Why does google always freak me out?

[Smudge]

I am here now because of my mistaking of googling symptoms a few months ago. Why, whenever you google anything, does it come back with the worse thing imaginable? I have had a fear of HIV all my life. Whenever you google anything, it always comes up with HIV. Dihorrea for example. Google that - HIV will appear. Sore throat, cold, etc. they all bring this up. Tonight I even googled "spots" and it came up with HIV! This just makes me even more scared. Surely when it comes to google it can't be trusted to be accurate? I mean, you can get any of the above quite harmlessly can't you? What I think i'm trying to say is, should google be trusted or not? Why does it always come up with the worse things?

[Laura xx]

God, I know exactly what you mean, but whenever I google any symptom it always comes back with the word "cancer"!!!

So am now convinced I have it!!!

From today I have offically "banned" myself from googling any symptom - hopefully this will make a difference :)

[GirlAfraid23]

I am here now because of my mistaking of googling symptoms a few months ago. Why, whenever you google anything, does it come back with the worse thing imaginable? I have had a fear of HIV all my life. Whenever you google anything, it always comes up with HIV. Dihorrea for example. Google that - HIV will appear. Sore throat, cold, etc. they all bring this up. Tonight I even googled "spots" and it came up with HIV! This just makes me even more scared. Surely when it comes to google it can't be trusted to be accurate? I mean, you can get any of the above quite harmlessly can't you? What I think i'm trying to say is, should google be trusted or not? Why does it always come up with the worse things?

I had to post a reply as I am having the exact same thoughts
I googled "rough patches in the mouth" if you read through my previous posts I have been having problems with this for while...and guess what came up...HIV! I am now convinced and I have many sleepless nights because of it....

[nomorepanic]

You are looking for HIV - you are not looking for other things that explain it.

How do I know? Cos I have never ever come across HIV as a side effect of what I suffer.

It is easy to pick the links that give us the answers we dread but not the ones that explain things easily and you are doing this.

Until you stop you will always find HIV I am afraid

[Dooges]

Hey there,
Yesterday I googled for the first time in ages. I was sitting there absolutely petrified from what I was going to find. I didn't want to do it but something deep down made me. Why is this?. Is it an herant need to know what is going on. The lack of knowledge kills me if I dont know.. I think these days with the internet we can find out anything we want but in reality, loooking for things on google that concerns our health is not the best option. Especially when ou are dealing with anxiety also.

From a rational point of view I have to say that your worries about HIV are not well grounded if you are not having unprotected sex with random partners or are using drugs with dirty needles.
Bu tthat is easy for me to say standing on this side of the fence.
People probably would say that about me when I verbalise my fears around neurological type diseases.
BRad

[Stressed32]

I agree with you...type in hang nail and you get HIV...LOL. My fear started the same way. I had mild anxiety that caused sore muscles....google said HIV. My hubby had staff infection I typed in skin boils...HIV. I had phenomnia for the 1st time...google said HIV. Now, after being worried of strep going around my school, I looked into my mouth w/a light and saw a few bumps that were not strep...google said....you guessed it HIV. Funny thing is, I had a test in 07 but have managed to convince myself that
1. the test was wrong or they made a mistake OR
2. blood I got a year ago was tainted
anxiety is a bear. Good luck and please....STAY AWAY FROM GOOGLE!

[Jhey]

It's true, Google is bloody useless for symptoms, about 8 months ago i was ill for 4 weeks, nausea day in, day out i went to Google and it assured me I had food poisoning, I went to the doctor and they just said, eat healthier, excersize more and it'll be gone, she was right. I went to the doctors yesterday complaining about heartburn, nausea, dizziness and he said it was gastroenteritis, Google thought it was Acid Reflux...
For the love of God, don't use Google.

[Squindered]

I do the same thing. Google is so bad yet i can't help myself trying to find things out. It always comes up with the worst possible option, which for me is heart related stuff. It just tells you about the high profile diseases so i can understand why it would come up with HIV all the time even if what you put in is actually completley unrelated.

[shep]

I can empathise with this, for me Google is the worst thing ever! Many a time I have convinced myself I am dying because of what I have read.

I make a conscious effort not to google symptoms although when in the height of anxiety it is the first thing to do. Its a vicious circle - :blush: and yep it always highlights the thing you fear most!

A x

[NoPoet]

The golden rule: NEVER check your symptoms on Google.

I like to think of the following: "The simplest explanation is always correct." If you are experiencing symptoms, google will show you a broad range of terrifying causes.

The actual cause of your symptoms is probably something very harmless.

Always, always go to your doctor if you are that worried about symptoms. Never try to diagnose yourself. You'll end up thinking you've got an alien growing inside you.

[mau]

The golden rule: NEVER check your symptoms on Google.

I like to think of the following: "The simplest explanation is always correct." If you are experiencing symptoms, google will show you a broad range of terrifying causes.

The actual cause of your symptoms is probably something very harmless.

Always, always go to your doctor if you are that worried about symptoms. Never try to diagnose yourself. You'll end up thinking you've got an alien growing inside you.
I so agree.

DO NOT GOOGLE SYMPTOMS.

[Liam]

I am here now because of my mistaking of googling symptoms a few months ago. Why, whenever you google anything, does it come back with the worse thing imaginable? I have had a fear of HIV all my life. Whenever you google anything, it always comes up with HIV. Dihorrea for example. Google that - HIV will appear. Sore throat, cold, etc. they all bring this up. Tonight I even googled "spots" and it came up with HIV! This just makes me even more scared. Surely when it comes to google it can't be trusted to be accurate? I mean, you can get any of the above quite harmlessly can't you? What I think i'm trying to say is, should google be trusted or not? Why does it always come up with the worse things?

Fistly Smudge, don't try to self diagnose on the net! I'm talking from experience. I though I had probably caught HIV years ago after having unprotected drunken sex on holidays in a foreign country. Not because there was a small risk but because that was how paranoid I was.

After months of worry I got checked out and I am fine.

The symptoms of HIV can be almost everything. But the same goes for a hangover, food poisoning, leopracy and the flu.

If you have slept around then get tested for peace of mind (You are bound to be fine) and take precaution in the future! :yesyes:

[aveeava]

i know exactly what you mean i do webmd and google and it always says heart attack or something like that and of course thats what im afraid of the most but its all explainable i have GAD and the symptoms are pretty much all the same =/

[Danny_dingle]

Hey Smudge,

I too am a googler (well, ex-googler since being warned off by this website - cheers guys! Never looked back!), and if you search the forums on here it seems that the majority of Health Anxiety sufferers are much the same.

My biggest problem is that I use the NHS website, which means I convince myself that any diagnosis I come up with must be a professional opinion and therefore correct. Wrong! As already mentioned, certain symptoms are so general they could be anything! There is a self diagnosis thing on the NHS one where you click 'yes' or 'no' options to symptoms you are experiencing and at the end it tells you a course of action. I tried typing in 'headache' once, knowing what was causing mine just to see how silly the answer was (perfectly harmless - caffeine withdrawal headache!! Fixable with a cup of coffee!) and it told me to seek immediate help and dial 999!!!!

I think sometimes, if we can look at our worse fears and find a way to laugh at them, we are onto a winner! (For any Harry Potter fans out there - I find that anything we are anxious about needs to be treated in much the same way as a Boggart - if not, look it up. It is fun!)

What I have heard mentioned in a thread on here was firstly, whenever you enter your symptoms into google (please avoid it if possible; this is only if you feel you really feel you must) try typing 'anxiety' in at the end and see what happens then... Alternatively, after you have googled your symptoms and 'confirmed' your worse fears, try typing in a completely random combination of symptoms and see what it says. Chances are, if you are worrying about seeing 'HIV' or 'cancer', it'll be there!

This certainly helped me as I saw just how futile it was trying to find out what was wrong without actually going to the doctors. If you are worrying, get professional advice, but also, if this is becoming a problem that starts to spoil your quality of life, go get professional help for your anxiety too hun.

Take care, best wishes,

Danny xxx

[mumof4]

hi

i used to google years ago but it always came up bad and i would worry now i dont go near it.

i do get tempted especailly when i was going through my miscarriage last month but anythime i got worried i called the epu.

[marius]

you have insufficient medical background, and you can not discriminate the real causes for any symptom. Usually, google surfers read that their symptoms may be due to cancer or other terrible diseases, and they freak-out. But they fail to see that there could be hundreds other diseases which give the same symptoms. If you cannot take a rational look on google, then don't look. It is wiser to have a diagnose first, then look for possible solutions.
marius

[charlotte83]

Most symptoms can be related to hundreds of things and thers no way looking on the internet will diagnose you with anything, it will more then likely just scare you.
I've looked things up in the past and its so tempting to do but its probably better to just think "sod it" and go to the doctor straight out if your worried about anything.