Anxiety symptoms

[MaryMac]

I'm just wondering if you worry about having an illness then you start to develop symptoms of it through your anxiety?
I've been obsessing about leukemia and I think (hope!) that the symptoms are in fact anxiety, such as sore muscles/bones, itchy skin, rapid heart rate....
Also got some sort of sneezy thing that I can't seem to get rid of. I'm adding all of these up and coming up with leukemia even though I KNOW if I did have it I'd probably feel far worse than I do!
I was at my doctor last week and she's referred me to a CBT therapist so I'm hoping that'll help!

[cjl2301]

Yes that definitely happens to people like us all the time! Years ago, I was convinced I had a brain tumor (one of many things I have convinced myself of over the years).

Anyway, the more I thought about it, the more strange feelings I would have in my head. However, once I let it go those feelings where gone! Actually they were probably still there but I just wasn't paying attention to them (like everyone out there without HA).

The point is, we all have little sensations in our bodies all the time. Most people just don't even pay attention to them.

Also, another thing that worked for me was that I would focus on something else for a while - something that can really take your attention, like reading a good book, or playing a good video game, or producing something for work. Then I would look back on the time I was doing that activity - sure enough, I didn't notice any pain or problems. This was pretty good proof that it was my anxiety causing the issue.