View Full Version : Hypochondria-my story
I firstly developed what I think is a bad case of health anxiety about two months ago. Here how it happened: some four months ago I moved to Germany in order to take part in a big scientific project (I am a political scientist by profession) which is still ongoing and will last 18 months. Back in my home country, I used to live firstly with large family, than with my fiance. Moreover, I had a lots of friends and acquaintances, and used to go out every night, eat, drink and be merry.
Well, when I moved to Germany all that changed. I am not a good mixer, and it takes time for me to get close to a person-therefore my social life was suddenly down to almost zero. Nights out and hanging around in pubs became rarity, and, due to the project and work being very hard and time consuming, it was (and still is) all seminars, libraries,experiments and hard scientific work. It also meant less and irregular eating, no snacks and reduced amount of coffee, less beer and whisky and more, let's say contemplative, lonely lifestyle.
Not long after I had come to Germany, I developed some minor sinus and dental problems (mild sinusitis, caries in two teeth). Oddly enough, I was not scared at all at first-I went to the dentist, who did a root canal on one tooth and normal filling on other, as well as panoramic radiograph (I didn't know what that is back then), and it was all. As for sinusitis, symptoms were persistent, but mild, and I didn't think much of it.
However, when I developed mild pins and needles in the head and neck, I started to worry, and made a fatal mistake-called Dr Google for help. And of course-there was brain tumour, nasal cancer, oral cancer, spine cancer, multiple sclerosis and so on. Then I started examining my mouth, and found what I thought was a lump, and my heart started racing. The more I googled, the more I became afraid that I have cancer, and words like maxillary sinus cancer, jaw bone osteosarcoma, periapical radiograph and meningioma entered my everyday life. And unfortunately, they're still there.
I went to the dentist to ask her about the lump, and she checked my mouth and told me it was actually a normal rim of the bone, and even x-rayed it just to assure me everything was ok. X-ray was all clear, but instead of calming me, it just made me feel worse-because now, you see, I connected mild sinusitis and pins and needles and became convinced I had brain tumour. So I went to the doctor, this time neurologist, and he ordered a MRI scan (luckily, as a member of the project, I have private insurance which covers scans if a doctor orders them). The day I did MRI was the most miserable day in my life-I was totally convinced that there is a cancer in my brain. However, as you would probably guess-it was all clear, or normales Befund, as they say in German. Oh, the relief. I felt I am at the top of the world, and immediately went to the pub to celebrate.
The relief, however, lasted shortly. Next on the menu-skin freckles and melanoma. You guessed correctly-I googled melanoma and started comparing my moles with Google Images. I even started taking selfies of my freckles to better determine whether they're cancerous or not. It took me 3-4 days of intense fear to determine that they're not cancerous, as Melanoma (dr Google said that) grows fast and is bigger than pencil rubber, while mine were smaller and stayed exactly the same.
Then I became curious about my weight loss (this is my actual fear) although the logical part of my brain kept (and still keeps) telling me it is perfectly normal to lose weight when you are on two meals a day, rarely eat sweets, do not snack or eat after 6PM and from averagely two beers a day switch to two beers a month-I started the search engine. There were things like how to lose weight, healthy diets, than problems with thyroid gland (oddly enough, I wasn't worried about that at all, as I am only worried about cancers), cancer cachexia-ahaaaaaaa, that's more like it. And of course, there is a new bout of anxiety over pancreatic cancer, liver cancer, colon cancer and so on. I did a thorough Google research on pancreatic cancer this morning, and it calmed me down a bit when I read that chance that person below the age of 30 develop the pancreatic cancer is 1:1000000-but still, maybe I am just that one person, and even there is no pan-can, there are liver, colon, stomach and other tumours to worry about.
The funny thing is-I am perfectly aware that I worry too much and have cancer-phobia (or hypochondria, or health anxiety). And jet I can't stop worrying-it comes and goes, sometimes it's stronger sometimes milder, but it follows me all the time. And now I am stuck alone in a foreign land with health anxiety (one, less rational part of my brain is telling me maybe with cancer also). Therefore, advice for everyone-DO NOT USE GOOGLE. The wretched thing ruined two months of my perfectly normal life. Now I am going to a seminar, determined not to research anything about health anymore-but this night I will probably do another round of sarcomas, adenocarcinomas and other cancer-related diseases. I come here to share my story and of course wish you all a merry and worryless X-mas and New Year
Thank you for sharing this. Incredible insight to HA and the triggers and mindset.
Positive thoughts
That story is exactly like mine the last two months and i'm sure many others. At least in this way you are not alone and can share thoughts on here. I am currently worrying about marks on my face and pain in my mouth too :(
Merry xmas and thanks for sharing.
Welcome to the forum Andrash :)
Have you tried to get any help for your anxiety? CBT is excellent for helping you deal with irrational worries and body checking, would be worth looking into.
Thanks for sharing. I can relate to so much of your story too. My anxieties can switch very quickly from one thing to the next, just as you describe. That's why getting the all clear from an illness is only ever a short term solution. It sounds as though you have a strong support network in your home country. How long will you be in Germany? Are you able to talk to friends and family back home? Do you know other people there who you can perhaps start to socialise with a bit more to distract yourself?
Thank you all for your replies and good wishes!
I will answer some posts and share some more details.
Firstly, both my father and my mother are mild health anxiety sufferers too, but their onsets are different. Father is more open about his "symptoms", he always complains, calls mom, me, friends and seeks reassurances. On the other hand, my mother puts a brave face but inside the fear is boiling. She was once convinced she had ovarian cancer (it was nothing) and brain cancer (it was Bell's palsy). I am more of this second type-silent hypochondriac.
First time it happened to me I was convinced I had had cancer was when I was about 15 years old. I had a feeling that something was stuck in my throat, and I thought it was oral cancer. I was scared stiff for about 10-20 days, and then the anxiety gradually loosened. After a year my symptoms disappeared too (doctor thought it was candida) and I was free of anxiety until now. I even went through several illnesses such as colds, diarrhea, bronchitis, fly, mild pneumonia and chickenpox without even thinking about cancer or any other serious diseases.
In the last two months I started developing some symptoms of obsessive-compulsive disorder (of course, everything related to cancer), such as: checking body extensively, looking at mirrors and widows to see if my face is gaunt (that's actual one, connected with weight loss and pancreatic cancer worries), checking mouth to establish whether presumed lump grows.
The most severe bout was the fear about nasal/brain cancer, especially for about five days, from the moment I made an appointment with the neurologist to the results of my MRI. Needless to say, the culmination was during the actual 20 minutes of the MRI scan and the hour after it finished while the radiologist was checking my results.
The fear is constant, but the level of it is not. There are moments when I am almost 100% sure I just have health anxiety and nothing more, and there are moments when I actually dwell over possible cancers. It's always one cancer at a time. The ones I worry the most about are not, oddly enough, the types that bring great pain and discomfort-it's the opposite, I worry the most about the silent types with little or no symptoms.
I didn't ask psychologist for help, or try CBT. It is due to two fact: I currently do not have time for it, and such visits are not covered by my insurance policy.
Actually, I travel to my home country in two days, for the Christmas&New Year break. I am really looking forward to see the old crowd, and socialize with them-I hope that I would feel better. However, I also fear a little that somebody will compliment me on my good-looking body or weight loss (I was a bit overweight before) and I will immediately connect it to cancer, and there we go again...:)
The funny thing is that I was never ever a coward-I do not have other phobias, I am lord high executioner of all spiders, cockroaches and insects in my house (my fiance is terribly afraid of insects) :), once or twice I found myself in a bar fight (while I was a teenager/student) I didn't shy from exchanging punches, and so on. That's why this sudden increase of concrete fear (in my case of cancer) is so unexpected for me.
Still, what I see as an good sign is that this onset is milder than pre-MRI one (I do not know how to explain it, but I am calmer and feel "less fear"), and that I am now conscious about health anxiety-I know it is there, present and it is most likely the cause of my problems, and not the terrible diseases I dread.
Sorry for longer posts, but I actually feel better while I write this, and maybe it will be useful for someone else to recognize his/hers own symptoms of health anxiety...
I didn't ask psychologist for help, or try CBT. It is due to two fact: I currently do not have time for it, and such visits are not covered by my insurance policy.
One thing I will stress is that this is worth spending both time and money on, just like any other health problem. You should treat it with the same seriousness as you have given to the fears about cancer. For recovery it's absolutely necessary to get the correct help.
One thing I will stress is that this is worth spending both time and money on, just like any other health problem. You should treat it with the same seriousness as you have given to the fears about cancer. For recovery it's absolutely necessary to get the correct help.
I put a lot of hope into this visit to my family and friends. If I see there is significant improvement (decrease of obsessive habits, less fear and anguish, less Dr Google and so on) I will try with self help. However, if it continues, or if I suffer a relapse when I come back, I will ask the psychologist for help.
It's not only the money which is the problem-it's the time too, as I spend about 10 hours per day working :( I only had time today to write all this because the Christmas break is coming and there are a lot less work to do this week. But still, I will have to find time and see what it should be done with professional help if this continues.
Thank you very much for the advice, it really helps talking with you all! :)
Welcome aboard Andrash. Wonderful post, with real insight and I really identify with you.
Have you considered trying one of the free online CBT courses to give you a taste of what it's like? If it helps you, it may help you decide whether it's worth the investment of doing the "real" thing
Welcome aboard Andrash. Wonderful post, with real insight and I really identify with you.
Have you considered trying one of the free online CBT courses to give you a taste of what it's like? If it helps you, it may help you decide whether it's worth the investment of doing the "real" thing
Actually no, I didn't know these existed. If you can send me the links, I will be really grateful. Thanks for the advice anyhow :)
I'm just trying to find the one I did (it has really cute cyber characters in it that I actually grew kind of attached to - but then I'm a bit nuts, as you'll see if you stick around)
If I can't find it I'll ask honeylove for it nicely since she gave it to me. There's one somewhere on this site too
---------- Post added at 18:41 ---------- Previous post was at 18:37 ----------
[/COLOR]https://moodgym.anu.edu.au/welcome - there, thats the one I did
I put a lot of hope into this visit to my family and friends. If I see there is significant improvement (decrease of obsessive habits, less fear and anguish, less Dr Google and so on) I will try with self help. However, if it continues, or if I suffer a relapse when I come back, I will ask the psychologist for help.
It's not only the money which is the problem-it's the time too, as I spend about 10 hours per day working :( I only had time today to write all this because the Christmas break is coming and there are a lot less work to do this week. But still, I will have to find time and see what it should be done with professional help if this continues.
Thank you very much for the advice, it really helps talking with you all! :)
If you want to recover, then it's very possible for you to find time in your day to do this. Just 10/15 mins of meditation/relaxation exercises a day is enough to be of significant benefit to mental health. Just one CBT session every couple of weeks is surely manageable?
You've got to determine what's worth spending time on in your life, look at your priorities - how much time do you spend worrying? Is that not time better spent taking care of yourself?
If you want to recover, then it's very possible for you to find time in your day to do this. Just 10/15 mins of meditation/relaxation exercises a day is enough to be of significant benefit to mental health. Just one CBT session every couple of weeks is surely manageable?
You've got to determine what's worth spending time on in your life, look at your priorities - how much time do you spend worrying? Is that not time better spent taking care of yourself?
Well, that's some good info for me-I really thought these things were much more time-consuming. There is also that sub-conscious thought/wish that you (I in this case) just want to go on with your life and that this problem disappears. I already know it's not gonna happen anytime soon, and there your advice fits. I will not ask for help in my home country (as it's pointless since I will be there for two weeks only, and it's Christmas anyway-nobody's working), but after I have come back, I will start looking for a good psychologist. It's just that you have to overcome that conviction that you can solve all your problems by yourself and ask the professional-I will surely try to do so.
I totally understand that, and see it a lot here on the boards. You think when you feel OK that it means your anxiety is gone, until the next blip. The problem is that we have never learned to deal with the anxiety in the first place, so it may die down for a while but if it comes back again we still have no tools to help ourselves through it.
That's why it's so important to learn about the nature of anxiety and how to help ourselves, so that we can learn to manage it and take control of our thoughts and emotions again. It doesn't mean that you'll never get anxious again, but it does mean that you're in control of your thoughts and reactions and won't sink into the anxiety hole again.
---------- Post added at 19:06 ---------- Previous post was at 19:05 ----------
I also meant to add that learning to manage anxiety doesn't have to be time consuming, a lot of it is looking at our thoughts and our lifestyle and figuring out how we can help ourselves feel better.
If you have a look on google for stress or anxiety management you will find that it doesn't have to be time consuming at all, small steps can help you in big ways :)
I totally understand that, and see it a lot here on the boards. You think when you feel OK that it means your anxiety is gone, until the next blip. The problem is that we have never learned to deal with the anxiety in the first place, so it may die down for a while but if it comes back again we still have no tools to help ourselves through it.
Exactly! That's exactly what I felt after the first doctor's checkup and scan-everything was OK, I was cancer-free, anxiety-free, free as a bird :) Bloody shame it lasted only three days :)
I think I can pretty well guess what was the cause of it-abrupt change of lifestyle, environment and level of communication with people. What I need to learn, is how to manage it and reduce it to tolerant levels-I hope the psychologist and self help (meditation, relaxation...) fits there.
It sounds like you were in a situation that drove your stress levels up, so learning to manage them will be a really good place for you to start :)
It would be worth looking at CBT - a psychologist will help you think and talk through your problems, but CBT will give you lots of tools to use. The link that Katesa gave above is a very good starting point.
It sounds like you were in a situation that drove your stress levels up, so learning to manage them will be a really good place for you to start :)
It would be worth looking at CBT - a psychologist will help you think and talk through your problems, but CBT will give you lots of tools to use. The link that Katesa gave above is a very good starting point.
Katesa, thanks very much for the link, I am registering right now there :)
I will try CBT while at home and combine it with getting back to old lifestyle a bit, and when I come back I will find time to consult a psychologist and have a chat with him/her.
It really warms my hearth though that there are people like you here willing to spend their time to help a total stranger over the Internet. You may all be, like me, anxiety sufferers, but you are also a very, very nice and pleasant people!
Well I'm glad that you decided to register and have a chat with us, there are lots of people here who will give you time to help you through this :) There's so much good advice on here.
Come back and chat to us as you're going through everything, let us know how you're doing and ask for advice if you need it! Everyone here is friendly and will be there for you if you need it, we all know what a struggle anxiety can be x
Just come back to wish Merry Christmas to you all! As for my anxiety, hanging out with my friends does help( I am in my home country right now) but the fear is unfortunately still there. Current worry=esophagus cancer.
I am doing cbt exercises from Katesa’s link regularly, but I will be definitely seeking professional help in Germany. I cannot bear to battle the fear alone again.
Lots of love and positive thoughts, A!
Positive thoughts are the key :) Merry Christmas!
Just received an email-appointment with psychologist booked for next Wednesday (January 8th) :-)
Hi I just read your post and it was so like my own experience. I also went to live in Germany at one time and thats where my health anxiety began also. I actually had a panic attack from nerves i think the day before i went but the doctor didn't really explain it well to me so I went to Germany thinking something was wrong with my heart as it palpitated something shocking the day before. I was very lonely in germany and like you went from a large extended family and friends to being on my own all the time. I also was in a relationship there that went bad from day one, so ended up alone. I developed a lump in the throat and countless other symptoms of things. I had many tests done when i came back home and all were clear. Fast forward 20 years and im still the same though not as bad. I just feel sad for all the years I wasted worrying. However i do fully believe that if I hadn't gone to germany, I probably wouldnt have had the attack and if I did, at home with friends and family etc and prompt medical attention I am sure it would have got over it quite quickly. I think when you go home proper you will be a lot better. How did the Christmas go?
Hi I just read your post and it was so like my own experience. I also went to live in Germany at one time and thats where my health anxiety began also. I actually had a panic attack from nerves i think the day before i went but the doctor didn't really explain it well to me so I went to Germany thinking something was wrong with my heart as it palpitated something shocking the day before. I was very lonely in germany and like you went from a large extended family and friends to being on my own all the time. I also was in a relationship there that went bad from day one, so ended up alone. I developed a lump in the throat and countless other symptoms of things. I had many tests done when i came back home and all were clear. Fast forward 20 years and im still the same though not as bad. I just feel sad for all the years I wasted worrying. However i do fully believe that if I hadn't gone to germany, I probably wouldnt have had the attack and if I did, at home with friends and family etc and prompt medical attention I am sure it would have got over it quite quickly. I think when you go home proper you will be a lot better. How did the Christmas go?
Thanks for the nice wishes :) The Christmas went well, had a really good time with all the people I hadn't seen for months before-fiance and family first, of course, but also the friends. Hope you had a nice X-mas too :)
On the health anxiety front-I decided to hit it with all my might and a little help from psychologist. I had my first appointment, and it went well-it's a long process, of course, but I am on the right track-doing something about it. As you see, I am also trying to help other people deal with it-I talked with my psychologist about it and she found that a very good idea-apart from trying to be kind is not bad per se, it also helps me when I find myself in a similar situation-worrying about some thing related to my health. I am than able to draw from my own experience as well as from experiences of others, and use that as a constant reminder about my anxiety, which will hopefully help me keep it under check. ;)
Germany is really a beautiful country, and now I am able to enjoy it more, although the workload is still big. But it will reduce in a month or so (as the project will enter the evaluation phase which is not that time consuming for me), and I plan to travel a lot and visit all the good stuff. :)
Thats so so good that you went to a psychologist. I wish I'd done that, but they weren't very well known about then. Yes, talking to others and helping others does in turn help you. Germany is a very beautiful country. I've been to Mainz, Stuttgart, Kaiserslatern, Cologne and Frankfurt. I used to take a cruise on the Rhine quite regularly to pass my day off work. That was nice.
I live and work near Frankfurt, but I also have to visit Berlin once a month (also work-related), so I divide my time between East and West :)
Ive never been to Berlin. I really hope that you get a lot of help from the psychologist and that this will just a blip in your life :-) Don't stop helping others though :-)
Ive never been to Berlin. I really hope that you get a lot of help from the psychologist and that this will just a blip in your life :-) Don't stop helping others though :-)
It's a two way street, so I won't, mach keine Sorgen :)
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