Fallen of the health anxiety wagon :( MS fears...

[snowflake293]

I am hoping someone can help because I am having a really horrible time with my HA. Again.

Basically I have been tapering off my meds (Sertraline) for some time, say about 5 months. I am on 25mg every other day now and I feel like I have some ‘rebound anxiety’.

It is mainly centred around health issues. I feel angry with myself for having these feelings because I worked so hard, for years, to retrain my brain!

This time I have MS fears L its churning me up and I hate it.I suffer with shoulder pain/tension which has been worse lately cause I’ve been more anxious but I am also getting strange tingling sensations in my hands and fingers.I do wonder if the tingling might be also related to coming off my meds.Either way,I am focusing on it all the time and it is making it worse. I am too scared to tell the dr about the pins and needles in my hands cause I am scared I will have to go for an MRI. My biggest problem is a fear of waiting for test results. I can't bear it and it makes me throw up I get so nervous. I can't sleep or eat.

I feel low anyway being off my meds and having these health worries is just dragging me down further. I am in a really ‘good place’ with my life at the moment, I have no real sources of external stress or worry... just my own mind to contend with L

How do I stop myself falling down the rabbit hole again? Has anyone else had MS fears?Its a new one for me, I used to mainly fear c-word stuff.

[mrmartyd]

Bear in mind that anxiety is capable of causing tingling in your fingers as well, it's quite possible that's what's happening to you and more anxiety = more tingling. MS was one of my favourites when I had health anxiety, I found one of the things that helped was learning about the similarities between anxiety symptoms and MS symptoms. It helped me realise it was anxiety, and after time the tingling went away.

[AMomentofClarity]

I am hoping someone can help because I am having a really horrible time with my HA. Again.

Basically I have been tapering off my meds (Sertraline) for some time, say about 5 months. I am on 25mg every other day now and I feel like I have some ‘rebound anxiety’.

It is mainly centred around health issues. I feel angry with myself for having these feelings because I worked so hard, for years, to retrain my brain!

This time I have MS fears L its churning me up and I hate it.I suffer with shoulder pain/tension which has been worse lately cause I’ve been more anxious but I am also getting strange tingling sensations in my hands and fingers.I do wonder if the tingling might be also related to coming off my meds.Either way,I am focusing on it all the time and it is making it worse. I am too scared to tell the dr about the pins and needles in my hands cause I am scared I will have to go for an MRI. My biggest problem is a fear of waiting for test results. I can't bear it and it makes me throw up I get so nervous. I can't sleep or eat.

I feel low anyway being off my meds and having these health worries is just dragging me down further. I am in a really ‘good place’ with my life at the moment, I have no real sources of external stress or worry... just my own mind to contend with L

How do I stop myself falling down the rabbit hole again? Has anyone else had MS fears?Its a new one for me, I used to mainly fear c-word stuff.

If you were doing so well, why get off the medication?

[snowflake293]

If you were doing so well, why get off the medication?

Because I don't want to be on it any longer?

---------- Post added at 09:20 ---------- Previous post was at 09:20 ----------

Bear in mind that anxiety is capable of causing tingling in your fingers as well, it's quite possible that's what's happening to you and more anxiety = more tingling. MS was one of my favourites when I had health anxiety, I found one of the things that helped was learning about the similarities between anxiety symptoms and MS symptoms. It helped me realise it was anxiety, and after time the tingling went away.

Thank you, this is really helpful