About a year ago I was in more or less exactly the same position I find myself now.

I was worrying myself silly that I had lung cancer. I was a light smoker and upon getting chest and back pain, I quit. The pains didn't go away and in fact my symptoms got worse. A cough, sometimes blood in the sputum I was coughing up.

I kept going to see the doctors. At last one doctor recognised anxiety, but also sent me for a chest x-ray and I gave a sputum sample to make sure nothing was seriously wrong physically. All was clear.

I had a series of induction sessions with someone from the mental health team (not a counsellor). These I found stressful but helpful. I also started smoking again.

At the end of the sessions it was recommended I sought further more professional help. I did not follow this up. I have a well-paid job and young children and just couldn't see how I could fit this in to my extremely busy life.

Things have been mostly okay, but now I'm at stage 1 again. Chest and back pain, sore throat, hoarse voice, occasional streaks of blood in my sputum again. I saw a doctor last week who checked out my heart and listened to my breathing. He didn’t seem too concerned, but I worry that because I kept going on about my health-related anxiety, he may not have taken the physical symptoms too seriously. I was getting a little better but now I feel worse. And of course, now I’m anxious.

I can’t keep going back to the doctor, but I can’t get it out of my head that I’m really ill – anxiety cannot cause traces of blood in my cough.

So where am I? I wish I knew. I’ve read with sympathy the other recent posts along exactly the same lines. Not sure it helps though! By the way, I'm male, 35.