what can i do about this anxiety??

[mattc15]

Hello all. I have come to the point where i am litterally constantly thinking about my health. If its not one thing its another. Cancer and heart issues are my main worries. Its totally eating me away and making me despondent. For example, last night i all of the sudden started to think i was either going to die of a heart attack or cardiac arrest for no apparent reason and i actually began freaking out and my heart began skipping beats. I dont know if i have an actual heart issue or not, but im only 22 years old. This isnt normal. If its not that im constantly worried about having cancer. Just wondering if anyone has any things that have worked for them in the past. Because this is totally destroying my social life and well being, and most probably my health as well.

[Cococj]

Hi,

I'm sorry to hear about your problems. There comes a point in any sufferer's life where he or she has to make a decision to seek help, be that through support on here or to see a medical professional.

When things are so overwhelming and you can't help but distract yourself then it's really, really time to go get some help. You've made a step by coming here and I really hope the site is helping you out, but maybe it's time to ge see your doctor if you've not done so already, get some counselling too and use the self-help techniques on this site.

I could simply tell yourself to distract yourself and go do something else to get your mind off of it, but from my own experience that's not always helpful as this very anxiety can stop you doing the things you want to do.

Feeling like you do now isn't normal, you're right about that, but it's become normal for you right now, the fact you're able to say it's not normal shows that you want to deal with the anxiety and move past it.

If you've not already tried a medication do try one, they're not for everyone but they will help control the symptoms of your anxiety while you use others methods to deal with the root cause.

I don't know you well enough to know where your concerns initially came from or how your anxiety started but I'm a fellow sufferer and it can seem a somewhat solitary life at times, please don't let it get you down. This. Will. Pass. In time, you just have to hold onto that thought, get the help you need and work through, step by step until you feel like the good old you.

Chris


:hugs:

[moore]

I'm much the same. For the last 4 months or so I've been bouncing from one suspected illness to another, and none of them came to anything - yet - hehe. Naturally I also feel that theres a bigger illness causing these little illnesses too.

There are people on here who know more than me but are probably asleep which is where I should be, but until they comment here's my 2 cents.

Maybe you need to think about controlling it instead of curing it. I dont expect to ever wake up and not have anxiety. I do want to be able to rationalise it better, because the key to controlling the anxiety and ultimately the fear of illness is to be able to rationalise the situation.
For example, the probability of you having cardiac arrest at 22 years old is immensely small, probably less than one tenth of a percent, whereas the probability of you having anxiety or panic is obviously more like 50%, and other things like indigestion or reflux are up there in the high percentages too.

For that, I have previously sought out cognitive behavioural therapy. Not, strangely, for health anxiety, but for seperation/generalised anxiety. But I am tempted to seek that help again over the latest bout of health anxiety.
Either way, I certainly recommend it, it did not cost the earth and I came out of it much stronger, mentally. Mainly, I learned that you can reprogram your habitual negative cycle of thinking by recognising the thought pattern and breaking it with plain facts or positive thoughts, i.e. forcing yourself to rationalise. It's not rocket science and it may seem obvious, but you have to actually recognise your negative thoughts first! Then, after repeated breaking and reinforcing a positive cycle, the habitual negative thoughts will subside. All of this happens at an almost subconscious level, it's all related to brain science, apparently the neurons in the brain make paths between them and the neural activity chooses the easiest path, which is the one you've reinforced by repeatedly "thinking"..but that all starts to get a bit hardcore...its easiest explained by thinking if you have a bad habit like holding a pen wrong. You have to retrain your brain to hold that pen right, its hard but possible. Eventually you wont ever hold the pen wrong again, you have reinforced the right way of holding it. Same for negative thought cycles, in theory!!

You could also get the same information from literature I suppose, I am not sure how effective that would be without face to face contact with a councillor, but it might be worth a go. I have read books on handling anxiety with some success. It's better than doing nothing at all, because every bit of information you have in your artillery on how to deal with it is useful.

OK...now I'm off to practice what I preach myself! Hope you can make some headway in your problems :)