybe because we are generally more aware of our physical vulnerabilities)

I agree with this, women go through menopause and all the massive changes to our minds and bodies this causes, our bodies literally tell us we are getting old, men however can delude themselves they are Peter Pan, not sure who has it better actually!

Apparently he took a wrong turning and went in the opposite direction. This was a much more difficult path than the one he should have taken, hence how he got into trouble. So probably more unlucky, rather than irresponsible.

I have actually found your post very helpful OP because I am feeling exactly the same and the fact that currently 56% of people think you are NBU should reassure you somewhat. So thank you for writing your feelings down like this, because some of the replies that have included strategies for dealing with the intense anxiety you are feeling, have been very useful. The last few days have been very unsettling for all the reasons mentioned throughout this thread, and it’s not surprising that some of us are experiencing increased anxiety.

I feel anxious about this too op. Mainly because so many people that my friends and family know have been struck by tragedy and I've become quite sensitive to news stories.
But now I figure that we all have to die at some point and if the worst happens, then we'll just have to deal with it, like many people do and come to terms with it.
What else is there?

@crackofdoom we should all have someone that wants to know we get home safely.

I'll be your person 🌻

I don't feel more anxious for me. I feel less anxious now for someone close to me who is one who cannot sit on a beach and will always go off for a wander because they have sat up and taken notice of this. Tim Spector wrote today about MM. "He was upset that the BBC and Channel 4 had said he couldn’t do any more cold water stunts because the insurance was becoming too high. Our last ski trip together he was as usual, going far too fast and crashed hurting his back but after a brief rest was back on the slopes, as eager and energetic as ever" Must be very hard to love someone like this, knowing they take risks, but they wouldn't be who they are without that.

As for the poster who said he took other people's ideas, I don't find that fair. I always heard him credit the researchers where he took his ideas from and he was always saying it was his wife with the real clinical experience on diabetes management, "just one thing" interviews the people who have done the work on the idea - he never presented it as his own. The general public tend to remember and credit him though because he was the one presenting it and lazy newspaper articles also often don't reference where the idea comes from whereas he would when presenting his own material. Lots of doctors and academics are paying respects to him on social media from what I've seen.

I have really bad anxiety around death, especially sudden death, and after a lot of medication and therapy I've (kind of) found a way to push most of the thoughts away.
Basically, I tell myself that this year I don't need to worry. This year I need to live. Go on the holiday. Take the boat around the dock. Travel to see friends. When I start feeling anxious I tell myself "I can deal with this in 2025." As each year passes, I change the date to the next year, and so on.
This usually works for me, and when it doesn't it's normally when I've been forgetting my meds 🙃

Would you trot out heartless shit like this later this year when the inevitable people will die swimming in rivers, canals and lakes in the UK?

And they will, on the first hot day.

I could have written exactly that, leaves you with a feeling of unease

They are not that old these days but sure you have to be careful as you age but also not give into ageist people who think u are too old to do anything.Theres also more to life than seeing kids marry or have kids.he helped people not just his family.

Perfectly said. And to add, we actually do not know the cause of his death yet.

It is. I found out that my mil died some hours before her own daughters did. And then, some years later, that my fil died before my Dh and another sister and had to call Dh at work and tell him. Both times I felt irrationally bad that I knew before them. Although I'm sure it happens quite often like that.

And some do very well.why are you wishing loneliness on her?

I’m finding all the coverage, and particularly videos, really quite awful. Apparently there is one at the end of his ‘walk’.

What do you mean, at the end of his walk?

I think there needs to be more awareness of the risks of vigorous or extreme exercise particularly in men over 40

Why just men?

TBH I have the same anxiety at times, but I think we need to appreciate that freak accidents occur all the time which can lead to death, but also people have accidents that should have probably killed them, and survived.
Most of these things are out of our hands, best to not do completely stupid things buy also remember that our time is our time. Atleast for me, that belief keeps me fairly happy and stops me viewing life as they film final destination.

Exactly. Most of us don't know how close we have sailed to the wind. As an Erasmus student, I regularly cycled home, no helmet, no lights through a city and onto my unlit country road at 3 and 4 in the morning. Completely stupid and if something had happened me people would have thought so but.. it didn't.

Equally it’s a relief that he didn’t suffer for days.

As far as I'm concerned he was a man who thought he knew it all on health and I don't mean to say that in a nasty way. He had got a bit too full of himself and as many older men do, refused to accept his ageing and limitations. So off he marched and paid the price. Or rather his family will now pay the price.

This isn’t the thread for it.

So what I mean is your anxiety protects you to a degree and is a natural feeling