Health anxiety

[Cornishqween]

My heath anxiety is flaring up at the moment, I live with it constantly, and the worst part is I'm terrified of actually seeing the doctor so I pretend it's not happening.

This corona virus isn't helping as I'm constantly checking what's going on and have started buying items 'just in case'.

Sorry for tmi but I have haemorrhoids that have caused me so much trouble over the last few years and lately are very uncomfortable. Well now I've felt a lump near that area but not where I think the haemorrhoids should be and I'm actually losing the plot. I've convinced myself it's a cancerous lump but am terrified to see the doctor. As I write I'm sitting in my bed physically shaking with fear

Dh thinks it's ridiculous and doesn't know what to tell me for the best. Either he takes it seriously and I panic or he says I'm being silly and I get cross.

I know I need to see the gp but I'm so so scared. How can I bring myself to do it?

It could easily be a harmless but annoying skin tag. But that probably doesn’t help you much at the moment.
The ‘Overcoming...’ series of books are excellent, sensible and reassuring. They have one on health anxiety:
www.amazon.co.uk/Overcoming-Health-Anxiety-David-Veale/dp/1845298241?tag=mumsnetforu03-21

I’m sure that would help you to start to unpick your worry and distress

Thanks @SparklingLime

Unfortunately I know it's not a skin tag as it's inside my body, hard and round . I've just convinced myself the absolute worst and now can't mentally track myself down. I know I have to get it seen to, I'm just terrified, I feel sick and on the verge of a panic attack constantly.

Thanks for the recommendation I'll Go search for that now on kindle. Might help me get some sleep tonight

Talk not track

Hi @Cornishqween

Are you on medication for your anxiety and/or having therapy?

Corona Virus is very unlikely to do you any harm even if you were to catch it; The reality is the "infected toll" at present is around 80,000 and yet there have "only" been under 3000 deaths.

Do you keep a journal? What I find helpful is to write down my intrusive thoughts, I like to believe it gives the worries an escape, gets them out of my head and on paper I can see how irrational those thoughts really are.

As for the haemorrhoids, the fear of cancer is a very common theme in anxiety sufferers but nevertheless the reassurance you need can come from only one place, a doctor. You're scared to see your GP but you're more scared of cancer right? So let the GP put your mind at rest, go see your doctor and that fear will subside.

Good Luck.

Deep breath. You can do this - and I promise it will all be ok

See the doc/nurse and put your mind at rest

Report back here when he/she says all is well

I suffer this.

I can only sympathise.

My DP is learning how to support me, he just let's me talk and talks through my options and thoughts. Its a roundabout way of talking me down and getting me out my own mind but it really helps. It's taken us 10 years to get to this point though.

Find someone to talk to. Not about a specific health issue but the anxiety, do it on a day where you don't have a flare up and can describe it to them instead of letting them experience it, I find this helps them understand it when you are having a bad day.

Thanks all.

I know in some part of me it's irrational, but the "what ifs " start to creep in and then I sort of convince myself, and no matter what I can't talk myself down.

I have had this since I was 18 and an ex boyfriend told me over the phone he had AIDS to try and upset me (because I broke up with him). I think the reality that there are horrible diseases sort of woke up the anxiety. It's come and gone over the years, but got better when I had kids, couldn't focus on myself so much.

I'm putting off going until next week as it's my birthday and I'm going away tomorrow. I know if they refer me for further tests I'll not be able to calm down, I'll be back to panic attacks etc and the weekend will be ruined.

As soon as I'm home I'm going to do it I'll post to let you guys know

Can you ever get over this? Will it ever go? My Nan said to me when this started nearly 20 years ago that she had the same anxiety her whole life, she thought she was dying from when she was in her 20s. She was told me not to let it control me like it had her, she said you'll waste your life worrying and that's what I do

You could be me, right down to finding reasons to put off seeing a Dr. " it's my birthday/ holiday/ exam"

What happens with me is I'll wake up one day and decide I, right I need to see a dr NOW!! It often backfires because my Dr is often fully booked.

Medication helps, counselling not so much. Everyone is different.

I take my DP to appointments which helps .

Make an appointment, the sooner you go, the sooner you can put this behind you. I won't patronize you by say it will be fine, I'm not a dr, but i suspect it will be. It is actually more important you discuss the anxiety

Hi CornishQween,

Have you made your appointment yet? The sooner you go to the doctor the better, hopefully he/she can put your mind at rest.

I used to suffer with horrible health anxiety - it's just awful and as your Nan said I ended up feeling that I was wasting my life. I still get it occasionally but not nearly as badly. For me the things that helped were:

1. When I found a lump/abnormality/something to worry me, I told myself firmly to try to put it aside for the rest of the day, and get on with something distracting. I didn't let myself even touch the area. Then I could revisit the problem the next day - after all, a day won't make a difference to the outcome. Very often I found that the next day I didn't even need to revisit it - I just knew it wasn’t actually a real health issue. If I did revisit it, I generally realised it wasn't anything to worry about. If I revisited it and decided it was genuinely a worry, I could make a doctor's appointment.

1. I think in a lot of cases anxiety about health is actually an expression of anxiety in other areas of our life, which we are suppressing. For example, the other day I woke up in the middle of the night and out of nowhere decided that a mole on my chest was cancerous - I got into a complete panic, heart pounding, mind racing etc. Even at the time I KNEW the mole was absolutely fine and I KNEW it was just my mind playing tricks on me. It was anxiety from other areas of my life rearing its ugly head in the form of health anxiety. In the morning I didn't even bother checking the mole but I did go through the other things I was worried about and came up with some strategies to deal with them. Perhaps you could have a think about anything else in your life which is causing you anxiety – if you can deal with that, you might find that the health anxiety calms down. I bet something like pilates/yoga/mindfulness would help too, though I’ve never tried it myself.

1. I'm also convinced that in my case hormone imbalance plays a big part in my anxiety. I can tell my hormones are hugely off-whack by other symptoms I have throughout the month. I'm trying a few supplements at the moment but this is a work in progress!

1. This might not work for you, but what also helped me was having a target of not going to the doctor for a set period of time. Of course this could add to your stress if there was something which you felt you really had to see the doctor about, but for me it turned it into a positive challenge. I felt like I was getting somewhere with my anxiety when I succeeded.

1. Do you have kids? I think a lot of women suffer with health anxiety partly because they're frightened for their kids' future if they were to die. I know that is the case with me. What helped me (though it was hard to do) was to sit down and go through exactly what would happen to the kids if I did die. Who would look after them? How would my husband cope? How would they cope emotionally? Even though there weren't easy answers, doing this made me realise that things would probably be ok for them in the end. I think this lifted a bit of a weight off me.

Sorry about the essay!! But I do really sympathise with you and hope you get an answer from the doctor soon xx

I really wanted to just stop by and give you a hug. You sound exactly like me. It's brought a tear to my eye. I'm going through something very similar. I've struggled with health anxiety since my daughter was born 13 years ago so I know how horrible it is. You can have periods where it's manageable and then it flares up. I'm sorry not to be able to offer any advice but I can assure you, you're not alone x

Anyone still checking this thread. I’m having a tough time with my health anxiety.

@Vick99 I just wanted to comment and say how excellent your reply was, I’ve screen shot it to read over and over, it makes so much sense and @Cornishqween sending you all my love from a fellow sufferer

Thanks @pinkrabbits39, that's really nice of you. Just to add, I started taking ashwagandha tablets about six months ago (on recommendation from Mumsnet) and that's been brilliant for my anxiety - at least I think it has, it's always difficult to tell with supplements! Worth looking into, anyway. Good luck, I hope things improve for you soon.

[quote pinkrabbits39]**@Vick99* I just wanted to comment and say how excellent your reply was, I’ve screen shot it to read over and over, it makes so much sense and @Cornishqween* sending you all my love from a fellow sufferer[/quote]
Thanks for reminding me to check this thread.

I've not been on for a long while. Still having terrible anxiety, although I did force myself to go to the doctors about my original issues and it was a lot less worrisome than I'd made myself believe. I now however have replaced this with something else...the cycle goes on

Must try that supplement mentioned, will do anything to help at this point. This year has definitely impacted my mental health in a very big way.

Lovely to read some voices of reason and have something to add to my scary thoughts. So thank you all