Veins and other things :( opinions?

[Savvy_Darling]

Hi everyone, I'm back with more body issues. I'm very overwhelmed right now and came here to get all this out. It might be a tad long but hopefully some of you lovely people can help me.

The first thing I'm worried about is vein visibility. Seeing those blue veins throughout your body. I'm very fair skinned and I know it's easier for us to see that and I know I could see some of my veins easily BUT I feel like I'm seeing more and more and it's freaking me out. I noticed it in the dressing room when I was out with my gram and I went into panic mode. All these veins in my arms and when I showed my gram she laughed at my distress saying I just have light skin and then named family members who also had visible veins. But what bothers me is why am I just noticing this?! I don't feel like it's always been this way. Then the next day I noticed on my porch, all the veins in my legs.. Especially in the back.. Like spider veins.. No vericose but they're visible. again, I never noticed this and it's scaring me. I know my mom has vericose veins and spider veins in the back of her legs but I'm 21 and I feel like I look ugly and I'm very self conscious now! My boyfriend says my legs don't look different but I disagree. I looked up things and I really couldn't find anything. I also don't have any other symptoms.. They aren't bulging or bleeding or hurting..
I know I can't be pregnant.. I only had sex a couple times since my last period and we use condoms and I'm so careful and he doesn't put no baby juice anywhere near me... But I'm scared.
The other thing I'm worried about is kidney failure because I thought one of my legs looked tanner than the other and I looked that up and stumbled on some page about kidney failure symptoms. My skin sometimes is dry after the shower and yea I get itchy feeling sometimes. My boyfriend also doesn't think my legs look different colors at all and must have been a shadow making it look so.
I also noticed on my legs like a pinkish reddish color on my lower shins.. I'm not sure why it's like that.. I don't know if it's just the hair follicle making it look pink or if my actual skin is pink. I looked up shin redness and all kinds of causes came up but ones that scared me were skin cancer and melanoma. I'm done looking up anything else because all its done has caused me major anxiety and I feel very overwhelmed. I'm scared about kidney failure or heart issues or cancer like melanoma and skin again.
I rode 20 miles on my bike yesterday fine so I'm not sure if that crosses out heart problems because if it were that I don't know if I'd be able to do that.
Also my blood pressure was good last time it was checked like a month n a half ago and it said kidney failure usually has a symptom of high blood pressure. I just can't get all these thoughts outta my head and I feel like I'm going to make an appointment with my doctor because I'm so scared or so many things that my brain can't rationalize and I feel like one big ball of trembling anxiety.

I'm adding some pictures.. Of the things I'm worried about and maybe I could get some opinions.
First one is my legs..if they look different colors..

[Savvy_Darling]

This is the veins in the legs..
(Like I said I can see them in my arms some places and on the inside of my hands like fingers)

[Savvy_Darling]

And this is one of my shins and the pinkish or redness I'm talking about.. It's only twards the bottom and it doesn't hurt, no swelling, just color. Maybe just the hair follicles making it look red?

[Savvy_Darling]

The pictures are hard to see exactly what I'm talking about. Like in some pictures my one legs looks a different color than the other and then in others it looks the same. Just like the shin redness. My boyfriend said that shadows and the way the lights hitting my legs can make them look different. It just seems like sometimes my right leg looks tanner than the left or that the left looks whiter.. Where I sit on the porch maybe the post on my right side is causing a shadow but I just don't know I just can't stop thinking about what I read about kidney failure and skin changes. Like one leg looking darker or whiter than the other :(


Now I feel really itchy too!! Ugh I'm dying.

[Fishmanpa]

Savvy,

There's nothing there! This is a worry that quite frankly is not worthy of concern. Do what you feel necessary but you're much better off spending any monies you'd pay for medical testing treating your psychological issues.

Positive thoughts

[DrG00GLE]

Of course one leg would be more tan than the other just like one lung in your body is bigger than the other. It's how life works. Everything else is fine and your cat is really cute.

[Savvy_Darling]

I don't know I feel like when I take pictures it isn't showing what I'm talking about how I see it. It can't just be me.. Or maybe in my mind it's just making things out to be worse than they seem :(
I never knew it being okay for body parts to be tanner than others.. Although At first I didn't think it was a big deal either until I googled and read about kidney failure and now nothing seems okay or normal.. Just really worrisome. Thanks for the replies though....

And yea that's my fat cat Dennis thanks.

[MyNameIsTerry]

Can't see anything.

I've spent some time investigating these parts of the female body so I think I would spot something which stood out. :winks::biggrin:

You want to see my veins. I have permanent blue veins on display in various places, mostly arms & legs. They've always been like that, it's just how my body is.

http://cdn-maf0.heartyhosting.com/sites/muscleandfitness.com/files/media/Big%20Bicep.jpg

...I wish :roflmao:

Remember that in hot weather you lose more water. If you are exercising more (aren't you doing a lot of running?) your veins will be expanding more as your blood is more efficiently pumped plus your muscles will be growing which can push them out as well as the fat you lose showing them up more.

You would know if your veins looked different and it was a medical concern. They would really stand out.

Look in a mirror. I bet they look the same as those photos. Just as an experiment, only do it once, don't build a new checking compulsion.

But don't shoot any further north than those photo's, I'm already having palpitations from these!!! :biggrin:

[Savvy_Darling]

Ugh Terry, it's just I know veins aren't like this usually... And on my underside of my right arm I can see them all the way up to my shoulder. I know what I'm seeing on my bicep isn't what's usually there. I'm really scared.. Like is my blood circulation bad? I don't feel pain or anything weird... The veins aren't bulging but they're so blue.. Even the weird purple spider vein which I know was never there I see. This is making me feel extra anxious and I'm so upset. I'm definitely freaking out.. Like am I going to have a blood clot or gonna die? I just don't know what brought this on.. Like I said I only noticed this Friday. Even if I have been exercising I don't think it's been extreme enough to cause this? :weep: I'm afraid to look in the mirror.
And no my veins don't look like in that picture and they don't bulge... They're under the skin just blue and noticeable!

[Savvy_Darling]

Just took this picture of my right arm. It's harder to catch on camera but you can see the blue veins... Im so freaked out. I'm scared of my heart. Like I said I don't feel funny but my anxiety is so bad that I can start to imagine I feel funny :( I really haven't had any heart or chest pains I'm so worried.

[MyNameIsTerry]

I can't see anything in that photo, the resolution isn't high enough to zoom in but that's perhaps telling as really blue would stick out I think. I can't even make out between the forearm and bicep which is where you would expect to see prominent veins.

There might be some on the back of your left calf in an earlier photo but I've got them too.

I can see a cat looking at your arm thinking "I can't see a blue vein".

[rsanchez]

I think Terry is right. In hot weather the veins expand, it's completely normal. Just make sure you're well hydrated.

[Savvy_Darling]

Yeah I noticed the pictures I take aren't really showing the veins right.. I don't know why... But to the eye and in the mirror they're so noticeable. Here's one more picture from Friday with different lighting.. But again pictures don't show like what I see... I've seen some other threads on here about veins and I have took comfort in reading them but I still keeping asking myself why are they so visible all of a sudden, what did I do to cause this, and the big one, am I dying.. Is my blood bad and is my heart not working right ? /: i know no one here can tell me for sure what's happening or if I'm gonna die but I just don't know what to do with myself I'm so worried.

Rsanchez, I read about that about the veins but why wouldn't I have ever noticed this? I guess this is what's really making me worked up that it's new to me and it's scary I feel like.

[MyNameIsTerry]

I can see some on that photo but they look normal to me. If your veins were very blue, or enlarged or both, they would show on those photos.

I don't know why you may be noticing this now but I bet if you compared yours to somebody else's, they would look about the same. But if you do that, do it once and walk away because you don't want to add that as a new check and to be honest, I tend not to suggest such things because of that.

Mine get more visible due to various factors e.g. long sleep times pump me up more, hot weather (losing more water), physical work/exercise, etc.

On the point of something like exercise, there are chemicals within our bodies that pump things up (:blush:) as you know. How can you say that this isn't just a chemical reaction to something you haven't realised? And we get those chemicals from our foods. So, I know I can eat certain things that will have an effect on my body. These are all perfectly natural things for the body to do, but I think sometimes HA people don't realise this because how many people on here can say they are that clued up on human biology, nutrition & the body, etc?

[Savvy_Darling]

Things I've done differently would be for the past couple of weeks I blend one grape fruit and about a cupful of carrots and drink it once a day. I've been also sitting out in the sun for 10 minutes a day (weather permitting) for vitamin D purposes. And of course more physical activity. Oh, and like I said originally.. Thursday night I used some rough exfoliating soap.. Maybe it made my skin lighter and I already have fair skin? I don't know.
I'm not sure if any of that would interact with my body but I hope this whole vein thing is of benign cause... Man if I make an apt with my doctor I can only imagine how she's gonna react to all my new worries.. Maybe a overnight stay in a mental hospital :( but all jokes aside I just really really hope I'm okay.. This vein thing is really making me feel crazy and that I'm gonna drop dead at any second :weep: I don't like seeing the inner work of my vein system.. It's quite disturbing.
And i guess they may look normal to you and everyone else I've shown but what doesn't feel normal to me is that I'm fairly sure these things weren't noticeable like this..

[MyNameIsTerry]

Well rubbing your body would probably cause some things to pop up more. Flick a vein with your thumb and it will show up more pronounced, an old trick in hospitals when taking blood samples (among less legal reasons outside hospitals :whistles) so it could easily be that or a combination.

But whatever it is, I'm sure you will be fine.

They look normal to me because I have them, and so does my GF. But I get your point, it seems new and like in all anxiety disorders change = possible threat to the fight or flight process, it's just the context that differs.

Something people often do on here is apply a waiting time before heading to the doctors to reduce their reassurance-seeking. It's a good idea and the aim is to see if the anxiety fades. This is an OCD technique too where resisting a compulsion for so many seconds can see you exposure yourself long enough to see it lose it's intensity, or walking away and coming back to the situation.

[Savvy_Darling]

Yea you're right Terry, I'll try the waiting trick.. See how I feel in at least a weeks time. See if any more symptoms or worsening happens. Gonna be hard to not worry but I'll try and continue to read over other vein threads I found on here...
Thanks for your help as always by the way.