Please help calm me down a little bit? I've never been so scared

[UserName20]

I'm sure some of you may have seen my post about my weird chest sensations/pains. Well after reading symptoms I thought my neck started to hurt when Im thinking about it. I was looking in the mirror and I see a hump where my neck base meets my back or spine. I showed my mom and she said it's possible it was always there and we just didn't notice it. It's not hard at all... Just like extra skin in that area and maybe swollen. I've been absolutely hysterical after seeing it, crying and begging her to take me to the ER. She told me that I need to calm down a bit and that she'll make a Dr appointment Monday so now I'm going to spend all weekend crying my eyes out because I know that this is something serious and I'm going to die, now I'm really noticing neck pain. Even when I go to the dr on Monday he's going to send me to get more testing, Of course I looked this up online and it seems to be a common issue among older women but I really don't know if this is suddenly there or if it's been there for a long time. I can't stop thinking about dying now... I can tell my mom is very concerned but she's trying to stay calm for me. She has health anxiety too just not as extreme as me and I know she's looking things up right now. I'm just scared I'm going to die. If this is common among older women I shouldnt have it because I'm only 16.

[KatiePink]

It's perfectly normal to have that little hump there, I think it's more noticeable with people who have bad head posture for example where your head is either facing down all day or too forward, its just muscle underneath which can make it look 'puffier'

[Fishmanpa]

As I have a daughter that suffers with depression and anxiety (22), it pains me as a parent to see someone so young suffering.

Print out this thread and take it to the doctor with you. He needs to know what's going on mentally with you. Talk to your Mom and also make sure to ask about getting help for your anxiety. What you're describing, IMO, is a normal body structure and not sinister in the least yet you're hysterical over it.

Let us know how you make out.

Positive thoughts

[KatiePink]

I agree and I know because I've been there numerous times! It does make you see normal things differently, and I'm always questioning if I've had it all my life or not. They're simply normal things that other people wouldn't even notice let alone worry about. It's dreadful I know that's why the best thing you can do is show your doctor x

[UserName20]

Thank you guys very much for all of your replies! I was finally able to calm myself down a bit. I don't know how to explain it or why I hadn't noticed it before?????? It's on the base of my neck on the back and is actually visible a bit when I was looking in the mirror. The posture thing would make perfect sense for me, at school my head was constantly bent forward all day at my desk. Google came up things like a Buffalo hump, which for the most part seems pretty harmless. I looked up the images and a lot look like what I have, some a lot worse. I'm trying my best to remain positive, it's just so hard to do with all of these "what ifs" constantly running through my head. It's just so terrifying not knowing. I'll see what the doc has to say on Monday, I'm praying that it'll all be ok. Thank you guys again for your responses! They really helped me a lot! :)

---------- Post added at 21:36 ---------- Previous post was at 21:07 ----------

Im so terrified thinking of what my doc is going to say. I keep imagining he'll take one look at my neck and say he's very concerned and send me for testing, tests that would confirm the that something serious and unfixable is wrong with me and then that's just it for me. :unsure:

[UserName20]

It's like I know that my health anxiety has convinced me of many things in the past, but it's not everyday that there's a huge, noticeable hump in the back of my neck where it meets my spine. From images on google it looks like a buffalo hump, but I just don't understand how I would have never noticed it before. This has got to be cancer, I already know it. Now I'm just spent wondering how bad it is and if they will be able to do anything for me.

[furret]

Oh dear, i am so sorry you are feeling like this.
Once i went with my mom to see the doctor. She was going for checkups because of a new diet, i was just accompanying her.
The doctor saw me and went straight to me, completely ignoring my mom.
He sent me for a thyroid study, i have a very round face and a VERY pronounced hump right where you say yours is.
Everything was fine. It's just REALLY bad posture, plus i spend practically all day on the computer so it doesn't help :P
We had never noticed it, and it has to be quite pronounced to have the doctor so concerned but it was nothing :)
And don't think it could be your thyroid for what i said. My face IS very round and i was a bit overweight so it looked even rounder. Oh and i have a pronounced double chin, and a VERY VERY fat neck.
Is just the way i'm built, a half sister has those same characteristics so is genetic and nothing sinister :) don't you worry.
For the record i am 24, suffering from HA since two years ago.

[UserName20]

Thank you very much for sharing, Furret! I feel a lot better after reading your post. I'm trying my best to remain positive about all of this! I was almost thinking about cancelling my appointment tomorrow, it's like if something is wrong I don't even want to know! Lol. But it will be nice to hopefully have a peace of mind afterwards! Thank you again! :) I'll keep ya posted on what the doc says tomorrow!

[UserName20]

Oh wow guys, I was under the impression that I had an appointment set up this morning before my mom went to work. This morning she is acting like she almost forgot about this whole thing?? I'm honestly really confused right now... Friday she seemed concerned and now it's just kind of like a whatever thing with her. I'm worried, I don't know if this hump is recent or what's going on. When I'm standing up it feels soft like extra skin, when I bend over it feels like it's bone!? I'm not having any problems with it or anything, I'm just confused as to why it's there. Online I read that some part of your brain can have cancer which causes this hump, other things I've seen that something in your kidney with cancer can cause this hump. I'm just really confused, is it unlikely that this is cancer of some kind since I don't have any other symptoms ? Do you guys think I should just try to forget about this for awhile? My mom doesn't seem to concerned about it I guess, I don't know.

[peoplelikeus]

I have this on my neck as do most normal people.

try to stop stressing.

Enjoy your life. It's short.

[Fishmanpa]

The bones of the neck include several cervical and thoracic vertebrae (neck bones). If you run your fingers down your neck from the base of your skull you'll feel a "bump" where the cervical and thoracic vertebrae meet the spine. That's what you're feeling. Everyone has what you describe and it varies in size from person to person.

It's totally normal. It makes sense that posture can accentuate this especially in today's world of always looking down at a phone or being humped over at a computer. So now you can choose to accept this or continue to worry needlessly.

Positive thoughts

[UserName20]

Thank you very much! I have finally managed to stop obsessing over it so much, and suddenly all of the aches I felt in that area are gone when I'm not thinking about it. I had a yearly checkup at the eye Dr today. I was reading online that sometimes they are able to see tumors of the brain or sense abnormal pressure behind the eyes which would raise a red flag. The thing I was worried about said the tumor is located behind the eyes. It turns out my eyes got a bit worse this year, so I immediately started figuring that I had a tumor. Out of curiosity I mentioned it to my Dr asking if that could cause my eyes to get worse, he laughed and told me the change in my eyes is absolutely nothing to be concerned about and he went on to tell if that if I had a tumor so close to my eyes that would affect my vision that I wouldn't be able to see out of the sides of my eyes at all and that it would be black. He told me that there's absolutely nothing to be worried about. I then of course brought up a little thing I noticed on my eyelid, he told me it was just a skin tag and gave me some eyelid wipes to help with that. My mom worked at an eye dr before and she told me that there was a young boy who had a brain tumor and they actually found it during his normal check up. I still don't understand how that's possible, but I'm going to just trust what I was told today!

[UserName20]

Ok I'm honestly blocking health sites from now on since I keep googling uncontrollably!! I've now convinced myself that its bone cancer. The hard hump when I bend over, how it feels like it's swelling and I've never felt this big hump there before, this must have just shown up overnight!! It all points directly to bone cancer. I even furthered my fear when I read that when it's on the spine it has a low chance of being cured. I'm so angry with myself, why must I constantly torment myself like this?

[Shazamataz]

Ok I'm honestly blocking health sites from now on since I keep googling uncontrollably!! I've now convinced myself that its bone cancer. The hard hump when I bend over, how it feels like it's swelling and I've never felt this big hump there before, this must have just shown up overnight!! It all points directly to bone cancer. I even furthered my fear when I read that when it's on the spine it has a low chance of being cured. I'm so angry with myself, why must I constantly torment myself like this?

I know it's hard to stop googling but you really must do everything you can to stop as it's just making things worse.

LOADS of people have a wee bump/hump there and it's nothing to worry about.

From someone who is also struggling with health anxiety about different physical stuff, the internet can be useful but the more you focus on it the worse it seems.

[UserName20]

Well, here I am, five WHOLE years later. I am now 21. ( I couldn’t remember my login for that account so I made another ) This was something that when I was 16 I wanted to go to the dr for but my parents thought I was fine. I pretty much just let that fear go.. I kinda just accepted that it was a part of my body that I’d just deal with. Recently for some reason I began thinking about it again. It is definitely a Buffalo hump ( it looks like the pictures online ) I began googling it again and came across Cushings disease. I have quite a bit of the symptoms, but I think the symptoms are related to other things too. For example, some of the symptoms are related to PCOS which my doctor believes I may have. Supposedly cushings disease rare, but a “Buffalo hump” is a sign for it.

I haven’t mentioned this hump to a doctor. I’ve seen plenty over the past few years for other things but I guess my hair covers it up so maybe they wouldn’t have notice anyways. I know that my posture was and is bad. ( ESPECIALLY throughout school I was always uncomfortable with my hair and would constantly have my head down on my desk leaking forward pretty much constantly throughout school years) I am pretty sure that a bad posture can cause one to form, but I am more worried about something else going on. I know that since it’s been 5 years and I’m still okay that’s a little comforting. Reading how frantic I was about it 5 years ago is a bit hard for me to revisit. I had been struggling so bad at that point.

I guess now I’m just falling down a hole again, convinced that I have this rare disease and that I’m going to die from it. I feel my thoughts spiraling again. I’m afraid I’ll die before I ever get to marry my boyfriend or have kids, there’s just so many things going through my mind. I have done very well with my anxiety this past year. ( for the most part there’s been some struggles ) but now I feel like it’s back and I need to get the strength to fight it off again. I know I had this hump before I was 16 even. I remember at the time posting this I had been going though pictures and it had been around before I was even 16.