Anxiety in Pregnancy

[AELLE7]

Hi All,
Just a little background, I suffer with anxiety and have done since I was six years old. Gradually it progressed into panic attacks at 12 and then I also suffered with severe health anxiety at 17. Even in good periods it's always a struggle to fight my instincts to self diagnose or to calm myself when having a panic attack. Now at 23 and six weeks pregnant, I fear it's going to get out of control, especially my health anxiety. I'm already obsessed with all the serious conditions you can

(Sorry accidentally posted half way through) I'm scared of all the condition you can develop and terrified of miscarriage. I've recently had some CBT on the NHS after a bad stint of panic attacks but I feel like a time waster going back so soon. I'm currently looking for a long term therapist in my price range but I was just wondering if anyone had any tips or guidance on how to deal with health anxiety through pregnancy. I just don't want to stress but I'm so scared something will go wrong.

When you go for your booking appointment be sure to mention it all to your MW, chances are she will refer you to a specialist mental health MW.
Sadly I have no advice in the mean time, other than to really try and put your CBT techniques into practice when you can.

Hi op I was in the same shoes as you and dd is now 5mo. I took 50mg sertraline throughout pregnancy and doctor was quite happy to up it if needed. Are you on any medication?

I've experienced various levels of anxiety throughout life and made sure to mention it to the midwife at my booking appointment (I'm 26+3 now). I also told her that I wanted to give permission for my partner to discuss it with her if he identified me getting out of control (one of my worries early on). She was great and flagged me up as needing possible support so I can get a quick referral at necessary.

I've managed health anxiety by avoiding reading too many articles or information - although I have the risk of not being completely informed about everything, I feel much less anxious than I did in the beginning when I was reading everything.

Sertraline was the medication that helped me massively a few years back when things got a bit out of control. I'm all for using talking therapies/cbt/exercise/cooking/whatever works, but on occasion medication is what is I needed to help me in the short term.

Anyway, I'm babbling on and not sure what help I'm being. Just wanted to offer some sort of support. Speak to your midwife about it all and hopefully they will help you put a plan in place to make the day to day a little easier.

Thank you all for your help. I'm not on medication. After it got bad a few months ago and I went back into therapy, I considered it but I get pretty obsessed with the side effects you can get when I take any form of medication so I have felt it could be counter productive and make me very paranoid. It's always been an option, but not one I haven't explored yet.

I'm definitely going to explain to the midwife my anxiety condition and my partner is going to come with me. I think asking the midwife to have open dialogue with my partner, in case it does get out of control is also a great idea so thanks for that. I'm hoping everything will be fine, it's weird I'm not even terrified of pregnancy or the birth, I'm just scared of my anxiety getting bad again.

Same position here. Suffered with aniexty forever. I gradually came off my medication when I fell pregnant as I started to feel a lot better lately however all the articles and posts about miscarriage turn me into a crazy lady I worry about absolutely everything I eat and do!