View Full Version : Ok, May be a helpful thread...
Hi All
I wanted to share my latest findings for a bit of respite from these dreadfull symptoms of anxiety.
Firstly over the last few years I have slowly lost intrest in work, or so I thought, at the same time my mother became terminally ill recently passed away. This gave me the encouragement to take my life by the horns. Anyhow financial problems meant I had to go back to work full time and so I did. The first few days I spent time taking time in the little boys room to spend a bit of time relaxing. Soon after I realised that I could still do the job my confidence soared and I began walking to work also. Now magically I find myself thinking about what I have to do tommorow at work and have I done everything that day. The walking has made me feel achey but shattered at the same time and able to sleep a bit longer in the morning. I still wake with negative thoughts now and then but I am so tierd I soon get back off if I make a mental effort to think of the days events at work.
So strangley, I so far am living evidence that the things that are the last thing you feel able to do is in actual fact the possible remedy or part remedy. It did take a few days of settling in at work and ironically the more work there was the less I had time to dwell on my own thoughts and the less work I had the more time I had to dwell.
So the saying "work maketh man" or woman of course is strangly true. I thought all along that I needed to remove life stresses but in actual fact I needed relief from those stresses at home the ones from the one place that should be stress free. When someone is ill it effects the whole family dynamics. It seems to me that everyone at home expects to feel happy and if they lose control of that it effects the entire family stress level and so it becomes a self fullfilling prophecy. We were going to downsize, move to the country etc..I dont think that would be so bad if only you were kept busy with motivational stuff not mundane tasks.
o if you have been off work with stress/anxiety and you can't face the idea of work then ask yourself to turn it on its head and do the last things that come to mind. Agreed if you are doing a mundane job that does not challenge you mentally firstly give it a try, a month or so and then go to retrain for a more stimulating post to boost your moral and occupy your mind. Part of me thinks that while ever I can claim sickness benefit I am making my problems worse by lowering my self esteem and giving myself too much time to dwell on life or lack of it.
It has only been a week at work so I will see if this reduction in anxiety and boost of moral continues or if it is still transient.
Good news I think. Any thoughts....
Mee
Hi Mee,
A wonderful lesson for us.
I started back to work three weeks ago and I find myself enthused and re-invigorated to a degree that I could not have imagined.
Keep us updated on how things progress.
Best wishes,
Chalky
Hi Meewah :D
Well done you , I think you have done fantastically well in returning to work :yesyes: .
I am more hopeful for myself now , after taking in what you have posted , thank you . I left my job cos of my ocd mainly , 7 yrs back .
Since then I have lost all confidence and self worth not that I had a great deal to begin with , but I had both of these things when I was at work , I was like a different person , one I actually quite liked . But the real me was always waiting at home kinda thing . I think that the main tool is like u say , distraction from our usual anxieties . I have never fully lost hope that I will , one day achieve my goal of returning to work . At the mo I am particularly despodent about all aspects of my life probably more than ever before .........and yr post has given me some hope back , for that I am so very grateful .
For the moment I am trying to address past issues that I feel , make me the way I am .............. I want to a least like myself a little cos then , I think , I will be able to face the world again .......as someone who is happy in their own skin .
Thanks Again
U should be proud
Love Hope xx
Thanks for the support.
Sometimes the things in life that we fear the most are what give us hope for the future. I hope you all the success in the future.
Mee
AngelHeart
22-03-08, 01:59
I know what you mean about work though. I work four evenings and sometimes I have to force myself out of the house to go to work but when I get there I have a good laugh with the girls I work with and come home feeling better! :-)
Ok an update.
You know the saying no news is good news.
I am still walking to work and working hard. I seem mainly ok at work as I am busy but as with this clever mind my anxiety seems to have worsened at home. From worse dizzy spells, sudden dizzy spells like you are going to fall of the seat. I have discovered after pressing under my chin two lumps. One either side of my throat like swollen glands. I have a feeling that it is like what my wife had, tonsilitus, I have a dry feeling and a bit of trouble swollowing so it adds up. I just cant stop my mind from thinking the worse that the glands are no where near my tonsils and that I have hodgkins disease or lymphoma. I know keep feeling tenderness in my groin area which I know is where other lymph nodes are. Its that doubt that plays on the mind...Just to make it worse I woke suddenly last night not able to feel my right arm. I moved it around and the feeling came back but then I woke earlier than usual and started thinking what if it was a stroke... then i could feel a slight pins and needles in my right foot and I started working myself up to the point that I did not want to get up just in case I could not walk or had any other stroke symptoms. Laying there I discovered was as bad as finding out so now I am up, it is raining so I wont be able to walk to work and I feel that my mind has decided to use the rain as an excuse not to walk as it could be the walking that is increasing my Blood pressure and may be causing small strokes etc..When will this stop. I feel that the only way I can escape these thoughts is by keeping busy at all times morning day and night but that is not practical. I think this anxiety is like a big balloon filled with water if you press on one side the balloon bulges on the other. It seems this health anxiety NEEDS a escape and is choosing the time at home when all is quiet.
Thanx for reading
Mee
Hi Meewah
Ive read your post and well i wish you all the best with your hard work and determination to get to work and perhaps feel that good feel factor of achievement.
I then read your health anxiety, It must be so hard for you.
You said your wife had tonsilitus can you not think that you just may have the same as her. I can understand its very difficult not to allow your mind to go thinking the worst but stop and think for a minute, tonsilitus is no small thing it can effect all your glands if left alone, have you thought about seeing your GP. Im not trying to undermind how you are thinking and i hope you think im trying to help and not telling you what to do.
Going back to work and doing all the walking your doing is going to change your body , like exhaustion which then makes you feel systoms like dizzyness etc.
I hope i havnt made it worse for you im just trying to help.
Take care of you and let me know how you are doing
Smudgie
Thankx Smudgie
I know, I know, its just easy to say it but not so easy to do. I have two people talking to me Mr rational and Mr over protective no matter what I can only seem to drown Mr over protective out when working, when I stop working he starts to say "what if...." this is enough to re awaken a sensititive nervous system and bring on physical symptoms which in turn make me listen to Mr over protective more attentively.
I hear what your saying....we would not both be here if we could follow your advise. I just wanted to share my worries which I am slowly finding are unfounded. We all know all of us will be ill at some time in our lives so we know that if we keep dismissing all our alarm bells each time one day it WILl be the real thing and we may blame it on anxiety.
Mee
:) hi meewah, i dont have proper health anxiety, but i can be anxious about my health - so much so that today i felt particularly yuk after a week or more of feeling yuk - ive had a wierd frozen shoulder type thing and ive been getting these weird headaches where my temples are soooo sore, but today i thought what if i get pneumonia - this is the second time since xmas this thought has crossed my mind, the last time was when i had the norovirus at xmas. anyway so i do worry about my health - but like you i lost a parent to a terminal illness (cancer) and since then i have worried less about my health than i did before - i used to think i was going to die if a got a headache - so i suppose i did have health anxiety then, but we didnt hav ethe net so we couldnt have googled back then - maybe the internet is part of the problem?
so to get to my point - personally i think serious illness is obvious - i know people must be worrying about illness developing and going unnoticed, but i would say there would be symptoms that would indicate illness. some people whether anxious or not will get misdiagnosed or will miss symptoms an dnot go to the doctor until its too late - but surely most serious iullnesses have symptoms that cannot be ignored and which severly interfere with your life - eg pain?
Hi Mee :D
Sorry things aint so good for u at the moment . To have to keep yourself going at full whack to keep things managable must be exhausting . I hope you start to feel better soon and find a way out of this torment .
Take care
Hope xx
:) i used to think i was going to die if a got a headache - so i suppose i did have health anxiety then, but we didnt hav ethe net so we couldnt have googled back then - maybe the internet is part of the problem?
Thanx for the advice. I agree about the internet in one instance but I think I may have been sectioned when I started with this anxiety. I was feerful of everything. It was as if everyone around me was in iminent danger including myself I felt I was drowning in a sea of anxiety to the point that nothing else mattered, I felt like everything that I cared about was in threat...of what....that I dont know...I had a feeling of dread that overtook every other emotion,,,totally out of control and prepared to do anything to protect my life and everyone that was in it, but completely helpless to do anything . The only difference between now and then is the level of anxiexty and dread...now I am careful not to do anything that will waken the animal within. The health anxiety is now secondary and gives my anxiety or dread somthing 24hrs a day to focus on.
I do believe that without this site specifically I would have been very isolated ,alone and suffering worse than ever. Google I can live without. When my mother became ill I googled everything to find a cure and discovered a undercurrent that made me fear the NHS, I read of doctors mis-diagnosing, MRSA, Hygene or lack of, I heard and tuned into everything in my every day life health orientated, I heard of peoples family going into hospital for a routine operation and not coming out...pressured staff...mistakes being made...the list goes on. I now fear for my families health and mine.
Sorry for having to endure Mee's life or lack of it.
Mee
:) hey mee, can i just say that my anxiety has been exactly the same!!!! im not sure how long youve been suffering with this - but i think the way you felt is pretty much standard GAD? anyway you say you may have been sectioned? were you sectioned? or do you mean that if you couldnt have used the net you think you may have been sectioned? what i meant about the net was specifically relating to googling for physical symptoms not looking up stuff about anxiety - i agree 100% about finding out as much as possible about anxiety disorders:yesyes: i think sometimes its hard to accept that wha tyou are feeling has been felt by millions - like you think 'how possibly can other people feel this bad'? but they do! lots of us on here have and do feel as bad as you feel - it isnt a suffering competition its just that the symptons/thoughts etc are all the same. i know people are taken into hospital who are suffering from anxiety but i dont think it happens very much and i think there would have to be other factors taken into account? like does the person have any family/support and is the person a serious risk to themselves? otherwise i dont think people get sectioned for anxiety? obviously if you have been hospitilised thats different, but im guessing from your post it was a fear of yours - also a fear of mine a long time ago - not actually a reality? take care mee and keep up the good fight - you will get there:yesyes: emma
:) hey mee, can i just say that my anxiety has been exactly the same!!!! im not sure how long youve been suffering with this - but i think the way you felt is pretty much standard GAD? anyway you say you may have been sectioned? were you sectioned? or do you mean that if you couldnt have used the net you think you may have been sectioned? what i meant about the net was specifically relating to googling for physical symptoms not looking up stuff about anxiety - i agree 100% about finding out as much as possible about anxiety disorders:yesyes: i think sometimes its hard to accept that wha tyou are feeling has been felt by millions - like you think 'how possibly can other people feel this bad'? but they do! lots of us on here have and do feel as bad as you feel - it isnt a suffering competition its just that the symptons/thoughts etc are all the same. i know people are taken into hospital who are suffering from anxiety but i dont think it happens very much and i think there would have to be other factors taken into account? like does the person have any family/support and is the person a serious risk to themselves? otherwise i dont think people get sectioned for anxiety? obviously if you have been hospitilised thats different, but im guessing from your post it was a fear of yours - also a fear of mine a long time ago - not actually a reality? take care mee and keep up the good fight - you will get there:yesyes: emma
No sectioning,
I just think within certain bounds the internet has been my lifeline. The sectioning thing is just a symptom of my all or nothing thinking. It cant be a simple throat infection it HAS to be cancer. Its the balance that has been swayed I am listening to my primary instinct. If you dont feel good then you must be ill right? If you are feeling brain induced symptoms its hard to comprehend that your instincts aren't working. That said I still have a funny lump feeling at the back of my throat and I wont try to feel my glands as I am unable to assess rationally there condition or size or for that matter any thing related to pain, lumps, moles...etc. I just shower in the dark very fast close my eyes when spiiting out toothpaste, never touch any part of my body except my wire. The only pleasure left!
Mee
Hi Meewah
Ive read your post and well i wish you all the best with your hard work and determination to get to work and perhaps feel that good feel factor of achievement.
I then read your health anxiety, It must be so hard for you.
You said your wife had tonsilitus can you not think that you just may have the same as her. I can understand its very difficult not to allow your mind to go thinking the worst but stop and think for a minute, tonsilitus is no small thing it can effect all your glands if left alone, have you thought about seeing your GP. Im not trying to undermind how you are thinking and i hope you think im trying to help and not telling you what to do.
Going back to work and doing all the walking your doing is going to change your body , like exhaustion which then makes you feel systoms like dizzyness etc.
I hope i havnt made it worse for you im just trying to help.
Take care of you and let me know how you are doing
Smudgie
This one smudge?
No problem, excellent advice, sometimes the best advice is painful. You speak like someone who has conquered this condition. We should all be are own therapist.
Dont worry.
Take care
Mee
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