Chest infection/pneumonia worries

[Andromeda]

Hello!

I have not posted here for a very long time.

After suffering from health anxiety for 8 very long years it seems as though a pattern has developed with my health anxiety.

I am able to manage it now day to day, I have been through almost a year long period of coping and managing this horrible beast and keeping it at bay.
The times it seems to come back are when I'm particularly stressed or if I'm actually ill.

On Monday night I had been to the gym, I came home all was normal and as I was settling down for bed I noticed my throat started to feel smokey. I'm not sure if anyone's ever had that sensation before but it usually signals the start of something for me :doh:

So I wake up on Tuesday and the smokeyness is even worse, I'm feeling sick and hot and horrible, I've got a cough (albeit a forced cough due to the smokey sensation) and today now I have woken up blowing horrible green mucus out, my chest feels horrible and tight, I'm hot and I feel like I've been hit by a truck.

I've had really bad chest infections a few times after getting walking pneumonia in 2012.

Unfortunately when I get any virus or cold my brain automatically jumps to doom and gloom and I invisage myself in hospital dying of severe pneumonia...

Everyone else around me seems to be able to get on with these infections but I just always feel floored like I'm going to die and that I can't get better without antibiotics.

Unfortunately I'm in no fit state to go to the walk in centre today so I was going to leave it until tomorrow but now I'm worried that I'm going to take a horrible turn between now and then and it's just not going well for me right now.

The fact that I've just rambled on and on after a year of being totally okay is so disheartening. I don't know why I can't just get on with it like everyone else

:wacko:

[MyNameIsTerry]

Don't berate yourself, Andromeda. You've just said that you've spent the last year controlling it - that's massive! Learning to employ the same control over big triggers, and when you feel quite physically unwell, it's just another target to achieve in your recovery. Until you get there, it's going to hit you in varying degrees and make you misjudge yourself like this but try to keep in mind your achievements.

It sounds like you have an infection. Coloured mucus is classic sign that my GP's always told me to look out for (I'm am asthma sufferer and a cold always turned into chest infections when I was younger so I needed antibiotics).

Up your vitamin C because this will help. I've had chest & throat infections and beaten them this way the past couple ofhats whereas I always needed antibiotics in the past. Otherwise see your GP when you can and they may prescribe antibiotics, but they reach for them less these days.

[Gary A]

We all get viruses and colds, hell, I've just about managed it through this summer without one. If I get to the end of August without getting a cold or whatever, I'll be amazed.

The problem with you is that you associate these common conditions with something that started with similar symptoms, but it then developed into something much worse. As hard as that is, it's not all that unusual. People who have had a heart attack will feel a cold chill when they feel any type of chest pain. People who have had a brain tumour will freak out at the slightest headache.

Most of us can take these things in our stride, but that's simply because the vast majority of people have never come to any serious harm when faced with these types of symptoms. That's never going to be easy for you, I'm afraid.

It's all about confidence. In a funny way you may actually gain more confidence by having these symptoms and then coming out fine on the other side of them. It will gradually prove to you that not every symptom is a precursor to some horrific illness.