This is why you shouldn't search google!!

[Savvy_Darling]

I wish I could put some type of block on my google/ internet on my phone!!
Here i go again.. I got myself seriously concerned I have lung cancer. And this is why:
My left shoulder has been feeling achy / tight... Like right where the neck meets the shoulder.. So shoulder blade area and little under it as well. It's also sore like a bruise feeling in one spot under the shoulder blade. When I compare the shoulders.. My left (the painful one) feels more tense like firmer than my right.

Well I looked online and came across how shoulder pain can be an early sign of damn lung cancer. Boy did my heart start beating then... And my mind started racing so then I did the stupidest thing and looked up "lung cancer at 21" and I found articles about young people who had lung cancer at 21, 23.. And never smoked a cigarette in there life and were healthy and they were diagnosed with it!!! It seriously hurt my soul. I've never smoked in my life.. I hate cigarettes.
But now I'm convinced I have lung cancer and I'm dying. And it may sound silly to some but how my brain works.. I seriously think this is it.. This is the end. It doesn't help that my boyfriends uncle has lung cancer. He smokes his whole life. He coughs horribly and I hate having to see him like that. So terrible and here I am now thinking I have it. And it doesn't help that's I've found proof on the Internet of young non smokers like me who had it.. One survived and the other passed. I could cry. I hate feeling scared of life.
Before this I was anxious about chest pain which happens towards the end of my period and then pancreatic cancer like in a previous thread I posted. I've been. Anxious since last Wednesday and I have a tendency to lay in a horrible position on my left side with my left arm under me and neck twisted to the left.. I know I tense up.. I feel like I've gotten this before around when I've been anxious and layed in the awkward position for hours looking on the Internet making myself feel worse. But now I might have had lung cancer all along and it wasn't anxiety and laying weird. Why do I do this! Please if anyone could help calm me down or at least talk to me about positive things to help me feel better I would so greatly appreciate it! All I can think is that I'm dying of lung cancer and terrified to go to the doctors about it. Thinking of getting an X-ray and having to hear the results makes me wanna dig a hole and hide myself from the world. :weep:

[Fishmanpa]

You can block Google and other sites. It all depends on how bad you want to. You'll need the help of a friend or loved one. All browsers have parental controls. Those that don't have apps you can add. You enter the sites to be blocked and have your helper password protect the access so you can't get in.

BAM! Blocked.... So... how much do you want your wish to come true? ;)

Positive thoughts and no more Google.

[Savvy_Darling]

I didn't know you could block Google on an iPhone ?? I'm going to have to look into this. Or buy a shock collar and get someone to activate it when I'm on my phone googling.

[Fishmanpa]

I didn't know you could block Google on an iPhone ?? I'm going to have to look into this. Or buy a shock collar and get someone to activate it when I'm on my phone googling.

Ironically, if you Google it, there are instructions on how to do it on your phone and at home. I imagine its less painful than a shock collar ;)

Positive thoughts

[MyNameIsTerry]

But there's a big problem...you can just change it. So, you will still have some need to resist it.

My therapist told me to make things hard to access and that way you will be less inclined to do it. This can work with compulsions but when they are all consuming and/or don't just fade away fairly quickly, it will always come back to your resolve in not accessing them.

For instance, if you are obsessively using your mobile, switch it off and shove it in a drawer as far away as you can to dissuade you from bothering to fetch it. If you look at your watch all the time, take it off and put it in your pocket. I had to do this one in my CBT and it does help. I filled my pocket up and put it underneath stuff so it made it a nuisance to get at.

It won't solve it, but it can help break the compulsion slightly.

The power to resist it lies within your own head.

---------- Post added at 04:47 ---------- Previous post was at 04:39 ----------



My left shoulder has been feeling achy / tight... Like right where the neck meets the shoulder.. So shoulder blade area and little under it as well. It's also sore like a bruise feeling in one spot under the shoulder blade. When I compare the shoulders.. My left (the painful one) feels more tense like firmer than my right.

Well I looked online and came across how shoulder pain can be an early sign of damn lung cancer.

But isn't an aching shoulder most likely to be diagnosed as - an aching shoulder? Muscle strain/sprain?

You could wake up with, Google and panic at the lung cancer suggestion to then have someone help you rationalise it and through questioning find that you slept on that side and was scrunched up.

This is the thing, it's not Google, it's the issue within HA, things like Cognitive Distortions. They explain a lot of what I see in threads on this board and I learned to apply them to myself by working out the ones I could see in peoples threads on NMP.

Whilst a Google search may pull up more common matches or popular searches, it's the user who doesn't choose to keep looking. This is a good example because such an ache could easily be many things and something many people experience day-to-day.

Through recovery you want to be able to Google this same issue, see lung cancer and think "whatever, it's a sprain/strain". That's what I can do because I don't have HA in my anxiety. I can find a lump, bump, patch, bruise, etc and think "who cares". At times I use some search tools to look for things and I get matches for cancer, like I did for my TMJ issue when I was really bad, but because my CD's differ to the HA sufferer I looked at several forms of cancer on the list and just scrolled down to the more likely issues. That's where it falls apart a lot of the time for the HA sufferer.

[Savvy_Darling]

Terry ---- that was extremely helpful! Thankyou so much for all that info. It's very accurate and how I feel my mind works. It's like I disregard all the logical reasoning and my anxiety takes over and muddies up my mind. All common sense out the window and the crazy what ifs and fear crowd my thoughts. If I deep breath and meditate for a moment I hear my logical voice saying "it's strain from you laying on your side with your shoulder crunched under your weight anxiously searching the web" but do I listen? No. It's like as soon as I see anything with a potential to end my life early that's what I'll think it is and get freaked about. I can admit that I just need to work on recovering instead of fueling the anxiety fire. It's so hard when the fear is so real and I'm panicked . �� :weep: but I really liked what you had to say and it definitely helped to put things in perspective for me.

[MyNameIsTerry]

I know what you mean, I have my own Cognitive Distortions, just around different scenarios and to you they would seem like how your health ones do to me. For instance, my OCD makes me want to do the same things at the same times of the day and anything out of place is a potential threat. I know that picking something up at a different time than "normal" will do nothing other than just increase symptoms of anxiety because I'm seeing it as a threat. It's just unpleasant.

I've moved on a lot with my OCD now, it's more about sleep routine and understanding of time. But back at the worst, changing my clothes took me weeks at a time because something was telling me it was bad. All my CD's would be telling me it's bad, that I will panic if I change a t-shirt, that something will be wrong, that I won't feel as would be "normal", that I WILL panic no matter what and then all the catastrophizing will come. It's typical fight or flight working overdrive to protect you from any possible threat.

To someone without my issues and my own form of those CD's that will seem completely irrational. For a long time whilst it did to me, I believed it strongly enough to remain entrapped by it. Things like this are still a fight for me but as you recover your slowly shift the balance of power from the subconscious to the conscious. It's like the scale starting to tilt back more towards you being in control and sometimes it waivers a bit too, it wobbles and we have those blips.

None of my anxiety has been about the things I see on this board daily, the terrifying conditions that scare anyone. Mine were all about the little things. So, whilst I can see things are irrational, I know that it's irrelevant because in the person's mind they are as scary as one of those T-Rex things off Jurassic Park! A had to touch things all day long, count stuff, think things, wear certain things & at certain times, drink water in multiples or even a certain side of mouth. There were so many. If things that small can enslave me in endless self destructive routines, of course so can the big worries about things like cancer that are based on small things too, like mine were. Mine was about an unknown thing happening because of my Magical Thinking subtype of my OCD but a lot of the time I had no clue what it would even be. Sometimes it was about not sleeping and others times it was about the fact I thought my compulsions prevented my anxiety from rising, which I didn't think I could handle (I bet that one sounds familiar?!).

But I got over a lot of that. So, can you and everyone else on here. I still have plenty to address but things are so much better than back then so never lose hope because back then I was saying exactly what everyone else is - I'm trapped forever. You will look back and know it was false as you come out of the other side of those very damaging stages.

Just think about what I said about how I can Google anything and not be affected by it. Seems impossible doesn't it? Now think about how you can put on a t-shirt without panicking or use a different fork to eat your tea. That was impossible to me.

[white1989]

hi savvy_darling,

I just wanted to say I know exactly what you're going through as I'm going through the exact same worries about blood cancer at the moment, I had some tests which showed my white blood cell count was lower than normal (the doctor said its likely to be a result of being run down and not to worry) but of course I've googled it and seen the dreaded C word, I've now got to wait another week for another blood test to check if they have come up again, I'm basically losing my mind and convinced my family and boyfriend are going to have to watch me battle through cancer and eventually die a slow and painful and nasty death.

It's ridiculous when I write it on paper but I wanted to let you know you're not alone, fearing cancer is the most horrible sense of anxiety (I'm only in my twenties too) and nothing that anyone says can make the fear go away, but in my opinion the likelihood of you having lung cancer would be slim to none, you're young and a non-smoker and while I'm not a doctor I would say that that puts you in a VERY low risk category in itself! I know its easier said than done but try not to worry for the time being and rest assured that you're really not alone! best wishes xx

[Savvy_Darling]

Thank you terry.. Gives me hope! I'm glad you are recovering and doing better.

---------- Post added at 19:41 ---------- Previous post was at 19:35 ----------

White1989-
Thanks for that! And oh man yes I sympathize with you because in your situation I would be the very same way! Part of why I'm terrified to go to the doctor to get tests and things done because God forbid if anything is off I know I will be a complete mess and I don't know if I can handle that. Ugh I hate this.
I really hope everything comes back okay with you! I guess one good thing is that the doctor didn't automatically cause a panic and said it could be because your run down. Probably running a second test not only to double check but to cover his own butt you know what I mean? Better to be safe than sorry but with the doc saying likely culprit being something so trivial I think you should hold on to that and try not to think of the big C. I know it's hard but you gotta stay positive and treat your body good so the next test will be better. :hugs: stay strong!

[MyNameIsTerry]

Thanks Savanna, I really appreciate that :flowers: