To think I’m dying? Any doctors around? 🙏

[Garret]

Got worse over a couple of weeks. Tiredness. Squishy tummy and no appetite. Aches and pains. Buzzing sensations all over. Back and neck pain. Joints hurting and clicking. Muscles twitching and hurting. Feeling wobbly. Now struggling to walk because of muscle burning pains. Anxiety and panic.

GP is totally unconcerned. Checked me over and said I haven’t lost muscle strength, range of movement, tone or sensation. Took some blood to test for vitamin deficiencies (I often have these but never felt like this before). Told me to address my anxiety and referred me to the psychiatric nurse.

I’m hysterical. Imagining I have some awful disease. How can the GP not be worried when I have such severe symptoms? Please help me if you can.

Another vote for peri here. (Assuming the B12 and folate come back normal)

Most of the symptoms you describe are classic peri symptoms - particularly the feeling that there must be something seriously wrong with you because you have so many seemingly random symptoms.

And middle-aged female GPs can be the worst IME. I’m the same age as you and felt pretty similarly awful ans mine told me it couldn’t be peri as I was too young and had regular periods.

I’m now on HRT and feel almost 100% better.

I would tell them you want a trial of HRT and see how you feel. My money goes on you feeling a lot better.

Honestly I didn’t think anxiety could cause such bad symptoms

OP - I'm sorry you're feeling so upset and anxious. If you Google anxiety you will see that absolutely all of your symptoms can be caused by it.

Do you go to the doctor frequently? You've mentioned having lots of blood tests in the last few months.

Please be assured that your doctor definitely would know if you were dying.
A sense of dread and a feeling of impending death are clear symptoms of anxiety.

How often do you go to A & E?

https://www.nhs.uk/mental-health/conditions/generalised-anxiety-disorder/symptoms/

What were your folic acid (folate) and B12 numbers .. actual raw data
B12 was 268 ng/l, folate was 3.2ug/l. It says “borderline low folate, no need for treatment unless red cells are macrocytic and B12 normal”.

Do you go to the doctor frequently? You've mentioned having lots of blood tests in the last few months.
I go maybe once a year. Except the last six months I’ve felt like crap so have been several times. Only ever been given iron and calcium + vitamin d though.

My mum has all these symptoms and she’s been through years of tests. All shown nothing to be wrong.

The DR diagnosed Fibromyalgia - he said this is basically what they diagnosed when they’ve explored all other options and they don’t know what’s wrong.

Do you lead a very very busy life cramming everything in. If so maybe you need a period of rest.

Did they test for intrinsic factor? ( pernicious anaemia test ) you can have low B12 and still be in the normal range , it has to fall significantly before they give you Vit B12 injections but if you test positive for intrinsic factor and low B 12 even in normal range it might be pernicious anaemia? Get thyroid results to ask for a printout and you can see where you are in so called normal range which is very wide, T4 and T3 should be in upper third of the range.

Edmr helped my health anxiety. Much better than cbt.

As another poster has suggested have you looked up fibromyalgia ( often triggered by stress )

I obviously don't know you so could be completely wrong but I suffer severely with health anxiety and you sound exactly like me and it is honestly unbelievable how many physical symptoms you get from anxiety. I genuinely feel for you cus if that's what it is its shit and has completely ruined my life ❤️

It’s nickname is “shit life syndrome”

Anxiety can make you feel like you’re dying.

OP there's an app called Dare which I've found really good for these symptoms of anxiety that physically manifest. There's a decent free version. I'd give it a go while you wait for the blood results. Anxiety is wicked. Be kind to yourself.

You might have covid

I suffer from health anxiety which I think could exacerbate your symptoms.

However, I get achy muscles and sometimes palpitations as well as low mood when my vitamin D is low. It makes such a huge difference to my physical and mental well-being. I use Cytoplan’s Vit D3+K2 over darker months. They’re stronger dosage so are for shorter term use but they’re the only ones that make a notable difference.

I also find Magnesium and Turmeric supplements help with my anxiety.

Hi - how do they know you’re not peri menopausal. 42 isn’t too young. Symptoms are varied.
I would insist on trying HRT (oestrogen patches and Utrogestan pills).
Thing is - if it is that you may well feel better quickly. If you don’t then the anxiety etc can still be addressed. So many women get given antidepressants when they’re coming into menopause.

I wonder if there’s some odd virus doing the rounds. I have many of your symptoms and don’t have health anxiety, way past menopause. I did a Covid test earlier as I can’t think of anything else to do. Don’t feel ill ill, just achy, bit light headed, pain in my neck and my legs feel like they’ve weights tied to them and beyond tired, I was heading back to bed an hour after I got up. Weird 🤷‍♀️

Get a second opinion.
Your diagnosis is very lazy on the doctor’s part.
They shouldn’t be saying it’s a mental health issue until they made sure it is not something else.

There's quite a few bugs going round at the moment op, diarrhea, dizzyness, eye irritations, stomach pains, feeling dizzy/fainting, joint and muscle pains.

It's only been a few weeks op, I'm not minimising your symptoms op but give it time you may start to slowly feel better, worrying that it's something sinister will put back your recovery.

Although your folate is within range, it is very low. Couple that with in range but low B12 is probably causing most of your symptoms & B12 needs folate to work. Start by taking 5mg folic acid daily, you need to buy it from Amazon as won’t be available OTC at that strength. It is water soluble so not toxic. Do NOT take any B12 supplements as this will screw any future B12 tests. Ask your Dr to run second line B12 deficiency tests, such as MMA. Research B12 & folate deficiency and learn what you can

This is such a difficult situation for you, because you are feeling anxious and that will feed back and can add extra physical symptoms.

It's not black and white - all anxiety or no anxiety. Having even some symptoms caused by anxiety would make it harder for you or a doctor to see which, if any, symptoms are not purely anxiety related (which are the important ones, as anxiety won't actually kill you even though it can feel like being in great danger).

The holy grail for all of us anxious about our health is a doctor reassuring us that they've investigated every possible thing and it's all fine. When we're worried we want that, and we want it right now. But it's nearly impossible to get and I can tell you from past experience that even if you get that you can be worrying again hours or days later. You get a new symptom, or you remember there's one you forgot to mention, or you think that they didn't listen properly...

Alternatively, if you temporarily throw everything you have at reducing the anxiety, then firstly you might feel a lot better right now today, but also you can report to the GP again that you have been doing all this, to try to separate anxiety symptoms from possible other ones. Some symptoms might reduce but some might stay the same and that's useful information to give to the GP.

Purely from personal experience:

• Headspace meditations can really help - worth the subscription in my view.
• Recording symptoms on an app like Bearable can help too as they are then out of your head (and it can help spot patterns and associations between symptoms, medication and so on).
• Maximum distraction by being busy with other people and having less time alone to try to think can also help. TV and podcasts.
• Rather than fruitlessly googling for more answers, make a list of other possibilities to ask the GP about - then they're out of your head for now.

Again I'm absolutely not suggesting those as a way of dismissing your worries, just purely as a way of giving a clearer picture of which symptoms might be anxiety related and which not. It can feel really hard - like how can you concentrate on a meditation or go for a walk or watch TV while you've got this unresolved medical question?? But doing things to just dial down the immediate physical anxiety response can make you feel so much better as well as giving the GP a clearer picture.

You sound magnesium and vitamin D deficient. Since they come as a package deal I would be out every morning to get some morning rays and taking magnesium every day for about two weeks. If no changes then back to GP and a referral out for mental health deterioration.

I was thinking this too. Also found that GPs switch off if you mention that you are anxious and assume it's all in your head.

It absolutely could be peri menopause related. You are the right age and it isn't related to having irregular periods. I felt awful before starting HRT and feel loads better now. The new NICE guidelines are to let women try it and see if they feel better. Go private if you need to along with getting tests to rule out anything else. I'm afraid most GPs are woefully under trained about peri and menopause and some are really dismissive about symptoms, there's no harm in you trying HRT and seeing if it makes you feel better.

Try and get referred to a rheumatologist but there are long waits. You may have an autoimmune disease as probably fibromyalgia. I think GPs really don’t pay much attention to quality of life issues. You are not dying that attitude is not going to help you get treatment. HRT may help but did bugger all for me but still on it. Your symptoms sound similar to mine often brought on during menopause. Gentle exercise, no processed, food positive outlook (which is hard when you feel like shit most of the time) will do more good than any of the drugs they can offer you.

Has your GP considered the side effects of the propanalol? How long have you been taking it? Does it correspond to the onset of your symptoms? Some of the more serious side effect could explain some of your symptoms.
Do you see the same GP each time? Is there another GP in the practice you could discuss things with?