jaythomas
26-11-11, 22:43
Hey there,
I dont mean to sound like i know everything and can solve everybodies problems. Its just when i really suffered from health anxiety my life wasnt worth living. It doesnt bother me so much now and so i decided that it might be worth sharing what i did so people can try out the things that seemed to work for me, because i can empathise with most people here and so i understand how bad the anxiety can get, so all i want to do is help! :)
Firstly, If anxiety is just simply getting too much and you havent been to the GP then you've got to go. Its the first stop really because treatment of all types comes via your GP. A lot of people are very much against medicine but if you cannot handle your anxiety it is very helpful! I agree with most people in saying that medicine isn't the answer, however it gives you the peace you need from the anxiety to be able to experiment with other methods and treatments, and so you are in a position to get better, because its so hard to combat anxiety while it is fully disrupting your life. Side effects change with each type of medicine, so if one doesnt work ask to be put on a different one that does the same job.
Make sure to do breathing excersizes at least 2-3 times a day. This involves beathing in for 7 seconds and then breathing out for 11 secondsfor about 15 times. Its really hard at first at when i was first doing it i couldnt seem to get it right but it comes. You will never notice the difference it brings because it takes so long and comes slowly. But stick with it and just trust that in the long term it will help. You might want to set an alarm to do it regularly.
Cognitive behavioural therapy has success rates as high as medication but it is really hard to get it due to the expense of going private and due to the queues within the NHS, however the main jist of it is to change your thought patterns and behaviour. It has an emphasis on how "your feelings are determined by your thoughts", so the idea is that you think positive, you think "non-anxiously" and aftera while your feelings will tune into your thoughts. Thoughts are something you can control, feelings are not something you can control, but your thoughts CAN control your feelings, so control your feelings through your thoughts. Once again you wont see the fruits of your labour for a loooong time, but stick with it! Trust it and just force yourself to do it. I understand how hard it is because of the comfort you feel from worrying, but FORCE it upon yourself.
Im a psychology student and a clinical psychologist explained that with many mental disorders there is something GOOD that makes the person keep it. In most cases of health anxiety i think this is going to be that you think that worrying about your health is going to mean that if anything ever is wrong it will be detected early and will be more treatable. So a good idea is to write 2 letters to your anxiety, as if it were a person. One thanking it for all its done and tell it in what ways it is good for you. In the second, write a letter of hatred and explain to it how it is ruining your life and why you dont need it.
Im assuming a lot of people here visit the doctor more than regularly :P i was going about 3 times a week but you might want to try going at set times regardless of whether your worried about something or not and just update the doctor. Who cares about what the doctor thinks about you, its your life and he/she cant do anything about you constantly visiting. So maybe for two weeks in a row go 'once a week' and then after that just go 'once every two weeks' and try and ween yourself of depending on the doctor. If you do go and dont have anything to report, you could just make something up and they will do a check of something, and the next time you worry about something you can remember that the doctor has done some routine checks...
If you type in 'anxiety symptoms' into google, you will find a maaaaaassssive list of symptoms. This can be really helpful because you will experience a massive list of symptoms caused by the anxiety and also that are everyday occurences, its just that your increased anxiety makes you notice them. So when you have notice a symptom, look for it in the list of anxiety symptoms.
After seeing a counsellor, she said to me that it is most often the case that anxiety is caused by other things such as social relationships, financial worries, work worries etc and these things build up. With all these things adding up your anxiety levels are high, and because you have high anxiety levels because of these things, it will spill over and cause you to have high anxiety levels about EVERYTHING else in your life. In our case it is about the thing that scares us most...Illness. SO try and look for what it was that you were anxious about before you got health anxiety, and resolve those things, once you have done that, watch the health anxiety wither away.
Finally, go out and learn about how anxiety works at a neural, physiological and psychological level. This will help you to recognise that anxiety is just something that is happening in your brain, literally just the firing of neurons that dont really need to be firing, and from this you can recognise that it is this that is why you are worrying....not things external to your brain, its just that when in the state of anxiety we look for the reason we are anxious to make sense of the world, and so will grasp what we find and thus find a symptom and assume that we are ill.
I hope to god that i dont sound like im trying to be high and mighty and like i know everything. Its completely not the case. I learnt all of these things from other people! Im simply a messenger. I just want to be able to help because in my times of crisis i think things like this could be a life saver, so if these tips help 1 person in the slightest then i'll feel like ive given back to the community that has helped me!
Best wishes,
Jay.
---------- Post added at 22:43 ---------- Previous post was at 22:42 ----------
p.s.........KEEP AWAY FROM SOURCES THAT TELL YOU SYMPTOMS OF ILLNESSES :P
I dont mean to sound like i know everything and can solve everybodies problems. Its just when i really suffered from health anxiety my life wasnt worth living. It doesnt bother me so much now and so i decided that it might be worth sharing what i did so people can try out the things that seemed to work for me, because i can empathise with most people here and so i understand how bad the anxiety can get, so all i want to do is help! :)
Firstly, If anxiety is just simply getting too much and you havent been to the GP then you've got to go. Its the first stop really because treatment of all types comes via your GP. A lot of people are very much against medicine but if you cannot handle your anxiety it is very helpful! I agree with most people in saying that medicine isn't the answer, however it gives you the peace you need from the anxiety to be able to experiment with other methods and treatments, and so you are in a position to get better, because its so hard to combat anxiety while it is fully disrupting your life. Side effects change with each type of medicine, so if one doesnt work ask to be put on a different one that does the same job.
Make sure to do breathing excersizes at least 2-3 times a day. This involves beathing in for 7 seconds and then breathing out for 11 secondsfor about 15 times. Its really hard at first at when i was first doing it i couldnt seem to get it right but it comes. You will never notice the difference it brings because it takes so long and comes slowly. But stick with it and just trust that in the long term it will help. You might want to set an alarm to do it regularly.
Cognitive behavioural therapy has success rates as high as medication but it is really hard to get it due to the expense of going private and due to the queues within the NHS, however the main jist of it is to change your thought patterns and behaviour. It has an emphasis on how "your feelings are determined by your thoughts", so the idea is that you think positive, you think "non-anxiously" and aftera while your feelings will tune into your thoughts. Thoughts are something you can control, feelings are not something you can control, but your thoughts CAN control your feelings, so control your feelings through your thoughts. Once again you wont see the fruits of your labour for a loooong time, but stick with it! Trust it and just force yourself to do it. I understand how hard it is because of the comfort you feel from worrying, but FORCE it upon yourself.
Im a psychology student and a clinical psychologist explained that with many mental disorders there is something GOOD that makes the person keep it. In most cases of health anxiety i think this is going to be that you think that worrying about your health is going to mean that if anything ever is wrong it will be detected early and will be more treatable. So a good idea is to write 2 letters to your anxiety, as if it were a person. One thanking it for all its done and tell it in what ways it is good for you. In the second, write a letter of hatred and explain to it how it is ruining your life and why you dont need it.
Im assuming a lot of people here visit the doctor more than regularly :P i was going about 3 times a week but you might want to try going at set times regardless of whether your worried about something or not and just update the doctor. Who cares about what the doctor thinks about you, its your life and he/she cant do anything about you constantly visiting. So maybe for two weeks in a row go 'once a week' and then after that just go 'once every two weeks' and try and ween yourself of depending on the doctor. If you do go and dont have anything to report, you could just make something up and they will do a check of something, and the next time you worry about something you can remember that the doctor has done some routine checks...
If you type in 'anxiety symptoms' into google, you will find a maaaaaassssive list of symptoms. This can be really helpful because you will experience a massive list of symptoms caused by the anxiety and also that are everyday occurences, its just that your increased anxiety makes you notice them. So when you have notice a symptom, look for it in the list of anxiety symptoms.
After seeing a counsellor, she said to me that it is most often the case that anxiety is caused by other things such as social relationships, financial worries, work worries etc and these things build up. With all these things adding up your anxiety levels are high, and because you have high anxiety levels because of these things, it will spill over and cause you to have high anxiety levels about EVERYTHING else in your life. In our case it is about the thing that scares us most...Illness. SO try and look for what it was that you were anxious about before you got health anxiety, and resolve those things, once you have done that, watch the health anxiety wither away.
Finally, go out and learn about how anxiety works at a neural, physiological and psychological level. This will help you to recognise that anxiety is just something that is happening in your brain, literally just the firing of neurons that dont really need to be firing, and from this you can recognise that it is this that is why you are worrying....not things external to your brain, its just that when in the state of anxiety we look for the reason we are anxious to make sense of the world, and so will grasp what we find and thus find a symptom and assume that we are ill.
I hope to god that i dont sound like im trying to be high and mighty and like i know everything. Its completely not the case. I learnt all of these things from other people! Im simply a messenger. I just want to be able to help because in my times of crisis i think things like this could be a life saver, so if these tips help 1 person in the slightest then i'll feel like ive given back to the community that has helped me!
Best wishes,
Jay.
---------- Post added at 22:43 ---------- Previous post was at 22:42 ----------
p.s.........KEEP AWAY FROM SOURCES THAT TELL YOU SYMPTOMS OF ILLNESSES :P