This is my worst HA spiral in years, waiting on results. I need help, please.

[CatLady1]

This is my biggest health anxiety struggle since my first one, 6 years ago.

Mods - I posted recently but please don't merge the threads, I need support because I feel like I'm in crisis.

Summary: My physio found a moveable lump on my lower back, in a spot that's been hurting on and off for 5 years. I couldn't deal with just “monitoring” it as she advised, so I got a private ultrasound last week from a proper MSK radiologist. Ultrasound said findings were consistent with a superficial lipoma of 4.5 cm. But I couldn't rest, so I went to a private dermatologist/plastic surgeon on Friday and had it removed. Insisted that it be sent for pathology, even though that doctor assured me it was a lipoma and “would bet his mortgage on it”. Pathology won't be back for another week.

But no, in my head, I definitely have a soft tissue sarcoma. Probably an aggressive one, maybe it's even metastasised. And I've made it worse by getting it excised as a lipoma without proper surgical margins, so it's more likely to spread. I've been reading every medical research paper I can find on the subject. So I'm going to spend the next year or two in and out of surgery and chemo, and then die in my very early 40s, leaving my 4 year old daughter without a mother. Or maybe I'll hang on longer, so my daughter grows up with the shadow of my illness hanging over her until I eventually die when she's about 10, and everyone is sad but relieved that it's all over at last.

I love her so, so much but I can't bear to be near her right now, because it hurts so much to think about her being left motherless and grieving. So what if the odds are in favour of a normal, benign lipoma? Why should I be lucky? Why SHOULDN'T I be the one who suffers? It's no good trying to tell myself that I'm going to be fine, because I don't KNOW that and so there's room for the other possibility.

I feel like I'm being dangled by the throat over a steep cliff, I'm scrabbling to get my toes on solid ground but I can see the bottom, hundreds of feet below. And it's a cliff I've seen other loved ones be thrown over in the past, my dad and so many aunts and uncles who've died of cancer before reaching old age. Yes, I've had therapy. Yes, I'm on medication. But I can't get away from the cliff edge.

I'm shaking like a leaf, I can't breathe properly. Forcing myself to eat a little, clean teeth, change clothes. Thank goodness for my wonderful husband, who is picking up the slack and trying to look after me without really understanding why I'm so frightened. All I can do is hide in bed and try to calculate my survival odds. This week at work I'm supposed to give several important presentations - I just got promoted, something I've wanted for ages, so of course I'm going to get diagnosed with cancer as soon as that happens. How am I supposed to just turn up and be on top of things while my mind is in this state?

I don't know what to do. I can't breathe. I can understand why some people with health anxiety have suicidal thoughts. I don't want to die but I don't want to go through this drawn-out torture either. Please, someone, please help me.

[Pigeon]

Please, please don’t do this to yourself. You have zero evidence of your lump being a sarcoma and strong reassurance from medical professionals that it is a harmless lipoma.

I understand your panic and distress completely as I am in a similar position to you (waiting for test results for different symptoms but not believing the positive results I’ve had so far) but you are making yourself ill with worry when there’s no reason.

You say you don’t know what to do, so I’m going to make some suggestions…

1. Take some deep breaths and try to calm yourself in whatever way works for you
2. STOP reading medical research papers and other information on the internet right away. Dr Google is definitely not your friend
3. Try and distract yourself from ruminating and obsessing by doing everyday normal things. I promise that you will feel better if you do. I know you think you can’t, but you really can. I’ve done it and it works.
3. Make an urgent appointment to see your GP to discuss better ways of dealing with your health anxiety. Whatever you’ve done so far isn’t working. Be honest with them about your current state of mind

Take care of yourself and let us know how you go on
xx

[CatLady1]

Still waiting for results. Been listening to hypnotherapy audiobooks to try and work through the anxiety. I'm not in full-blown meltdown now, just feel gripped by fear. Every time I reason myself into thinking "you don't have sarcoma", there's a little voice whispering "but you might have it". I feel like I can't plan, can't live, everything is on hold and I'm just trying to get through this an hour at a time. I could do with a hug tbh.

[MrLurcher]

Hi CatLady1, I'm in a complete mess as well worrying about my issues, but I will try and help.

So, my Jack Russell / Spaniel cross has a large lipoma on her inner hind leg (thigh) - golf ball size, which is fairly substancial for a small dog. It's not THAT easy to see because it sits in or on the thigh muscle, so if you just glanced at her you'd think she just had a muscular leg. I took her to the vet earlier in the year about it, and she felt it and said this is most certainly a lipoma. However I have anxiety and I said how can she confirm. So she drew material from the lipoma with a syringe and squirted some on a tray and said 'yep, fatty cells, certainly a lipoma'. But I still wasn't reassured. So she said she could send it to pathology, but it cost like £130 or something, and she said she really doesn't think I need to. I paid for it anyway. Result - lipoma.

What I'm trying to say, and I'm being a massive hypocrite because I would be worried as well, but doctors can tell from feeling and seeing if something is sinister or benign. What did the surgeon who removed say it was?

You've also had it scanned, and I'm pretty sure they can tell by the imaging if something is serious or not.

[CatLady1]

Got the results back. It's a benign lipoma. Of course it is.

And of course my first thought was 'what if the pathologist missed something?' So that's for me to work on. Going to get back into talking therapy, I think; and ask my GP to review/adjust my anxiety medication.