Health anxiety is ruining my life

[BonnieBlueButler]

For the last 3 weeks I've been convinced I have bowel cancer. Today, I noticed one tonsil is bigger than the other so now I think I have lymphoma instead. Or maybe I have both. Either way, I'm certain something is wrong and it's just a case of finding it.

Does anyone relate? I've had HA for a while, ever since I've had my children but it's out of control at the moment. My life is miserable and I hate what it is doing to me and hate myself for it. I'm missing so much with my children as I'm spending all my time worrying that I will leave them.

I'm terrified to touch my own body in case I find something else. I'm googling constantly which I fully realise just feeds my anxiety and spirals me but it's compulsive. I'm desperately looking for something to reassure me but end up feeling worse.

I've had CBT in the past but it hasn't really helped too much. She told me she could only really treat me for general anxiety as HA is very difficult to treat as it's not altogether illogical. Is this anyone else's experience?

I found myself checking my son's tonsils today to compare to my own and I know I need help. My mom did the same when I was growing up and it's all I can remember. I'm horrified that I'm repeating the same cycle.

Has anyone successfully managed to control their HA? I'm getting pretty desperate.

I suffer from HA too. Really bad about a year ago. Had to see a counsellor and course of CBT. It was awful and was taking over my life. The worse bit was I had no one to talk to then I posted on here and realised I was not a lone. I am much better now but I wouldn't say completely cured. I find that when I feel overwhelmed by anxiety I go for a walk or try to distract myself. I found the book Overcoming Health Anxiety by D. Veale helped me. You are not a lone. 💐

Thank you so much for replying. You're right, it can be very isolating. I have such awful dark thoughts about it all and feel so alone at times. My poor husband tries to understand but it must be very difficult. I'm making life so hard for everyone.

I will definitely look into that book. Thank you.

Hi Bonnie
I really identify with what you have written. Ive suffered with HA pretty much my whole life (partially genetic/traumatic childhood)

If it helps, Bowel cancer and tonsil cancer are two things I have thought I had and been checked for (I also have one massive tonsil - its normal!) I also have stress related IBS.

CBT helped me somewhat but it is a temporary fix and it needs to be re done once you are feeling bad again. Exercise has always helped me, and writing your worries down so that on reflection you can see that they are irrational (I would have died of like 35 diseases by now!)
I also have an app that has some buddist mindfulness techniques which has helped me sleep when I'm feeling anxious.

Parenting with anxiety has been my biggest challenge. I have a 19 month old DD and actually I've coped with motherhood well except for when she's ill. (A temperature and Im terrified she has meningitis) I went through a really dark patch last year when I was at home with her full time, at one point I thought she had neurofibromatosis! My Dh is very laid back and finds it very hard to understand. We have had some real clashes over safety!!!!

Don't beat yourself up. This is a hard illness to live with and you are doing amazing. Be kind to yourself. Have a drink (I would be tonight if I wasn't expecting again ;))

unicorn thank you so much.

I wasn't like this before I had my children. Now I spend so much time imagining their lives without me. I think about writing them letters. I sit and sob thinking of them without me. It's ridiculous. My mind goes to some very dark places and I can't control it. It's like a button was pressed when I had my babies. Suddenly, I became terrified.

I have had so many deadly illnesses that I haven't actually had. My motor neurone disease month was a treat! But with each new one, I can't help thinking: what if this time I'm right?

I went to the docs today about my swollen tonsil. He wasn't worried. Thinks there is an infection. I have antibiotics. Straight away I'm planning what I'll say next time as I'm sure the antibiotics won't work and it's just a matter of time before they find the true problem.

It's no way to live is it?

Knowing I'm not alone helps so much.

By the way, congratulations on your pregnancy unicorn

@BonnieBlueButler you're not alone in feeling like this, what you've written is very similar to how I feel, although I worry about leaving my partner on his own. I also have stress-related IBS.

We don't have kids but are currently TTC and am worried what my health anxiety will be like when I hopefully get pregnant.

I'm having talking therapy and she has recommended CBT as the next step.

Google is the root of all evil!!

I'm so grateful for your reply Magpie. It really helps. It's such an awful and exhausting condition. The hours I've wasted worrying and fretting and diagnosing myself. I get so angry.

And you're absolutely right - Google is awful. I would not spiral nearly so much without it. I just cannot help myself though.

I'm also a fellow health anxiety sufferer - my current worry is inflammatory breast cancer as I have a red patch under one breast (almost certainly rubbed due to the hot weather, but there's that "what if" that is the bane of my life).

Regarding the tonsil, I had one that was seriously massively bigger than the other - had to have it out to be biopsied just in case - you can imagine how my anxiety was through all that - turned out to just be a massively big tonsil, and nothing nasty at all (at which point my ha moved on to something else). It's a total bastard and robs life of joy. I hate having it. Mine ebbs and flows - its always there to some extent, but it goes through massive flare ups on a regular basis. I can't look at my body just in case I find something - and once I have found something, I either obsessively look at it or can't look at it at all. I have yet to find a successful way to manage it, but wanted you to know you are definitely not alone xx

Apanicaday you've summed it up perfectly. It robs life of joy. I can't live life as I'm terrified of it ending. I regularly make my best friend promise that she will come and hug my children every day if I die. It's such a terrible way to think.

I'm terrified of doing a breast examination or even looking too much at them as I know I'll find something, even though there is likely to be nothing so I totally relate to you not being able to look at your body. I also recognise the 'ebb and flow'. When it's in full force it's all consuming. It comes out of nowhere and then I'm back in the middle of a nightmare cycle that I cannot get out of.

Thank you for the tonsil information. I'm so glad it turned out to just be a big tonsil. See, the tonsil thing would not have really registered with me if I hadn't had access to google and casually put it in. You can imagine what I saw and it has just spiralled from there. Obsessive googling, obsessive checking. On it goes.

I do so appreciate your reply.

The coming from nowhere thing is very familiar to me too - I find something and then can feel the panic descend almost immediately - tunnel vision and all the rest of it. I also can't do breast examinations as I know I will find something. I am very very lucky in that I've found a brilliant gp - she knows me very well, and also knows how to deal with my worries. She is endlessly patient too. I dread her leaving the doctors I go to.

Just wanted to say that I understand as I have the same problem. Like you Bonnie, mine was triggered by having a child. I already had a history of anxiety and have had a stressful time with both my parents being seriously ill in recent years, so I guess I had other predisposing factors too.

I agree it really sucks the joy out of life. Sometimes I feel that I am merely existing. Although I know that I will look back on the time squandered on worrying about my health and wish I'd spent it more wisely, when I'm in the thick of the anxiety I can't see the bigger picture at all. I keep telling myself "a life lived in fear is a life half lived" but I'm scared to stop worrying in case that makes it more likely that something will happen to me (??!!).

I too can't do a breast exam (or indeed look at any of my moles, or feel my lymph nodes) without finding something to panic about!

Thank you Mines. I keep saying it, but it helps so much to know I'm not alone - although I wouldn't wish it on anyone.

Unfortunately, my anxiety is massive today and I'm feeling certain there is something awful wrong. Every little twinge in my throat is convincing me I have throat cancer. I've been reading up on health anxiety and it's absolutely true that any focus on a particular symptom exacerbates it ten-fold. I know this to be true, but I still can't help it. I keep looking at my children and feeling dreadful.

I'm just hoping that I come out the other end of this particular phase soon. This is the worse it has ever been. My mom ended up with electric shock therapy in the early 80s, so bad was her cancer phobia. She literally couldn't get out of bed she was so paralysed with fear. So as well as the anxiety about my health, I'm also terrified of ending up as bad as my poor mom was.

Are you on any medication bonnie? I know it's not a magic cure, but mine helps to stop some of the dips - when I go off the deep end I still go off the deep end, but it helps to stop that happening with every single thing. Having said that, it isn't helping greatly at the moment, and there are some side effects I could do without.

The increased focus on symptoms is so true - I can feel my breast burning where I have convinced myself the cancer is - there's nothing there but I can still feel it. I remember being able to feel stuff in my throat too when i had the big tonsil.

I've been trying to use something called ACT at the moment - the psychologist I see recommended it to me as CBT hasn't helped me much. There's a book called "the happiness trap" thats got the key ideas in it - some of them work better than others for me, but it's worth a read - if for no other reason than to give your mind something else to focus on for a while. Another practical thing that helps me when mine is really bad is to do something to stop my brain being able to get hooked and obsessed on thoughts - my particular favourite is to listen to audiobooks and crochet - but it has to be both at the same time or my brain isn't busy enough to stop the thoughts. Doesn't always work, and it doesn't fix it, but it does sometimes give me a bit of respite from the constant internal arguments between the "this is it, you are going to die" side, and the "no it isn't, it's just an xyz" side, which get so very tiring.

Sorry - that turned into a bit of an essay!!

Apanic I took citralopram last year when things got bad for a couple of months but I really didn't like it. I didn't feel great on them but the side effects of stopping were horrible. I got frightening brain zaps for weeks. My GP has advised me to go back on them but I'm not sure. What I feel I need is something quick to calm me and shake me out of this current episode but there doesn't seem to be a quick fix.

Thanks for the information on ACT. I will definitely look into it. I'm willing to try anything. I also didn't find CBT too helpful. I really had high hopes for it but rather than actual useful techniques, I just felt like it was a lot of theory.

Like you, I'm exhausted with the whole process. Constantly thinking in this way is so exhausting. I get to the point where I feel almost saturated! But even then, I manage to worry more. The only thing that helps in this state is to say to myself that even if the worst is true, it can be treated etc. I almost have to make myself believe it is true to get any respite at all from worrying that it might be. I don't know if that makes any sense at all.

I'm also a big audio book fan. It does calm me and at the moment, I just can't focus on reading books myself.

Early this Year I was convinced I had Stomach Cancer and/or Pancreatic Cancer!
I spent my days googling looking for some reassurance I did not but only convinced myself that I actually MUST have!
Nights not sleeping-crying to my partner.
Composing letters to my children in my mind
Crying 10 times a day
Not caring about my appearance or anything really,not eating.
Back and forth to the Doctors to demand/beg tests

I had many tests and these have helped at the moment I am awaiting a Colonoscopy as several months ago my fear moved onto Bowel Cancer and wont really go away until I have it.
I know how silly I sound-Docs think its IBS
However everytime I get a symptom of IBS(which is also a symptom of BC) i freak.
It is horrible and you all have my sympathy.
I have always been a worrier and a "what if" kind of person but I do think since having my youngest that things have changed and I worry about everything-things I never worried about with my eldest.

Charlie I can totally relate to the bowel cancer worries. It was this fear that started the current phase I am in. Six weeks ago I had absolutely convinced myself that I had it and that it had spread to my lungs. I have an appointment with a specialist in August. I am coming to accept that it may actually be stress-related IBS but I have wasted so many hours of my life worrying about it.

Meanwhile, my worries have fixated elsewhere! I now fear throat and mouth cancer. Sometimes my husband lists all the cancers I've had over the last couple of years; there are many. I also feel ridiculous at times but the awful fear and dreadful certainty that this time you are right is so hard to rationalise with. Worrying is so pointless but so hard to stop.

Thank you for your message.

I had just came on here to start a thread saying this

I'm beyond terrified of cancer, even writing that feels like I'm pushing my luck

I've had CBT, colonoscopy, other things....am just beyond terrified

I look at it as inevitable, like I've only got so long to go, like its only time till my kids don't have me, honestly I chew myself up continuously thinking of my demise and the effect on my kids....

its just awful, I'd give anything not to feel like this, I just cant imagine feeling normal and not continuously think of dying or being diagnosed with something awful

I can't watch cander adverts or see programmes to do with it, even fundraising I run a mile, I just can't face it

you're not alone op

ssd I'd also do anything not to feel this way. It does feel inevitable and I often find myself thinking, if I can just get my kids to a certain age, then they may have a chance without me. The irony of that isn't lost on me. I'm terrified of not being alive and yet I seem to be wishing my life away.

I'm so sad that this is how I feel and of how much joy I'm missing. I'd do anything to 'snap' out of it. I keep mentioning my mom, but I don't think she's had a day of worry-free happiness in 40 years or more. Not a single day. I'm terrified of being like this but I do not know what to do about it.

bonnie, I'm the same, I keep thinking "if I can get them to 18 it'll be ok if I die then"...what an awful way to think

my dad was a worrier too....a few weeks before he died, he told me he wishes he hadn't worried so much.....I know this should stop me worrying but I can't, it's in my bones

Hi OP. It sounds like you are double-anxious - the HA and then the anxiety that the HA is going to ruin your life.

I know you said CBT wasn't helpful before but it is very good for anxiety. Perhaps you didn't have long enough or didn't click with your therapist?

Sertraline can be good for anxiety. I have also used beta blockers in the past to combat physical effects, like heart pounding.

Compulsive checking can be habit forming as you have found. It doesn't actually reassure and you end up diverting to a new condition. Distraction is a good technique if you can't rationalise as the anxiety can burn itself out in a bit of time, if it comes in waves.

I second the Overcoming book choice as I've used others in the series.

Just know that you're doing well in the respect that you have insight! You could be posting on here asking if we think you have x or y disease but instead you're posting in MH and talking clearly about your anxiety. Keep that up!

Yes, I have largely put my health anxiety to bed. CBT really worked for me. I occasionally worry now, like once or twice in a day for a couple of days a month. No biggie. And I feel like I have the tools, and I know what I'm doing to fight against it effectively.

I think this thing that you were told that HA is difficult to treat is absolute bollocks. What sort of person did your CBT? A clinical psychologist or a counsellor? HA is bread and butter CBT stuff. Absolutely treatable with CBT.

Go get another round of CBT with a psychologist. Preferably an NHS one.

I'm so grateful so all of your posts but also sad to think of so many of us going through this.

It's interesting you say that the anxiety can burn itself out in time alpaca. That's what's always seemed to happen eventually in the past. I was terrified of MS and spent a whole summer convinced I had it. I even convinced my husband. It's frightening how insistent I can be. My neurologist appoint my was for October half term. By the time it came around, I no longer thought I had it and most symptoms had just disappeared. I think I just reached the very height of anxiety and it just went away. It's not happening yet this time. It has never been this bad and I can almost feel myself slipping into a depression from the constant worrying. My husband just told me this evening that I've lost interest in everything. I've stopped running in case I have a bad run and think it's because I'm ill. My little boy is 4 this weekend. Instead of being excited about it, all I can think is that I won't be here for the next one. Thank you for your encouraging words though. I have posted plenty of times looking for health reassurance but I do recognise that this level of worry isn't normal. I've downloaded the 'Overcoming' book.

Output well done on getting over your HA. It really gives me hope. My CBT person was a counsellor. She just said there are so many things going on in HA and that it's not totally illigical so thought it best to treat me for generalised anxiety. There was a lot of theory, much of it I know about as I did psychology at university and very little practical tools. I am more than willing to give it another go though and pay for it if needed. I'm a teacher and up until April time was so looking forward to the summer with my children. Now all I can see is day after day of wanting to be alone and just waiting for bedtime to get some peace. I can't stand this thought. I can't stand to waste anymore time. I really need to get this sorted. I won't forgive myself if I ruin this summer.

I'm sorry my posts are so long and rambling. It's just cathartic to be able to tell about it without being told, in the nicest way possible, to stop worrying.

Perhaps you are experiencing depression now? The lack of interest in things is what doctors call "anhedonia" and is a classic sign of depression. Personally, my anxiety couples strongly with depression; when I am depressed, my anxiety is worse.

How would you feel about speaking to your GP about depression? Anti-depressants can be extremely effective if you have the correct ones. And they're not for life, you can taper off when you're feeling better. I know you had brain zaps before, and they are unpleasant. However, if it means you will be well again, it might be worth the risk? They are temporary at least.

Don't apologise at all. I have posted on various websites when I've been sick and it helped no end. You have every right to be here It sounds like it's affecting your self-confidence a lot. I would make a GP appointment, the book might not be enough right now (but it will help). However, it is up to you.

I hope my mention of depression doesn't compound your HA at all. It is extremely treatable.

Bonnie, do absolutely take up the advice about medication, but also do ask your GP about CBT. I've had CBT twice in my 20s and that 'lasted' until my 40s and post natal anxiety, when I felt I really needed a top up. In between, I did see a counsellor who claimed to do CBT (when i was doing ivf) but it was nothing like the experience with the NHS psychologists. What they provided was a completely different quality of challenge, thoughtfulness and adaptation to what I was thinking and my lifestyle, and that's no doubt why it was so life changing in 8 or so weeks. I'm such a fan of well executed CBT, but I think there's a lot of shit CBT out there, muddying the waters of its effectiveness.

Find someone well qualified, preferably an NHS psychologist. It can be life changing. Honestly, I could literally barely move for anxiety a year ago. I was actually paralysed with fear on a regular basis. I am now so so much better. Stuff enters my head and just goes back out again and gets replaced with nonsense about Made in Chelsea or storage units or how nice it would be in my dream house. It's marvellous! There really is hope.