Brain tumor...I’m CONVINCED and suicidal

[littlesister]

Hello everyone, i’m new here and after finding this site i at least don’t feel so alone. i’m struggling so bad right now. some background info, i’m a 25 year old female with decades-long documentation of GAD and OCD. this is the worst my condition has ever been and i’m about to lose my mind. i already have practiced writing what i want to say in a suicide note if i can’t overcome this...that’s how desperate i am.

i am petrified of having a brain tumor. in high school my friend passed away after being afflicted with the demon known as glioblastoma multiforme. at the time i only felt sadness for her. as an adult, the fear is always in the back of my mind that it could happen to me. i’ve struggled with this on and off for 2 years. when it first began, my GP ordered me a CT scan which came back clear. this was Feb 2017, so about a year and a half ago.

in Feb 2018 I began having the same fears after some dizziness and eye symptoms. I had my optic nerve checked Mar 2018 and all was well. I gradually overcame the fear, not wanting to look like a crazy and pursue more head scans. But as of Aug2018 the fear is back so bad. I just don’t see how i can be this paranoid and upset if it’s not actually happening to me. a week ago I developed a headache/head pressure that has varied in intensity and position but hasn’t left me. at best there’s always a pressure on my temples. my ears are clogged and sometimes i can’t hear out of one. my vision is slightly unfocused but i just started taking valium (sadly as you can see it’s doing nothing) and i know blurred vision/dizziness is a side effect so i’m going to try not to worry about that too much and just focus on the things that were taking place before the valium prescription. i see my GP, a psychiatrist and will be seeing a therapist in September. i have made an emergency appt to see my GP tomorrow because i cannot stop waking up each morning crying uncontrollably and shaking. this fear is ruining my life. i work full time and my employer wants to promote me but i can’t accept because i believe i’m going to die soon. my boyfriend and i have finally saved enough money to buy a house together but i don’t want to because i think i’m going to die.

any advice, just someone to talk to would mean the world!

[StephA]

Any hypochondriac is convinced they have something. So what you’re going through (your thoughts) isn’t abnormal. We can’t diagnose as we are not doctor’s, but I’d be willing to make a bet that you do NOT have a brain tumor. If you’re truly suicidal I would call a hotline or get an appointment with your therapist ASAP. I can tell you that you will hurt a lot of people if you follow through with suicide. It’s just not worth it. I’ve actually had cancer (breast) five years ago at 36. I had an intestinal illness (C Diff) three times during treatment and that was much worse than the chemo itself, but I’m still here five years later. I was never once suicidal through all of that and after, so I can’t tell you that I understand your feelings because I don’t! However, I will tell you that there horrible things can happen to anyone, but you had a clear CT scan not long ago, because I’m guessing you were convinced you had a tumor then, and you did NOT so that itself should tell you something! You have good ol health anxiety and please don’t let the dragon defeat you. Fight back! You will be ok!

[littlesister]

hey StephA i’m so sorry to hear about what you went through :( maybe trials make us braver in the long run so perhaps i shouldn’t be so afraid of them. i did make an emergency appt with my GP because i am having suicidal ideation and i hope i can get some peace of mind tomorrow and help on how to deal with this. thank you so much for caring and i hope to update here with good news and coping mechanisms on this health anxiety journey...

[Andrash]

hey StephA i’m so sorry to hear about what you went through :( maybe trials make us braver in the long run so perhaps i shouldn’t be so afraid of them. i did make an emergency appt with my GP because i am having suicidal ideation and i hope i can get some peace of mind tomorrow and help on how to deal with this. thank you so much for caring and i hope to update here with good news and coping mechanisms on this health anxiety journey...

Ask yourself one question: how can you be suicidal and fear cancer (or any other disease) at the same time? I will help you - you can not. The very fact you have health anxiety means you are afraid of death - further meaning you want to live. You don't want to commit suicide.

[littlesister]

Ask yourself one question: how can you be suicidal and fear cancer (or any other disease) at the same time? I will help you - you can not. The very fact you have health anxiety means you are afraid of death - further meaning you want to live. You don't want to commit suicide.

Yes, I do want to live desperately. however, i am also losing my mind with worry and can’t take much more of this intense paranoia and want relief so bad! my phobia is so strong that i have nearly convinced myself i am terminal so why not just die with dignity, on my own terms, instead of suffer? a lot of it possibly comes down to control as well. i cannot control contracting a brain tumor, but i can control the way i choose to exit this world. so, that is the reason behind my suicidal thoughts. it’s quite a paradox but it does stem from this phobia being so real and huge in my head. i know this would destroy my family so i am seeking help before acting on impulse and ideation. thanks for all of the concern i suppose, but i personally wouldn’t tell someone they are something one way or another. mental illness is still stigmatized and seen as an invisible disease by some, and a lot of people take drastic measures in order to “prove” something. i’ve personally seen it happen and it’s so sad! just some food for thought, i will keep updating as i seek help, however.

[Cusper]

I get it! It is about control. Your reference to someone who died of an aggressive form of brain cancer brings me back to the time my best friend's mom was diagnosed and died within 6 months. I started my health anxiety then. It had gotten so bad that I had wanted to end it all because I thought,"if this is living I just don't want to"

I also suffer from OCD and GAD. There was one person that said to me, "suffering is when you believe your thoughts" I know you have witnessed someone in highschool that died of a terrible disease and if you just go on statistics alone, the probability that happening to you have the same thing is probably the same if you won a lottery. (which is 1 in 28 million depending)

I have had extreme health anxiety my entire life but they always get worse when i am making poor decisions in my life. I don't know what your situation is but when I feel pressured to do something I don't want to do I would rather die than make a decision or to hurt anyone else's feelings. Do you really want to buy a house with your boyfriend? Are you worried that if you do it would be a mistake? Or on the opposite end of the spectrum do you not think you deserve to own a house?

I remember when I got the house of my dreams I was worried something would fall from the sky before I got to move in.

Or

I remember when my boyfriend that i no longer loved wanted to marry me I started to really think i had a bad disease.

Sometimes it's not about what you think it is. Dig deep and maybe think that your fears might be a distraction from events that are occurring in your life.

I find when I am not being proactive in my life the obsessions and the health anxiety takes over. But now I take it as a sign that I might not be making the right decisions in life.

ps. Valium is insanely addictive and even if you are on it regularly for over a week you could be addicted. Please be very very careful and try to stay off of it. I tried it for a couple of weeks and even that had a bad withdrawal effect.

you mentioned that you were writing? if you read over your ideas could there be any underlying clues as to what is bothering you?

[DizzyH]

As someone who has struggled with health anxiety my whole life I can totally relate to this.
My partner of 14 years passed away 3 months ago from glioblastoma multiforme and since then I have been in a very frustrating cycle of grief and an overwheming fear that it could happen to me too, resulting in some very real physical symptoms which can appear to confirm that, well to me anyway.

[Jack4440]

I would be thinking "what if I commited suicide and I didn't have a brain tumor?". Seriously, you can never know 100% so stop trying to convince yourself otherwise, nothing in life we can be certain about ... Minus death and taxes. The more I came to terms with the fact I need to live with a level of uncertainty the more comfortable I became with it. You're chasing something you can't catch, you'll never be reassured because you can always doubt the reassurance. It doesn't work, it's only short lived. You need to learn to live with that, everyone does.
Think of the distress others will go through if you continue with these thoughts, it's a terrible thing to go through ... You need CBT and urgently. You could have an MRI all clear but you would still find a reason to think "maybe the Dr checking my scan was distracted? What if he didn't sleep the night before and missed something?" This is why reassurence never works for us type.

[Imeleedi]

Sorry to hear you are in a brain tumour hole. I do have a lot of knowledge about this and brain tumours in general so if you want to PM me and talk in more detail about what you are experiencing and what you are scared of, Im sure I could reassure you if you want to.

[swajj]

Ask yourself one question: how can you be suicidal and fear cancer (or any other disease) at the same time? I will help you - you can not. The very fact you have health anxiety means you are afraid of death - further meaning you want to live. You don't want to commit suicide.


Great post and so logical. :yesyes: