Young and cannot stop worrying about my health - should I just pay for a private MRI?

[anonymous98]

I want to keep this vague, since anyone who reads it who knows me in real life might be able to identify me.

Ever since I was young (pre-adolescence), I've had a terrible fear of illness. I spent about a year as a teenager convinced I had various forms of cancer, ebola, TB; You name it, I thought I had it. I've been on and off medication since I was 16 and have been in therapy since childhood. None of it has really helped. I have had debilitating panic attacks for years.

I'm now well into my 20s, have just finished a postgraduate degree and have gone back to living at home because, frankly, I cannot deal with adult life. I am working sporadically (mostly temping and freelance) because I walked out of my last job in 2022 after having a complete breakdown, convinced I was going to collapse and stop breathing. I then spent several months convinced I was allergic to everything, couldn't leave the house, lost a bit of weight and then became worried I had cancer. I've since put the weight back on. I know I sound absolutely ridiculous but these thoughts feel very real at the time and I feel absolutely terrified. I'm agoraphobic and have a fear of fainting in public (I have fainted before and found it incredibly frightening). I was also diagnosed with a mild neurological condition during my degree which is not life-threatening but affects my vision. I have to have regular check-ups at neurology which I dread because I'm convinced they're going to find a brain tumour.

I was living with friends but got kicked out of the flat (not unjustifiably) because I kept dissociating and spent time in my room crying and avoiding everyone. I feel I've lost a lot of friends and opportunities already because I cannot deal with anything.

My mother, who I live with, is really struggling to deal with me and has suggested that I should just pay for a full-body MRI. I've had various tests done fairly recently (comprehensive bloods, an ultrasound of my pelvic region, CT scan of head last year), all of which have been fine. I also bought a FIT test after hearing about colorectal cancer rates increasing in young adults which was completely clear. I don't believe doctors who tell me I'm fine and am honestly considering just getting in an MRI because I cannot go on like this.

Sorry, just re-read and realised how rambling and incoherent this is.

The mri won’t help - it’s a snapshot of your body that day, and it sounds like you’ll immediately start worrying about something new developing.
I would look into some sessions with a psychologist instead. You need techniques for managing these worries. It’s great that you can recognize, at least in hindsight, that these worries are not proportionate.

Oh this sounds so difficult for you.the problem is and MRI wouldn't pick up on lots of problems and if it's only due to health anxiety it would be quite unethical for them to take your money.

I'd suggest your money may be better spent on finding a good provider of private psychotherapy to treat your health anxiety if you're previous sessions haven't quite worked.

Should also add that I have vague, non-specific symptoms. Heart races, sometimes I feel 'unreal' and dissociative, slightly fatigued and occasional dizziness. I had a sore back for a few months but that seems to have gone away.

MRI can't cure anxiety. It's completely inappropriate & pointless for your illness.

These are more likely anxiety symptoms

Sounds like OCD. The scan won’t reassure you. Nothing will ever reassure you. Therapy is the answer xx

Thank you, trying to believe this myself. Are there any effective OCD therapies? I've had lots of CBT and it hasn't helped.

It’s okay, I understood.

So seems pretty clear it’s health anxiety. The thing is, if you get an MRI will that really reassure you? Will you then be questioning the accuracy of the scan, the fact that not everything shows up on an MRI etc

Also it’s kind of ironic that you’re tempted to go for an MRI to quell your mum’s inability to sit with your anxiety. That tells me that your anxiety has perhaps not been accepted while you were growing up - if your mum struggles with your anxiety, she will also sturuggle with her own anxiety, and that means you won’t ever have learned to tolerate the feelings of anxiety.

I think you’ll be much more productive looking into anxiety than getting unnecessary health checks.

Some good sources on anxiety - read their books -

instagram.com/theanxietymd?igshid=YmMyMTA2M2Y=

instagram.com/wisdomofanxiety?igshid=YmMyMTA2M2Y=

instagram.com/owenokaneten?igshid=YmMyMTA2M2Y=

Also op, you have to work on accepting that as we age, our bodies do ache, you will have health issues minor and perhaps major, most of which can be treated successfully and you need to manage it proportionately.

I've currently got cancer and I'll hopefully be fine but if not I've lived a rich and full life. If I'd have spent the last 20 odd years panicking about getting cancer I'd have wasted the best years of my life. Think about that.

Thank you. My mother is extremely anxious so it's the blind leading the blind, really. I'll look at the resources.

It sounds like things are feeling really tough for you
Genuinely, you'd be better spending the money on a course of decent CBT. The MRI, will reassure you but only temporarily, you will then worry it's missed something, or need another type of test, or something developed the day after the MRI.
Health anxiety is really common but can be treated really affectively with therapy. I've treated people with health anxiety for 15+ years, no-one has ever been reassured more than pretty temporarily by tests or procedures. The symptoms you are describing are all associated with anxiety, they are not any less real, or difficult to cope with, but you are unlikely to find a physical cause for them..

OP, as others have said: an MRI will not reassure you.

If you were my daughter, I'd be trying to find the best possible therapist for your anxiety. CBT doesn't work for everyone; it may be that a combination of medication and therapy would help you where one thing alone won't.

I'm sorry that you're going through this: proper anxiety is horrible, and it's also very upsetting for your mum to live with it. I have seen it from both sides, as I have suffered from it myself, as has one of my (now adult) children.

Hi OP,
I’m a GP. I won’t give individual advice on here, but usually further investigations worsen health anxiety. So whilst your mum’s suggestion is well meant, please use your money to find a great therapist to help you through this instead. It often takes more than one course of psychological therapy to help especially as your needs change over time. If you do go for the scan, be prepared for the ‘what if they missed something’ thoughts or the commonly found ‘incidental-omas’ on scans which can lead to further unnecessary investigations and worry. Medication can help whilst waiting for or commencing therapy too and this is something your GP should be well placed to discuss with you.

good luck with it!

Sounds awful.
Sorry to ask this, but can you think of a reason why your therapy hasn't worked/isn't working?

The problem with any kind of panic/anxiety is that no therapist can cure it for you, they simply guide you to cure yourself.

No you shouldn't. MRIs of totally healthy people can throw up oddities that will cause you more anxiety, AND you'll be putting yourself in the hands of people who are financially incentivised to ask you to investigate anything and everything further. The anxiety will reattach itself to something else, maybe even psychosomatic symptoms from the MRI itself.

You should spend the money on proper mental health support, it's really important.

I agree with PP that you should spend the money on private mental health support. An MRI will not help you.

I agree that the MRI is a bad idea. You’ll feel better for a day, then the anxiety will move somewhere else, soon it’ll be as bad as ever. And you’ll be fixating on another MRI, maybe an EEG or bladder function tests or a muscle biopsy. There aren’t enough medical tests in the world to reassure a person with real health anxiety.

Have you tried any of the third generation CBT therapies? ACT, maybe? Even DBT might be worth looking into.

Would you be able to fund some private therapy?

Don’t get an mri. You need therapy.

Have a look at this video;

If it resonates you should consider remedial hypnosis - it's not "woo" but can change your thought patterns within 3 sessions.

Health anxiety means that the sufferer is not reassured by tests which are clear. They continue to believe there's something wrong with them that hasn't been found yet. You've already had a lot of tests and you're still not reassured.

You need to recognise your symptoms are due to anxiety. Put the effort into getting help for your anxiety. An MRI will not help you

A book I found very helful was How To Stop Worrying and start living dale Carnegie. Cheap on Amazon. Won't solve everything but will posshelp

CBT plus exposure and response prevention. With meds if you want to try them. That’s the evidence based course of action. Best of luck x

With the greatest kindness OP, there is no quick fix for this, and NOTHING OTC will help you.

You need regular therapy and potentially medication to manage this. I struggled, and still do deal with, health anxiety after a diagnosis that changed my life six years ago. I had MRI scans on the NHS for something unrelated, but believe me, it will do nothing to qwell your fears - you'll just be on to the next thing, the next ache, the next tingle - as I was!

CBT was all but useless for me - my stubborn brain refused to allow new pathways to be made, and I was constantly second guessing it. Proper talking therapy, Freudian, old school 'what's your relationship with your parents like' therapy, got me to a place of understanding and acceptance.

I can recognise and prevent spiralling now. And I think that is one of the most powerful tools I have.

Take care of yourself and put the work in and free yourself from this cycle. x

Thank you everyone. I have read these messages and although I'm not able to reply to them all at the moment, I greatly appreciate all the help. I was paying for private therapy for a while. However, it was coming out of my savings & money from my late grandparents, so I felt very guilty about using that money and stopped. I'm going to keep pursuing that I think - my therapist is lovely and was the only person who proposed treating me for OCD as well as anxiety.

Also agree that opting for an MRI will just mean that something will get flagged up, cause me huge amounts of potentially avoidable anxiety. I think the private sector have a tendency to overdiagnose and over-treat. And yes, it won't help long term because I had a scan of my head last year and am still worried about brain tumours.