Mid Back pain wraps around to sternum

[nicol1333]

Hello-

I’m 7 month postpartum and my anxiety has been pretty bad. I am onn20mg if lexapro and I don’t feel like it’s helping too much but I know that I suffer from extrem health anxiety, some OCD and generalized anxiety. I’ve been trying to approach symptoms logically and level headed. But for the past FOUR MONTHS I have had this crazy mid back pain. It wraps around my ribs sometimes, it hurts my sternum to touch my chin to my chest. I’ve been doing stretching, trying not to carry my baby overly but this is hard since I stay home with her. I have been to the GP twice and they don’t think I need any testing and that it’s likley muscular. Of course I read online that it’s either lung cancer or pancreatic so I’m freaking out. I’m 35 and I don’t think it’s normal to wake up with your sternum aching and my mid pack feeling tight and with sharp pain. It’s usually worse when I wake up, for awhile it hurt me so bad it was waking me up at night, once I get moving it isn’t as noticeable. I don’t know if I should go back to the doctor again.

Does anyone have any advice?

Thank you

[Aussie11]

Hi, sorry to hear you’re in quite a bit of pain as well as panic with this. There is a thread about similar issue from back in 2014 that I replied to, and it’s recently made an appearance again. If you search for left rib pain you should find it there (I think I’ve included link below)

https://www.nomorepanic.co.uk/showthread.php?t=153513

Seemed like there were a lot of us having issues with this type of pain after having and carrying around babies. I had similar pains again in 2016, and have them again at the moment. Each time I’ve been through heaps of tests and nothing has shown up. I’m getting abdominal MRI result tomorrow and hoping for normal result there too! Like you I’ve feared pancreatic cancer or something horrible like that. If you google you will only find nasty causes but this is obviously a distorted and inaccurate view, otherwise all of us on here who have ever complained of same left sided rib/back symptoms wouldn’t be around to tell the tale!

Perhaps try getting some Physiotherapy or massage to see if that helps. Interchanging I’ve packs and heat bags can help relieve it. If you’re still in pain down the track or it gets worse then perhaps see doctor again for reassurance, but it does sound like quite a common complaint.

[nicol1333]

Thank you for the response! I’m going to read through this thread now!