Alcohol, anxiety and armpit pain?

[hello_mrzebra]

Hi all

New to the forum, so glad to have found it. I'll spare you the long-winded rambling of my introductory post, but if you like you can read it here (http://www.nomorepanic.co.uk/showthread.php?t=62378).

I ended that post with a question that I think is better suited to this area of the forum, which is:

Does anyone else have any experience with alcohol, anxiety and armpit pain?

I have been having armpit sensitivity for the past 4-5 weeks now, and it seems to always flare up after a night of drinking and then subside after a few days. Coupled with that is increased anxiety after drinking which gets me worrying about my armpit pain (after googling "pain+lymph nodes+alcohol" and discovering it to be a symptom of lymphoma)

I'm pretty well convinced that I DON'T actually have lymphoma (the symptoms for that arrive 10-15 minutes after drinking and are sharp and excruciating, while my symptoms are more of a general dull achiness that doesn't arrive until the day after--plus I've been to a doctor and he felt no untoward masses)

But I'm curious who else has armpit pain/sensitivity as a symptom of their anxiety, and if drinking tends to make it worse?

Thanks!

[Gazman]

I have armpit pain, it's quite mild and comes and goes, it only started a few days ago / last week.

your welcome story is very common in that alot of people here seem to get a bad stomach and the whole obsession with these normal bodily sensations that worry us no end.

i too googled at the start of this anxiety i've now got, because i had twitches, which told me i had ms because it starts with twitching, cramping etc, it's completely out of context tho as the twitching would be constant in 1 spot and usually after 1 part of the body is dead or dying.

just goes to show u can't trust google at all, and i still worry i have ms and if i see a leaflet about it or if anyone mentions it my belly flips, so i know i still have a big fear of it.

Welcome to the site and i hope u enjoy it here, it's a big help :)

[hello_mrzebra]

Thanks for the reply.

It's so crazy how susceptible our minds are to the power of suggestion. My fear of lymphoma started a year ago when an acquaintance of mine was diagnosed with it. He recently made a facebook post about his recovery (he's doing very well, in remission) and that jump-started my worries again.

It helps to remember these timing correlations, how silly it sounds objectively to think that as soon as you hear about some disease you instantaneously contract it, as if illness could be spread by word-of-mouth.

The chance one actually has something seriously life threatening is very slim, and the chances that whatever one has is exactly the thing one just heard about and is obsessed with self-diagnosing based on vaguely similar symptoms is an infinitesimal probability!

[Gazman]

do u feel that whatever disease you fear, your health anxiety mimics it?

Mine seems to at least, worried i might get a heart attack then my chest starts to hurt.

It's like i googled my symptoms, came up with ms or als, got really panicky and anxious about it, docs said it was anxiety, calmed down... read on here that a tell tale sign of ms is severe cramp, i start getting mild cramp feelings lol!

I tell myself the same thing, the odds of me having what i'm worried about after googling / hearing about it would be incredible, but then i still think it's something else just as sinister lol... ugh it's annoying

[hello_mrzebra]

Yeah I definitely feel like I manifest the symptoms of whatever I'm worried about.

When I was worrying I had testicular cancer, the pain in my testicle was unrelenting. As soon as I had an ultrasound and got the "all clear" diagnosis, the pain ceased almost instantly.

Plus worrying all the time makes me feel run down and generally poor, which in turn gives ammunition to the fear that I have some type of sinister disease, because let's face it, "feeling fatigued" is a symptom of just about everything, right?

[eugene12345]

Hi!

I came across your post while i was googling "armpit pain a day after drinking". your post exactly explains my symptoms. armpit dull pain on the day after i drink! I wonder how are you doing now and if you could find the reason for your armpit pain? i hope that all is well with you.
i'm very worried. i hope it isn't hodgkin's lymphoma.

Thanks,
E