Ida123
13-11-23, 01:45
Hello this is my first time posting here. I'll try to keep this brief.
I have a history of health anxiety going back to when I was 14 years old. I am 27 now and I regularly go through month long bouts of intense health anxiety shifting from one focus to another. I've worried about just about every possible condition and disease but what triggers my anxiety the idea of progressive conditions that would erode my mind, my memory, my sense of self. (dementia, tumour, schizophrenia etc) This has mostly manifested in the past 8 years. The idea pops into my head that I'm not as sharp as I used to be, that my memory is worse or that I can't handle multitasking as well, or that my thoughts are less organized than they used to be. I, of course, start ruminating and analysing my own mind. I hyperanalyze my own thoughts. Every single time I have a brain fart and forget to clock out a work, or it takes me a moment to remember what day of the week it is, or I forget an appointment or something, I spiral. I worry my mind is eroding away and that I'm a shell of who I once was.
I try to reassure myself by considering how common a mistake the mistake was or something but that just causes me to ruminate more and more. It'll get to the point where assessing my own cognitive abilities is a secondary mental task that I'm doing all the time. This, unsurprisingly, makes me very distracted and causes me to make more mistakes. An important thing to note is that I have ADD and my executive functioning has probably always been poor, I've always struggled in school and professional settings. I try to remind myself of this. I remind myself that my brain has struggled more with certain things and that my own anxiety is probably exacerbating it, but even still it terrifies me, I can't stop thinking about it.
I got fired from a food service job recently because I was underperforming. It required a lot of time management and multitasking and quick methodical work. It felt like the harder I tried at it the worse I was. I managed to keep myself from ruminating on these things but since I was fired the fear has bubbled back up. I find myself constantly second-guessing my short term memory. "did I already ask this customer if they want a bag?" "did I say this thing I thought of saying, or did I just think about it?" the other day I got it into my head that the store I work at closed at 5 that day when we actually closed at 6. I told a bunch of costumers that we were about to close and then my coworker had to remind me that we weren't. This triggered a hours of rumination. I've been tripping over my words lately. It's entered my dreams too-- I analyze myself in a dream and realize I don't know how I ended up in this situation, or I realize that I did something that doesn't make any sense, and then I wake up and realize that of course it didn't make sense because it was a dream and not reality.
I started seeing a therapist about this again recently I'm hoping it will help. I'm terrified that psych or neuro testing would confirm my worst fears. I'm going to try and go on Adderall or something soon, I'm tired of feeling so disorganized and unmotivated. The ADD and Anxiety seem to work together to make things hard for me and have been for many years so I don't know what makes more sense to treat. This is no way to live. Even if something isn't wrong with my mind now I'm bound to get less sharp as I get older, it would be such a nightmare to still have this anxiety when I'm old and my body and mind are actually starting to fail me. I'm tired, any reassurance or help would be really helpful. <3
I have a history of health anxiety going back to when I was 14 years old. I am 27 now and I regularly go through month long bouts of intense health anxiety shifting from one focus to another. I've worried about just about every possible condition and disease but what triggers my anxiety the idea of progressive conditions that would erode my mind, my memory, my sense of self. (dementia, tumour, schizophrenia etc) This has mostly manifested in the past 8 years. The idea pops into my head that I'm not as sharp as I used to be, that my memory is worse or that I can't handle multitasking as well, or that my thoughts are less organized than they used to be. I, of course, start ruminating and analysing my own mind. I hyperanalyze my own thoughts. Every single time I have a brain fart and forget to clock out a work, or it takes me a moment to remember what day of the week it is, or I forget an appointment or something, I spiral. I worry my mind is eroding away and that I'm a shell of who I once was.
I try to reassure myself by considering how common a mistake the mistake was or something but that just causes me to ruminate more and more. It'll get to the point where assessing my own cognitive abilities is a secondary mental task that I'm doing all the time. This, unsurprisingly, makes me very distracted and causes me to make more mistakes. An important thing to note is that I have ADD and my executive functioning has probably always been poor, I've always struggled in school and professional settings. I try to remind myself of this. I remind myself that my brain has struggled more with certain things and that my own anxiety is probably exacerbating it, but even still it terrifies me, I can't stop thinking about it.
I got fired from a food service job recently because I was underperforming. It required a lot of time management and multitasking and quick methodical work. It felt like the harder I tried at it the worse I was. I managed to keep myself from ruminating on these things but since I was fired the fear has bubbled back up. I find myself constantly second-guessing my short term memory. "did I already ask this customer if they want a bag?" "did I say this thing I thought of saying, or did I just think about it?" the other day I got it into my head that the store I work at closed at 5 that day when we actually closed at 6. I told a bunch of costumers that we were about to close and then my coworker had to remind me that we weren't. This triggered a hours of rumination. I've been tripping over my words lately. It's entered my dreams too-- I analyze myself in a dream and realize I don't know how I ended up in this situation, or I realize that I did something that doesn't make any sense, and then I wake up and realize that of course it didn't make sense because it was a dream and not reality.
I started seeing a therapist about this again recently I'm hoping it will help. I'm terrified that psych or neuro testing would confirm my worst fears. I'm going to try and go on Adderall or something soon, I'm tired of feeling so disorganized and unmotivated. The ADD and Anxiety seem to work together to make things hard for me and have been for many years so I don't know what makes more sense to treat. This is no way to live. Even if something isn't wrong with my mind now I'm bound to get less sharp as I get older, it would be such a nightmare to still have this anxiety when I'm old and my body and mind are actually starting to fail me. I'm tired, any reassurance or help would be really helpful. <3