Strange experience on the road to recovery from HA

[bulan]

I wonder if anyone else has experienced this... I haven't struggled with intense health anxiety for a while. 2014 was my worst year, and I've been recovering ever since, with ups and downs of course. I've relapsed a little this year for a number of reasons... 1) my Mom developed HA and I wasn't strong enough not to let it affect me, 2) 2018 has been the year of illness and strange symptoms for most of my family, 3) we have highly stressful things going on in our lives, and I'm not handling them well, nor sleeping well.

But this week's intense HA episode was mainly triggered by two intensely stressful things happening last week: a deeply distressing conflict with one of my relatives, and my sister-in-law's battle against her abusive, narcissistic husband *and* the court system that tends to give abusive men custody of their kids. Both of these situations have triggered feelings of claustrophobia and near panic. This, in turn, triggered a fibromyalgia flare, which has given me a handful of new, worrisome symptoms, which then triggered my HA.

At the very least, I'm thankful now that I recognize the connection between these things.

So the anxiety I've been struggling with the last few days wanted to be focused on my latest symptoms, but I was able to talk myself out of it. The strange experience I mentioned in the title is that my anxiety was suddenly 'homeless.' It couldn't make me fixate on any specific problem, so it was just there... and I didn't know how to deal with that, because I haven't dealt with generalized anxiety before! So at the moment I'm trying to take slow breaths and find an outlet for it. I feel like I was half-successful at dealing with my HA, and I want to deal with what's left. Has anyone had this experience before?

[Akoto]

Your experience doesn't sound all that strange to me! It reads like you're positively buried with stressful things, and worry can be hell.

As for your health anxiety being 'homeless', well, I can only say what I personally feel. I just recently relapsed after getting some good control over it. Now begins the process of working my way back (hate you, Doctor Google).

My thoughts are that my health anxiety will always be with me, just like my chronic physical problems. However, it can be managed. Sometimes, you'll fall back a step, but it's not the end of the world if it happens. You work with your psych on getting better or back on track, whichever you may need!

I can't directly relate to your problem because I have some health issues which will never go away, but I'm more than sure it's possible to have both HA and GAD. Can you speak with your psych doc or therapist and tell them what's going on? Maybe they can help you over this new hill.

On the other hand, it's a good thing that your health anxiety is 'homeless' right now. That sounds like a little progress. Don't let it have a home in you! It'll do you no good, as I'm sure you know.