My health anxiety is making me suicidal

[BeingmummyIsTheBestxo]

I've had health anxiety and general anxiety, Intrusive thoughts for as long as I am remember. I am diagnosed with GAD and OCD which revolves around my health and indeed my own mortality. I have therapy every week to try and combat this. I am prescribed medication which I just cannot bring myself to take due to intense fear of adverse effects. Iv diagnos d myself with many things over the years from brain rumours to epilepsy to heart problems and many many more. I spend my days avoiding being in the house by myself, avoiding being at home alone with my toddler due to fear of something bad happening. Mainly terrified I'll just drop dead at any moment.. I cannot get these thoughts out of my head. It is constant. It is exhausting. My DH has just about had enough of me and my avoidance behaviour, my irrational beliefs and thoughts, my irritability mainly due to being mentally exhausted. I feel like a terrible mother to my toddler.. I love him so much and my anxieties revolve around something happening to me and him being with out me. Recently, I've not been able to focus on anything other than my anxiety and my thoughts of dying suddenly and about my health. I always feel physically sick, shakey, racing thoughts, achey, heart racing, heart palpitations, fatigued. I've spiralled into a thought process of what's the point, I feel like I can't fight this anymore, I'm so miserable and exhausted, and I just think at least if I'm dead I won't have to live like this, I'll do everyone in my life a favour by just ending it all. I have never made plans they are just thoughts. How can I be thinking like this when I'm so terrified of being sick or death? It feels cruel to me that these are the main things that fuel my anxiety yet I'm sitting here thinking maybe I should just do it and stop prolonging the inevitable. I'm not sure what I'm hoping to achieve from this post. I just feel so alone. And feel that by keeping this all to myself I'm saving everybody else's feelings and saving. Myself the guilt and shame of being like this.

Op you have two choices here. You take the medication or carry on as you are. There is no other option. I know that sounds incredibly harsh but it’s the truth. What could be worse than feeling like you are now?

Your husband is probably at his wits end because you are ill, have been offered a lifeline and won’t take it. He is frustrated. You are being selfish but you don’t realise it because you are so ill. You HAVE to take the medication for yourself but for your family too. It’s hell living with someone who has got health anxiety. Please try. You can get better but you have to take a leap of faith. You either live with the minuscule chance of a SSRI causing heart issues or you live like this and could ultimately lose everything.
just do it, swallow the tablet and start living

Do you allow your toddler to take prescription meds or over the counter ones? Do you feel the same about Calpol for example? Just wondering if your anxiety around meditation extends to others you love.

Yes I allow my toddler to take .meds if he needs them

Juiceworld that sounds like what it says on the service website

Unfortunately in the real world you wouldn't get to a secondary care assessment threshold without having tried an SSRi or two in primary care. The GP probably knows that and that's why they didn't refer.

Therapy has been tried. There's a huge waiting list for secondary care psychology and the most effective treatment is an SSRI plus CBT.

OP needs to find a way to take the medication, possibly for the sake of her husband and child, or her situation won't get better.

Hey @BeingmummyIsTheBestxo just finally sitting down and thought I'd check in. How's your day been?

My hormones are at it and I've had a bit of a wobbly day today.

How's your wrist feeling?

Hey.
My worst is much better today! Still sore but better than it was! I've had an okay day, I manag d to go out for a while leak and to do some of my housework which would usually send me into a meltdown but I've managed it, just sitting down now after putting DS to bed and starting to feel quite anxious. I've got an appointment with the GP Wednesday just to see if there is anything else they can do for me. But I imagine they will tell me th same as everyone else and to take the medication but if I can just discuss my concerns with them hopefully I might be able to push myself to take that leap. Me and DH are on bad terms and we spoke last night about ending our relationship because he feels that he can't live with me anymore and has given me an ultimatum to stop talking to him about my anxieties or leave so I'm not sure where I am going to go from here now.

Just wanted to provide a counterbalance in case it helps. I have taken SSRIs (initially Prozac, but more recently, citalopram) for many years. I think 25 in total. I know some do, but I didn’t have any side effects when starting them - there wasn’t a period I had to “get through” before I started feeling better. There is a delay in noticing improvements, but it isn’t automatic that you will feel awful in the interim. Wishing you strength. X

I used to take citalopram many years ago in my late teens with no issues. I remember I stopped taking it because I felt better but also because it used to give me terrible nightmares and I was sleeping for england even when I took it at night I would sleep for 14 hours or so. Granted I was not as bad mentally as I am now. It was more a depressive episode which led me to be prescribed them whereas now my anxiety is th major issues.

You could ask about trying a different AD? I have made my peace with being on them lifelong. Initially I would stop the px when I felt better but after 3-4 relapses my then GP asked me why I felt I needed to do so. I found I didn’t have an answer so have not even attempted to rock the boat since.

I suffer from GAD but more and more is health related, especially as I get older
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Fluoxetine is quite good for not having withdrawal or onset effects as it has a long half life. It's less affected by missed doses and 20mg is often effective for anxiety. Maybe you would consider it?

As the daughter of someone with health anxiety ( used to be called hypochondria) I can tell you it is miserable and exhausting for the rest of the family too. Sorry if this sounds really unkind or unsympathetic. I’m personally so sick of it that it has made me resentful and I view it as selfish and narcissistic. Some people would love to be able to have access to health care around the world. Take the help you have been offered and live your best life

It's a mental illness. How can you view a mental illness as selfish and narcissistic? It isn't something anyone chooses to have.

Honestly. I appreciate that it can be seen as being selfish. I really do get it and I would probably feel th same if I was my DH. I really can't help it. I don't want to be like this. It's taken over my life and it's exhausting.

Hi @BeingmummyIsTheBestxo I started on Sertraline many years ago. I didn't have a bad few weeks, it helped straight away, but I was also given Diazepam to take for the first 5 days while it kicked in. I have come off it a few times when I felt better like you did with the citalopram, but my anxiety came back.
I can really recommend it, it has changed my life. Another thing that really helped me is a mindfulness app. I used Calm. It has a breathing option, helping you to breathe when you feel anxious, short stories to help you sleep and keep your mind racing, and relaxation programs. There are lots of different ones, but they do help. Do talk to your dr about how best to start. We are all here for you if you ever want to talk.

*keep your mind from racing

You obviously haven’t lived it. I have and i agree. I know op can’t help it but it’s impossible to live with. Your needs and worries are non existent.You can never have a problem of your own or discuss it because their mind is elsewhere all the time. I understand ops husband’s frustration. The doctor has told her what she needs to do but she won’t do it. You can’t begin to imagine how devastating it is for the family. It’s not all about the person with the mental illness, although in their mind it is. Op needs to put her family first, feel the fear but pop the pills anyway for the love of her family.

I’m giving my personal opinion as a family member - after decades of experience.

Oh I'm so sorry to hear that. It sounds like your going through some really tough stuff at the minute op ❤️

Well done for getting out a bit today and getting some bits done. Be proud you've earned it 😊

Please don't be put off coming back to this thread because of those posters being quite harsh. You need support to take the steps to care for yourself and I'm here for you.

I've lived it in that I have health anxiety myself.

It's all consuming. It's not something you can choose to overcome with willpower. It's actually a form of OCD. I've had a lot of therapy to deal with it. Unlike OP I'm not afraid of meds and have taken many of them to deal with it, but unfortunately they haven't worked for me. I have genuine health conditions which is what has led to me having health anxiety. I've also had three different therapists to try and deal with it.

Believe me, as the person who has the anxiety, I am constantly aware of how it affects my family. I hate myself for it. But just like any mental illness I can't overcome it by just choosing to put family first. That's not how mental illness works.

Your personal opinion is that it's selfish. But it isn't deliberately selfish. The person can't choose how they feel or how the illness affects them. Try to look at it like a physical illness, you wouldn't consider someone with a chronic illness like MS to be selfish would you?

Thank you so much

Thank you so much. I so appreciate it.

The best advice I can give you OP is to stop googling. I assume you constantly look up health stuff online? Almost everyone with health anxiety does. It's the absolute worst thing for it. During therapy I've basically been told the way to overcome it is:

1. stop googling/learning about health conditions/looking up every symptom/going on forums or Reddit about illnesses
2. stop asking friends/family for reassurance
3. stop body checking/checking heart rate/BP that sort of thing
4. only go to the Dr if a new symptom has been there for 2 weeks, or is very obviously urgent

I'm working on these steps myself. They're very difficult to achieve. But it's the only way to get there. You have to get your mind to stop always thinking about health. And the only way to do that is to change your behaviours first.

I'd highly recommended looking up @cherellethinks on Instagram. She's a health anxiety therapist. I had sessions with her for about 12 weeks. She's been through it herself and recovered. She's fantastic.

I am truly sorry that you are suffering like this. I do understand it’s all consuming. It sounds like you are fighting back, that makes a huge difference to how you are perceived by family and friends. You are engaging with therapists and trying medication. It becomes selfish when the sufferer doesn’t even attempt to try . I do understand that everyday is a battle for you and I am glad you understand the potential effect on your family. For fairness sake I am backing the op who experienced this as I have as a family member because it’s important to note that this not just your disease or op’s disease, it hurts everyone connected to the sufferer. Trying to reason with irrational people takes it toll. Having someone constantly seeking reassurance is beyond draining and affects our mental health but because you can never compete with the health anxiety sufferer you just have to get on with it. Keep fighting and don’t give in. It sounds like you are doing everything you can and that is all anyone can ask for

I appreciate this reply, thank you. I am really trying as hard as I can to overcome this. It's just very, very difficult. Especially as I have had genuine health conditions diagnosed in the past 18 months (a sudden visual impairment, a cancer scare that ended up needing major surgery, and now Hashimoto's disease which I was told was "just anxiety" for months)

My current therapist is NHS and she recognises that having actual health conditions makes dealing with health anxiety that much harder, but she still believes I can overcome it. So I will keep fighting. I celebrate every day that I manage to stick to all the steps I wrote in my above post.

Something that also helped was taking my mum (who didn't understand my anxiety at all) to one of my therapy appointments. It helped to open her eyes to it, and she understood my thought processes. She also got some advice from the therapist on how she could best support me. It really helped our relationship. I'd recommend it as a good step for OP to consider also.