Massive health anxiety relapse

Here I am again, losing my mind and terrified. I’m so totally inside out that I hardly know where to begin. I feel like the walls of my mind are about to crash in on themselves. Health anxiety and GAD like never before...it feels like they have combined and I don’t know what to do.

I’ve been experiencing aching lover back and perineum for the last month or so. I had the same thing at the end of last year and convinced myself it was prostate cancer...I’m 45. No other dangerous symptoms but a terrible ache around the pelvic floor, lower back, buttocks and occasionally lower abdomen. I absolutely can’t get it out of my head that it’s prostate connected. This is possibly because I had a vasectomy a few years ago and some time afterwards, someone said to me that vasectomy increases the chances of getting prostate cancer...I’m terrified, I mean absolutely witless that I’ve put myself in a terrible situation by doing this. I’m struggling to get through each day and can feel myself slipping into a horrible place. My partner convinced me to go to the doctor last week and I was told that lower back pain can radiate to the perineum and cause all sorts of sensations. She even said that she didn’t think that doing a test for prostate cancer was the right thing as there are no symptoms that would worry her and that the test they do isn’t always conclusive. I just don’t know what to make of this. I want to cry my heart out – I’m so, so completely tired of the anxiety and worry, its non stop. I have been referred to the physio about my lower back but also back to CBT because of my history of Health anxiety and GAD. The waiting list is over 12 weeks long so I’m left trying to hang on until I hear from them. I’m exhausted and this makes me worry that the tiredness is due to being ill. The physical symptoms I have aren’t really anything new – I’ve had them before but I have lost all ability to put things in perspective. I have known people who have had cancer and lost the battle and I’ve heard stories about people who have had symptoms they thought were nothing serious only to find out they’re in advanced stages of the illness. This frightens me more than most things I can think of.

The only tiny shred of hope I can seem to hang on to is that the symptoms might be something to do with the pudendal nerve being irritated as this can give similar symptoms as the ones I have been having. Also chronic pelvic pain syndrome seems to be a thing. I’m absolutely out of my mind with anxiety and the stress of everything.

Normally, I can usually push through the health anxiety but my GAD is off the scale at the moment – this sounds pathetic as I type it but my house is showing signs of subsidence (which is being dealt with by ins company). This is absolutely sending me off the scale in terms of my worry...I feel like I’m struggling to cope with everything, feel like such a crap person/weakling. My job is always stressful and I’ve just returned after a long holiday so this is adding to everything else that is in my head. I really don’t know how to get back on track and am scared about how much worse this can get. I’m a mess. I don’t like coming back to the forum ( as I know there are others who have far worse problems than I) but often a few words of perspective from other sufferers somehow helps.

If your Doctor won't do the test, it's almost 99.99% certain you don't have it. Lower back pain is the single biggest complaint Doctors see, even more so in middle aged men. Over 50% of us experience it.

When you say 'you've heard stories about X or Y', it means you're looking at worst case scenario's on Google etc. That's the first thing you need to stop doing. Stop researching something your Doctor doesn't think you have. You're adding stress to your mental space for no reason.

Thank you for the reply joe, I hope you're right. I'm at my wits end - I genuinely don't feel I've ever been closer to an actual nervous breakdown - something I told the doctors. Just need to gain a foothold and stop the awful thoughts.