I can’t get out of bed

[fireflylanegirls]

I feel like my life is over. I literally couldn’t get out of bed this morning, the way I feel is just too bad.

I spent over a year worrying about Covid, not just worrying, obsessing.
Panic attacks, sleepless nights, I couldn’t focus on my family life, couldn’t concentrate because of the worry.

I was finally vaccinated and although initially I didn’t feel any better, within a few weeks i started to feel so much happier.

Then the shit news comes about the clots from the vaccine.

I feel absolutely numb. I’ve spent the last 24hours just crying. I wish I’d never had the vaccine now.
It’s been 4 weeks and I’m such a nervous wreck.

My husband has had to drop our son at my mother in laws today because I’m in no fit state to look after him.

I’ve called my GP and have been told to increase my Sertraline to 100mg.

I absolutely hate living with this fear.

I knew this vaccine was too good to be true 😩

This is not normal health anxiety. Please ring your GP again tomorrow.

But yet you still don’t believe your husband. What WOULD make you realise it’s anxiety and not a blood clot?

Has your GP referred you for CBT? If not, then might be worth giving the surgery a call to have this arranged.
You did the right thing getting vaccinated, the chance of developing a clot is extremely rare. Just try to remember that and gravitate to more positive news about the vaccine, it will help alleviate the irrational fears you're experiencing.

I don't mean this flippantly, but why are you so terrified of dying when you are wasting your life like this? An existence of worry and stress to the point you can't get out of bed.

Posted too soon!!! I meant that to get you to see how ridiculous being bed bound worrying about death is. You are wasting your time alive by obsessing.

When my brother was very ill, he was sectioned and got intensive help. It's a shame your doctor thinks a phone call back in a week is enough!!

It's clearly impossible to convince you there's no risk re blood clots so I'm not going to try.

Setting that aside, are you able think about what everyone is saying about your health anxiety? In that we all think you are seriously mentally unwell. Even if you're convinced you're getting a clot, can you also entertain the idea that you need intervention for your mental health?

Ask yourself - how likely is it that 100% of people on mumsnet are reading the situation completely wrong and/or lying to you about you having a mental health crisis? If you can't make that make sense in your head, imagine a friend had posted about a situation and everyone said 'the problem is x' - how likely is it that the problem is x? There's a good chance x is the problem. Can you accept that?

Also think of it like this. If you had a broken leg (clot) and cancer (health anxiety) you wouldn't avoid treatment for one because you were more focused on the other.

Reading some of your posts I genuinely thought you might need some sort of hospital treatment/to be sectioned - to an independent observer it genuinely seems that bad. I don't know enough about the system to know exactly what you need but someone (think it was bluntness) posted some links above. Can you get help for this issue? It doesn't need be either/or.

I'm sorry that you are having your life taken from you in this way.
Can you maybe try and see how your worries are actually manifesting your worst fears.
You don't want something to happen to you that will take you away from your baby but, your crippling anxiety is doing just that.
The most useful advice I can give you is force yourself through each moment - 'I am out of bed and I'm still alive', 'I have had a shower and am still alive', 'I have got dressed and am still alive'.
Laying in bed crippled with worry however valid you believe it to be is not living.

Ok you think your reaction is normal.

Do you know any other human being who has had the vaccine?
You understand how many millions of peoooe have had it?

If you think your reaction is normal.

Then you must think we all are laying in bed, scared to go out, crying, unable to function, unable to look after our children, convinced we have a blood clot?

This is what you think we are all doing? Becayse that’s what normal means, it means you think your behaviour is typical of the vaccinated population.

Is this what you think? This is what millions and millions of people are doing? Is there any one you know in real,life who has been vaccinated who is behaving like you? There has to be right? Or you’d not think it was normal

You are more likely to die from a plane landing on your house

I am pretty sure that statistically speaking this isnt true.

Anxiety is not logical. Things will get better when your medication kicks in. You are doing all the right things.

@JellyBabiesFan

You are more likely to die from a plane landing on your house

I am pretty sure that statistically speaking this isnt true.

It probably is, given that nobody in the world to the best of our knowledge has died of a blood clot that appeared 28 days after the AZ vaccine, as the risk period is first 14 days and none after 20 days - whereas a few unlucky individuals have died of having a plane hit their house.

OP can you get an emergency prescription for Xanax or something similar? You clearly need more intervention right now aside from waiting for an increase in Sertraline to work which takes some time.

To all the people here attempting to reassure her with statistics, it's unfortunately not going to work. As a recovered emetophobe, severe health anxiety is always irrational even if you know you're passed the safe window. There always a "what if" in the back of your head and that's what causes the problems.

Does anyone here remember the fear of HIV from the 90s? Many people developed a phobia where they were terrified that they "accidentally touched something in public that looked like blood and may have infected themselves". I used to be part of a large health forum and they had to ban people from the HIV boards because there were so many threads being started by people with health phobias wanting reassurance that they don't have HIV. The problem was that no matter how many people told them the odds of getting infected from touching a toilet seat or door knob was nearly 0, they were still anxious about that 0.0001%.

Sadly covid and the ensuing vaccine situation seems to have triggered the same type of phobia, which is clearly what OP is suffering from. The specifics are different but it boils down to the fact that there will always be a lingering doubt about possibly getting a blood clot from having had a vaccine, regardless of how much time has passed and how many statistics say otherwise. Shaming or playing devils advocate as some PPs have done definitely do not help in any way.

Health anxiety is a complex disorder and you cannot shame or insult someone out of it. It's like telling people with clinical depression to cheer up because the sun is shining.

@YellowandGreenToBeSeen

But yet you still don’t believe your husband. What WOULD make you realise it’s anxiety and not a blood clot?

@YellowandGreenToBeSeen

Maybe a brain scan?

The risk of clots from things like the Pill is much much higher. This is just very topical and been pounced upon by the media.

I had health anxiety some years ago and spent much of my time in a panic as you are now. I was terrified and used to wake with a start in the middle of the night with palpitations. Every morning began with the thought that today would be ‘the day’. I quite earnestly planned my funeral and wrote down my wishes because I was convinced I had cancer and was going to die imminently.

You talk about whether a fear is rational or not, but I’m not sure the size of a risk itself really matters- it’s how much it impacts you. In my case, a fear of cancer may well be rational as it is such a common illness. Both of my parents died young from cancer so it would not be that unusual if it happens to me too (the loss of my parents is obviously what caused my health anxiety). So I was not being irrational in thinking I might get cancer at some point in my life. What was irrational was the extent to which this thought impacted on my life. Like you, I became inert at times. Incapable of doing anything other than thinking and talking about cancer. I sought reassurance- even getting myself referred for a mammogram and an internal pelvic scan, despite scant symptoms. Once I got an ‘all clear’ for one part of the body, my anxiety would just switch to another.

I started taking Sertraline and had to increase the dose three times until I was on the maximum allowed. It took time to work. The time spent waiting for it to work was very, very tough. But I had to wait it out and it did work eventually. Luckily I had some brilliant friends and a lovely OH who understood what was happening and who declined to be drawn into my continual seeking of reassurance. Incidentally though, this support didn’t include telling me I was being ‘silly’. I’m sure your partner is trying to be supportive but dismissing you in this way isn’t ideal. It would be better if he could be willing to listen to you and console you but without actually getting drawn into conversations about clots/vaccines/Covid. So he could focus on the anxiety itself and say: ‘Your anxiety is really bad at the moment, I’m sorry you’re feeling so frightened’. I actually gave my OH a ‘script’ along these lines because initially he (trying to be supportive) indulged my questions and worries about cancer which was just making me worse.

I hope you start to feel the effects of the Sertraline soon. In the meantime, you will need to find distractions. Hobbies/friends to go walking with/people to chat to online or by phone- as long as the conversation doesn’t centre around health etc.

Distraction doesn’t cure anxiety and won’t work longer term but may help you through the next few weeks while the medication is taking effect. I think I remember you saying you had been on it for 6 weeks- hang in there, it takes time. 💐

A CT brain scan exposes you to something like six months' worth of background radiation in one wallop. No point subjecting yourself to that looking for a clot that isn't there.

Besides which you'd probably just tell yourself that there might be a clot there but the scan didn't see it for some reason, of that a clot sneakily waited until five minutes after you came out of the scanner to develop.

No reassurance will last very long. Your mind is malfunctioning. Get more help for that.

*or that a clot

@Level75

Reading some of your posts I genuinely thought you might need some sort of hospital treatment/to be sectioned - to an independent observer it genuinely seems that bad

Oh gosh, this is awful. It really upsets me.

To be sectioned seems so extreme.

It was only yesterday I was sat at work drinking coffee with my colleagues trying to be normal, I don’t want to be sectioned.

It’s just all so much and sometimes I struggle to cope, but I didn’t realise I came across as needing something so extreme.

I feel like I’ve gone through a really traumatic experience. I gave birth and 4 weeks later the supermarkets were empty, everyone was panicking, a week later the country was locked down because of this awful illness out to get us.

I was absolutely terrified and to be honest that terror and fear has never left me.
The fear of dying and leaving my baby without a mum.

I’ve never got past that fear of Covid. Whilst everyone else seems to be able to live with it, I haven’t.

These last few weeks I’ve started to have a tiny bit of normality.
I’ve been to a supermarket, I’ve been to work, my son is at nursery.

Then the news of the blood clots and it’s like the fear has come flooding back.

I could hide from Covid. I could stay at home, not see anyone.

I can’t hide from the affects of the vaccine. I’ve already had it now. It’s in my body. 😫

@TickyTok agree with all you say but sadly I think OP is currently unable to take on board what we’re saying as she’s in the grip of a crisis. Hopefully when she feels a bit calmer she will be able to. Agree that a short term script for Xanax/Valium could be helpful - maybe worth asking your GP OP?

Btw @TickyTok -Can I ask what cured your emetophobia? It’s one of the phobias/ anxieties of mine that has never quite buggered off despite CBT/exposure etc!

How old is your baby? If he’s less than 12 months you should ask to be referred to the perinatal mental health service. I was referred in my second pregnancy and it made a world of difference to me. I had terrible anxiety but for me it was about my baby’s health rather than mine. I won’t try to convince you that your health is fine because nothing I can say will convince you just as nothing anyone said to me could convince me my baby wasn’t seriously ill in a way that hadn’t been recognised (he wasn’t).

Please please ask for more help. I got better and you can do. I don’t worry about the things that I was absolutely convinced were true.

A couple of things I’ll suggest that did help me and you can try if you want to:

(1) set a time limit on googling what might be wrong - I think I set 30 minutes a day

(2) I like Strictly and I watched It Takes Two twice every day (live as broadcast and recorded the next day) and the main shows. I know it’s not on at the moment but if there’s anything LIGHT that you can binge watch that can be a distraction. Any of the ‘bake off’ ‘sewing bee’ ‘pottery thrown down’ type programmes would be suitable I think.

Take care xx

@fireflylanegirls the fact you pushed yourself to return to work etc - and felt much better for it! - is really positive. Yes it’s shit that you’ve had a setback but unfortunately recovery from anxiety is rarely a smooth road and you’re bound to have relapses.

I think you should hold onto the positives of what you’ve achieved, but also speak to your GP again; be brutally honest about how you feel and maybe discuss short term medication to address the immediate panic (Valium/ Xanax etc).

The scare mongering over this vaccine has been totally horrific. Not surprised people are feeling this way.

*Oh gosh, this is awful. It really upsets me.

To be sectioned seems so extreme.*

Honestly, unless you’re a risk to yourself or others (which it doesn’t sound like you are), I would think this would be very unlikely.

What you describe is very similar to where I was a few years ago. I wasn’t in a good way but I didn’t get sectioned and I did get better.

Though I am not any sort of expert in mental illness (apart from being a long term sufferer) so I could be wrong!

OP, what would happen if you went to A&E and they assessed you, did lots of tests but decided you didn’t need an expensive brain scan. We’re talking doctors with many many years experience. People who want to diagnose and treat people. Professionals who take pride in their jobs. Would you believe them? If the answer is No, then surely that indicates your anxiety is extreme?