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I wonder if any of my fellow HA sufferers also get affected by reading news articles of people passing away.
I was reading about a 49 year old actress (only 4 years older than me) who passed away recently of a suspected heart attack and since then I have been very anxious and having been getting chest ache/twinges. Which then leads to concentrating on my breathing and pulse.
Feeling rather down, anxious and embarrassed :(
I am trying to stay clear from these things, very hard, with having about Bill Turnbull newsreader who worked at BBC, with his prostate cancer. I am worried about every pain, ache etc and other symptoms I been getting is cancer, I jump to the worst thing first. I got bad HA.
This always happens to me. Lately it has been happening when I read about athletes dropping dead of heart problems during games. Just this past week here in the states a 26 year old basketball player collapsed at the end of a game. It was reported he had a cardiac arrest and is in critical condition.
The thing that gets me the most about these stories is that these are people in the 1% of peak physical fitness. They are checked and rechecked every year throughout the year by top doctors, receiving blood tests and heart tests to make sure that they are physically able to play. They are given a clean bill of health and then BOOM! Dead.
Some of the things I tell myself to bring about calm is a) you do not know this persons family medical history. Heart disease is something that can be past down through genetics, b) look at the number of professional athletes in the world and then look at how many times you see this happening. Maybe once or twice a year....out of thousands and thousands of individuals. How many thousands of athletes, from the top tier leagues of all the sports, down through the developmental leagues, down to college and high school programs do you see this happening to. Like I said before maybe a few. You then say to yourself, the odds are microscopic.
Yes, definitely...I try really hard to avoid reading but I also realize that I can't hide from people discussing these things and all I can control is the processing of what I hear and read.
Too many times I've overheard people having a conversation near me or have a friend or family member tell me about someone being diagnosed with cancer or some terrible thing to them. Inside, I panic before they've even finished the story because I know they've just reminded me of one new thing to fear.
I just try to remember as MarkyMark wisely said that you really don't know the whole picture (usually) and I try to tell myself that the odds are in my favor of not having an except repeat of the terrifying scenario I've just heard...
Ugh, this is everyday for me at work. I work with a small team of four and each one of them has at least one family member who has cancer or recently died of cancer, and they always talk about it. I hate it. It's selfish of me to say because I know it's just them trying to cope with a horrible situation, but they go on and on about what their symptoms were, the treatments they are getting, etc, etc. It's not enough that my job is so monotonous I'm constantly letting my mind self destruct every hour of the day with other frightening thoughts.Quote:
Originally Posted by artist12
Thank god I have podcasts to listen to when they go on about it.