TaylorC
10-06-16, 10:57
Before I get into my question here’s a bit of my history with anxiety (feel free to skip to the bottom for my question - this is pretty long!)
:
In 2013, I was under a lot of stress and I started to get random pains. It turned out I had a urine infection, but I got antibiotics and it went away. Anyway, I kept getting tons of random pains and symptoms, and I started to worry about them.
And things just got worse and worse for about 6 months – at first I didn’t know that all of the things that I was feeling were anxiety related. I always associated anxiety with panic attacks – and I wasn’t having those.
Anyway, back then I realized after speaking with doctors that it was anxiety and I took time off from work and I got better without medication – which I had been offered.
Anyway, since 2013, I’ve dealt with stresses in life pretty well and anxiety hasn’t affected me much… until recently.
Okay, so, back to my question, over the past month or so I’ve been getting chest pain (just the left side) and pain in the left arm.
At first part of me thought that it might be anxiety, as did my husband – although chest pain is not typically a symptom I get when I’m anxious.
But, another part of me worried that there was something wrong with my heart. My husband reassured me that I’m a healthy 27 year old who doesn’t smoke and exercises frequently, so my heart is likely fine.
However, I worried about it so much, even when my husband rubbed the area, which was tender and told me that it was muscular pain. I worried something was wrong with my heart.
So, after about two weeks of worrying about my heart I went to the doctor, who told me it was most likely anxiety. I had an ECG done, which was fine. I was relieved, and figured that it was all down to anxiety.
Since, then I’ve gotten a few more symptoms, like shortness of breath and tingling, but I attributed all of them to anxiety and they went away.
So, last week I felt pretty good again – almost back to normal. I was back to work and I seemed okay.
But, I was still getting chest pains – even though the muscle tenderness had calmed down quite a lot – although not entirely.
My Question:
Anyway a couple of nights ago, I woke up in the middle of the night clutching my chest, and I felt like my heart was seizing up and I was breathless. I was half asleep at the time, so I was rambling incoherently and my husband had to calm me down.
It was really scary, so now, a small part of me feels like there’s something wrong with my heart, like it’s just going to seize up and stop beating.
I’m still getting chest pains, and now I wonder if it was my chest pains that caused the anxiety, and not the other way around.
Part of me feels like I wish I had not mentioned anxiety at all when I went to the doctor the first time, and that I should have just focused on the chest pain instead.
Part of me wants to go back to the doctor’s for more tests, but I think they will just attribute it to anxiety because of my past.
Does anyone have any advice – should I just ignore the weird feelings I’m getting on the left side of my chest and accept that it’s anxiety – or should I get more tests?
Thanks!
:
In 2013, I was under a lot of stress and I started to get random pains. It turned out I had a urine infection, but I got antibiotics and it went away. Anyway, I kept getting tons of random pains and symptoms, and I started to worry about them.
And things just got worse and worse for about 6 months – at first I didn’t know that all of the things that I was feeling were anxiety related. I always associated anxiety with panic attacks – and I wasn’t having those.
Anyway, back then I realized after speaking with doctors that it was anxiety and I took time off from work and I got better without medication – which I had been offered.
Anyway, since 2013, I’ve dealt with stresses in life pretty well and anxiety hasn’t affected me much… until recently.
Okay, so, back to my question, over the past month or so I’ve been getting chest pain (just the left side) and pain in the left arm.
At first part of me thought that it might be anxiety, as did my husband – although chest pain is not typically a symptom I get when I’m anxious.
But, another part of me worried that there was something wrong with my heart. My husband reassured me that I’m a healthy 27 year old who doesn’t smoke and exercises frequently, so my heart is likely fine.
However, I worried about it so much, even when my husband rubbed the area, which was tender and told me that it was muscular pain. I worried something was wrong with my heart.
So, after about two weeks of worrying about my heart I went to the doctor, who told me it was most likely anxiety. I had an ECG done, which was fine. I was relieved, and figured that it was all down to anxiety.
Since, then I’ve gotten a few more symptoms, like shortness of breath and tingling, but I attributed all of them to anxiety and they went away.
So, last week I felt pretty good again – almost back to normal. I was back to work and I seemed okay.
But, I was still getting chest pains – even though the muscle tenderness had calmed down quite a lot – although not entirely.
My Question:
Anyway a couple of nights ago, I woke up in the middle of the night clutching my chest, and I felt like my heart was seizing up and I was breathless. I was half asleep at the time, so I was rambling incoherently and my husband had to calm me down.
It was really scary, so now, a small part of me feels like there’s something wrong with my heart, like it’s just going to seize up and stop beating.
I’m still getting chest pains, and now I wonder if it was my chest pains that caused the anxiety, and not the other way around.
Part of me feels like I wish I had not mentioned anxiety at all when I went to the doctor the first time, and that I should have just focused on the chest pain instead.
Part of me wants to go back to the doctor’s for more tests, but I think they will just attribute it to anxiety because of my past.
Does anyone have any advice – should I just ignore the weird feelings I’m getting on the left side of my chest and accept that it’s anxiety – or should I get more tests?
Thanks!