Horse
28-02-13, 20:36
Owing to the amount of posts on NMP regarding Health Anxiety and it's issues, I thought I would share and hopefully give some comfort and reassurance to our friends and fellow sufferers by condensing my 45 years of symptoms and pain into a 5 minute read.
I am probably right in thinking that the majority of us on here are frightened that we are suffering from some form of firstly Cancer, secondly Heart Disease, or thirdly Brian Tumour, or if you're like me.......all three! It's funny isn't it that no matter how many times we visit the doctors, hospital or read about all the problems and symptoms of anxiety, we are still not convinced that all we are suffering from is of course, anxiety!
I will start with what is probably the most common symptom of this horrid illness, and that is it's main target, normally the stomach. Ever since I was about 13, I had this compulsion that I must empty my bowels before going to school. Consequently, I would sit there until the circulation in my legs had long stopped working and the time to leave for school would get nearer and nearer until I reached a point of being late with still no sign of success and then the anxiety started. The fear of being late made me start feeling hot and unwell, my mum shouting at me to get a move on just made it worse and in the end I got to the point that I couldn't go to school for fear of having an 'accident'. One thing I should point out here is that whilst I am writing this, my stomach has started to go into spasms!!!!
It wasn't until some years back that I read that our stomach is in a sense our second brain. Therefore, all these years of stomach upsets and funny noises were strongly related to my emotional state at the time.
Basically, what I'm saying is that it is quite normal for us to suffer with IBS, wind, rushing to the loo, constipation and all the other toilet troubles considering our mental state. Without going into all the Psychological babble of why's and therefore's, in a nutshell, our tummies are saying calm down, chill out and stop worrying because it doesn't like it!!
Easier said than done!
Needless to say, after 45 years of emotional, physical, sexual and mental abuse, I have used more toilet tissue than all the 'runners' in a laxative marathon!
The amount of times I have diagnosed myself with stomach cancer is quite phenomenal, even more so since the onset of IBS and my age fast approaching 59 and all the TV commercials related to bowel cancer symptoms (normally shown during dinnertime)!
This brings me onto the heart attack and brain tumour scenario which I will cover both at the same time as I expect most of you reading are beginning to nod off now. Over the years I believe my total number of heart attacks so far to be 837! Although in all honesty, I believe 34 of those were a stroke! The signs were all there, the palpatations, the stabbing burning chest pain, the numbness in the arm and the sweating and shaking. Ironically, during most of these attacks, I managed to iron a shirt, change my underwear, polish my shoes, brush and floss my teeth before driving myself to A and E in a composed manner! Naturally, the headaches are very annoying, or brain tumours as I prefer to diagnose. Occasionally a migraine will occur, visual auras, speech difficulties, numbness around the left or right side of the mouth or face, loss of co-ordination and intense pain on left or right side of the forehead. Now this really can be a problem, namely because I can't see to iron a clean shirt or drive myself to A and E let alone figure out how to put on a clean pair of underpants by myself!
If only I didn't worry so much about things that, looking back, never happened anyway, and as for the things that did happen to me, well I'm still here. OK, so I've had my heart broken many times and there have been occasions when I've come face to face with the devil himself and scared him off. There have been many times when I wanted to end my life because of sadness and loneliness, regret and guilt, but I didn't. Yes there are days when I just think of the times when I was happy with my family and the anxiety didn't bother me too much because I could handle it. Sadly, now alone and riddled with bad nerves my anxiety starts as soon as I awake (providing I managed to sleep in the first place) and will last until I fall asleep again. I look in the mirror and hate what I see, a man barely alive on the outside, but dead on the inside.....or is it the other way round?
The remarkable fact about all this is that, it was and still is me that has caused all this in the first place! My worry of the 'what if's' and lack of self esteem and confidence have all contributed to my sorry state of affairs all through my life. In other words, all our symptoms are basically brought on by ourselves. OK, we have no control over events that happen to us through the years, but the way in how we let them affect us can be controlled if we really try.
It's maybe too late for me (although it's never too late) but for the younger of us out there who suffer on a daily basis, I can only very strongly advise that you attempt to start taking some form of control over the way you react to the anxiety that affects you, or rather the way in which you let it affect you. Nothing is impossible. We all have the power to override the part of our body that controls our health regardless of it's severity.
My own philosophy is now 'If it happens, deal with it'. After all, what have you got to lose anyway?
Don't forget, your symptoms are no more than your body saying it doesn't like the way you're thinking because of what has or might or is going to happen to you.
An update on my current state of health at this particular time of writing is that my legs have now gone to sleep after typing this post for so long, therefore I better iron a shirt before taking myself to A and E as I've obviously now given myself Deep Vein Thrombosis!
Honestly, this country is going downhill fast!
May God Bless all who read and laugh!
Horse.
I am probably right in thinking that the majority of us on here are frightened that we are suffering from some form of firstly Cancer, secondly Heart Disease, or thirdly Brian Tumour, or if you're like me.......all three! It's funny isn't it that no matter how many times we visit the doctors, hospital or read about all the problems and symptoms of anxiety, we are still not convinced that all we are suffering from is of course, anxiety!
I will start with what is probably the most common symptom of this horrid illness, and that is it's main target, normally the stomach. Ever since I was about 13, I had this compulsion that I must empty my bowels before going to school. Consequently, I would sit there until the circulation in my legs had long stopped working and the time to leave for school would get nearer and nearer until I reached a point of being late with still no sign of success and then the anxiety started. The fear of being late made me start feeling hot and unwell, my mum shouting at me to get a move on just made it worse and in the end I got to the point that I couldn't go to school for fear of having an 'accident'. One thing I should point out here is that whilst I am writing this, my stomach has started to go into spasms!!!!
It wasn't until some years back that I read that our stomach is in a sense our second brain. Therefore, all these years of stomach upsets and funny noises were strongly related to my emotional state at the time.
Basically, what I'm saying is that it is quite normal for us to suffer with IBS, wind, rushing to the loo, constipation and all the other toilet troubles considering our mental state. Without going into all the Psychological babble of why's and therefore's, in a nutshell, our tummies are saying calm down, chill out and stop worrying because it doesn't like it!!
Easier said than done!
Needless to say, after 45 years of emotional, physical, sexual and mental abuse, I have used more toilet tissue than all the 'runners' in a laxative marathon!
The amount of times I have diagnosed myself with stomach cancer is quite phenomenal, even more so since the onset of IBS and my age fast approaching 59 and all the TV commercials related to bowel cancer symptoms (normally shown during dinnertime)!
This brings me onto the heart attack and brain tumour scenario which I will cover both at the same time as I expect most of you reading are beginning to nod off now. Over the years I believe my total number of heart attacks so far to be 837! Although in all honesty, I believe 34 of those were a stroke! The signs were all there, the palpatations, the stabbing burning chest pain, the numbness in the arm and the sweating and shaking. Ironically, during most of these attacks, I managed to iron a shirt, change my underwear, polish my shoes, brush and floss my teeth before driving myself to A and E in a composed manner! Naturally, the headaches are very annoying, or brain tumours as I prefer to diagnose. Occasionally a migraine will occur, visual auras, speech difficulties, numbness around the left or right side of the mouth or face, loss of co-ordination and intense pain on left or right side of the forehead. Now this really can be a problem, namely because I can't see to iron a clean shirt or drive myself to A and E let alone figure out how to put on a clean pair of underpants by myself!
If only I didn't worry so much about things that, looking back, never happened anyway, and as for the things that did happen to me, well I'm still here. OK, so I've had my heart broken many times and there have been occasions when I've come face to face with the devil himself and scared him off. There have been many times when I wanted to end my life because of sadness and loneliness, regret and guilt, but I didn't. Yes there are days when I just think of the times when I was happy with my family and the anxiety didn't bother me too much because I could handle it. Sadly, now alone and riddled with bad nerves my anxiety starts as soon as I awake (providing I managed to sleep in the first place) and will last until I fall asleep again. I look in the mirror and hate what I see, a man barely alive on the outside, but dead on the inside.....or is it the other way round?
The remarkable fact about all this is that, it was and still is me that has caused all this in the first place! My worry of the 'what if's' and lack of self esteem and confidence have all contributed to my sorry state of affairs all through my life. In other words, all our symptoms are basically brought on by ourselves. OK, we have no control over events that happen to us through the years, but the way in how we let them affect us can be controlled if we really try.
It's maybe too late for me (although it's never too late) but for the younger of us out there who suffer on a daily basis, I can only very strongly advise that you attempt to start taking some form of control over the way you react to the anxiety that affects you, or rather the way in which you let it affect you. Nothing is impossible. We all have the power to override the part of our body that controls our health regardless of it's severity.
My own philosophy is now 'If it happens, deal with it'. After all, what have you got to lose anyway?
Don't forget, your symptoms are no more than your body saying it doesn't like the way you're thinking because of what has or might or is going to happen to you.
An update on my current state of health at this particular time of writing is that my legs have now gone to sleep after typing this post for so long, therefore I better iron a shirt before taking myself to A and E as I've obviously now given myself Deep Vein Thrombosis!
Honestly, this country is going downhill fast!
May God Bless all who read and laugh!
Horse.