Health Anxiety

[Buckley05]

Hi there,

I heard Beyond Blue advertised on the radio today and I decided to go to their website and that has led me to joining the online community. Does anyone out there have health anxiety? I have had it for as long as I can remember and to be honest in it's early days I managed it very well and even now feel that my case is mild as I have learned to manage it as best as I can myself but I am always interested in other peoples ways of coping and maybe I might be able to help someone out there with how I have taught myself to manage this.

To be honest, in my case I don't stress over every illness or disease that there is. My main anxiety is with cancer, mainly breast cancer. I have no explanation why, it's just something that I stress over. I don't go to the doctor every 5 minutes and have set myself strict rules on checking myself and doubting myself all the time. I have done my own research and sourced some good information over the internet on management techniques and how you can overcome negative thoughts which have helped me but regulary I keep second guessing myself, like for eg. I only check my breasts one a month and then once I've checked them I doubt myself and say "maybe I've missed something". I do refrain myself from checking them again because one thing I have learned is if you repeat this checking behaviour it helps in the short term but then you doubt yourself again and so the cycle starts over. I asked my doctor to send me off the an ultrasound to make sure nothing is wrong and he knows that I struggle with the "girls" lol.

Anyway, I believe that with anxiety especially OCD related anxiety and I think health anxiety falls into that category as it's repetitive behaviour it's very important to follow the techniques to help you manage and hopefully cure the anxiety. Although I have told my husband how I get and he is understanding, I tend to keep this subject to myself and when it kicks in try and follow my manage system.

Although I don't think I will ever be rid of it totally, of late I have decided that instead of fighting it and always wanting to make these thoughts totally go away and all the time I would fail at that. Lately for me it's about management with my feelings and if you can get a good balance of that things will be ok.

I will say that one thing that has stuck in my mind with my findings about health anxiety,

"If you can accept uncertainty, your worries will go away, as soon as you fight uncertainty your worries will stay". Everybody has uncertainty in their life its the way we handle it which can make a difference.

[geoff]

 dear Buckley, I love your last comment, "If you can accept uncertainty, your worries will go away, as soon as you fight uncertainty your worries will stay", well with OCD the latter prevails, that's why we do our habits and rituals to temporarily dispel our fears or worries.

'Once I've checked them I doubt myself and say "maybe I've missed something', well this again is how I think, as I have had OCD for 50 years or as far back as I can remember, and it's a typical way we function.

Some people who don't understand what OCD does to a person think that we are crazy, and a long time ago I was often called this, so now I hide my habits and rituals.

I well and truly understand what you are going through, we aren't mad or crazy it's an illness that we have, and I believe there are a lot of people who have OCD, and it does stem from anxiety, but not everyone with anxiety has our illness, and aren't they lucky.

There is medication that I take which is supposed to reduce our anxiety and therefore reduce our OCD, well that's what the professionals say, it may help someone but not you yourself. But what I can say is that this medication has finally helped me with my depression, but it was a long time in the making.

I am always interested with other people who have this illness, and I also know that Chris wants to keep in contact for the same reason, but yours is intriguing so please stay in touch and take care. L Geoff. x