To please ask you how to help my cousin

[cousinlove]

She has crippling health anxiety. Always in reference to her children.

I know reassuring her it's not x y or z is not helping. What can I do?

Nothing.

She need a professional advice.

My friend is the same, she at the doctors with emergency appointments to every cough and sneeze.

Wasting resources.

Be blunt that she needs help herself, that’s all you can do.

I can't just let her help herself. She comes to me for reassurance and I want to help.

Currently worried about leukemia due to a fever. I just really want to know how to help her.

I had terrible health anxiety...until Sertraline! My GP was wonderful and put me on a low dose. It helped almost immediately.

Can I ask which dose you were on?

She's already on it but it's not helped. I'm wondering if she should switch

CBT, anti anxiety medicine, mindfulness, self care

I had a friend like this. She was actually diagnosed with OCD which was causing the health anxiety and intrusive thoughts. Your cousin needs mental health support. Try and get her to talk to her GP as a first step.

The best way you can help her is to realise you cannot help her.

She'll need professional help, because quite often well meaning people like yourself, end up inadvertently feeding the anxiety.

Keep a very close eye on her if she refuses medical help. Those kids could be at risk.

And if it's always in reference to her children, she definitely needs professional help before she ends up ruining their lives.

Having been in a similar position, I can agree 100%. The only thing you can do is to get her help.

The voices, or fears, or visions in her head won't turn off because of somebody is being lovely to her. Sadly. I'm sorry, you sound lovely, but she needs professional help.

Reassurance can even make things worse as it becomes part of the pattern of anxiety. I learned this when reading up when my DS got OCD.

there is a you tube guy called "the anxiety guy" bloody fab for health anxiety, he's got a book out on audible.

Stop gap before she can get full medical and professional help. Does she know she has a problem?

Health anxiety is just exhausting, I really empathise with her, it's a long road ahead.

Thank you for all the comments.

I understand me reassuring her actually elevates the anxiety in the long term. If she thinks something is x and I say no, it's not, she then thinks it y.

In terms of professional help, I'm offering to call the crisis team etc. But what actually helps to ta kle it, counselling or CBT or something else?
I have quite a few mental health issues but not sure how to tackle thir in particular.
She is already on SSRI.

It is just in relation to her children - must be worse as theyre young. She takes them to A&E etc quite a lot but this doesn't seemed to have been picked up on by hcp. I'm thinking attending A&E worsens it also?

Does she suffer from ‘munchasen by proxy’ (old name for it).?

The doctor won’t speak to you directly about her, but you can send them a letter voicing your concerns.

Are the children at risk? Could you contact social services?

i agree with the others, she needs professional
gelp. Dies she recognise she has a problem ? Can you Google to see if there are any charities that may be able to provide help?

Oh nothing like that, no, she's a fantastic mother. She loves them so much that she just gets very worried about them. So a simple cold to us would send her spiralling, it's awful.
I think she halfway recognises there's a problem. She's not at the point of rationalising that these are just anxieties and aren't anything to be in fear of but she is starting to see it is health anxiety. I'm concerned about pp depression and also the potential for it to worsen if not treated. I'm gonna do some more googling. I also know she has to help herself but I want to help her help herself if that makes sense