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Severe Health Anxiety
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Hi,
I’m 35 and last week, woke up with a sudden onset of floaters and over the next couple of days I had blurry vision. I then had a numb(ish) right leg. I went to the optometrist who said I had great eye health, astigmatism and gave me anti blue light glasses with a slight magnifying lens. I then had prickly kind of sensations and freaked out and went to the hospital. Over the course of a night, I had a CT scan (with dye), all my bloods done and a brain MRI.. everything came back ok and they found nothing abnormal on my MRI to suggest MS, but I’m still freaking out. I feel like my legs twitch etc and it sends me into a panic!!! I’m so severely anxious and stressed. I have been given a referral to see a neurologist and it can’t come soon enough, as I’m obsessing over looking up symptoms on-line and I truly feel as though I have it.. can anyone put my mind at ease? I know anxiety can do awful things to your body... can I really just go off a brain MRI?
thanks x
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Hello Jae85,
Welcome to the forums. Health anxieties can be really terrifying and I'm glad you've reached out.
The thing about health anxieties are that we tend to magnify small things which are a normal part of our bodies' functioning. Assuming I told you now to simply focus on your right foot, at some point, you'll probably begin to feel something in that foot (e.g. twitching or tingling for example). This doesn't mean you have an illness; they're normal aspects of your body that you notice because you're focusing on it. When you have health anxiety, you're naturally more focused on your body, resulting in the kinds of prickly sensation, twitching, numbness etc. Of course, the fact that you're anxious also comes with its own physical symptoms, which doesn't help the situation.
I'd suggest firstly, not to look up symptoms online. I've done that before and trust me, it's the worst. Far from helping, Googling symptoms often only convinces you that you have a serious illness (which you probably don't have). Secondly, try taking your focus away from your body. For me, doing mindfulness exercises helps. Apps like Smiling Mind and Stop, Breath & Think are my go-to apps. I also do relaxing activities that take my mind off my anxieties, like taking a walk. Thirdly, take medical professionals' advice as a truth. I've been guilty of the "what if they missed xxxxx" thinking as well, but that really doesn't help the situation. You have a neurologist appointment coming up, but you've already been told twice that you're a healthy, normal individual. Instead of worrying about the upcoming appointment, try thinking of it as a way to confirm you are fine rather than a way to find out what is wrong.
Take care,
M
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Hello Jae85,
The optometrist did say you're fine, so I'm inclined to think it was probably not something serious (it could be related to your stress, perhaps?) or they'd have flagged it out. The warm bath sounds perfect - it's a great routine to have! For sleep, I've tried using scented candles to calm myself before falling asleep and it really helps. Would you like to give that a shot?
Good luck with your appointments. I hope the neurologist gives you all the reassurance you need. But until the appointment, do try the apps to calm yourself. Do keep us updated if you feel like it 🙂
Warmly,
M
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Hi!
I can relate so much to this post
I know this was sometime ago I am wondering if your vision got better with less stress ?
🙂
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Welcome to the forums and thank you for sharing this here. It’s a really brave and proactive thing to do. This is a really safe, supportive space, so we’re glad you could share this with us. We are also reaching out to you privately to check you’re ok.
As you can see on this thread, many of our community members share similar challenges, and may be able to share with you some of the wisdoms that have helped them. We’re sure they’ll spot your thread and share their perspectives here soon. In the meantime, here’s some things you might like to look at:
- Some strategies for managing anxiety
- This previous thread where community members shared some of their Beyond Blue’s anxiety management strategies
- Kids Helplines pages on asking for help
You’re also very welcome to start a thread of your own if you’d like to share a bit more about what’s going on for you. There’s some tips on doing so here.
Thanks again for posting here. It must have taken a lot of strength to share this but you never know who will read this post and feel less alone in their own experience.
Kind regards,
Sophie M
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I can relate to this so much! Thanks for sharing!
I have extensive medical knowledge and I've developed some health anxiety. I think knowing what can go wrong can make you imagine the worst. I think I have a skewed view of health problems, because I only see severely unwell people, I forget that there's millions of people put there living healthy, long lives.
I had myself absolutely convinced I had a rare for of cancer recently. All evidence suggested I was fine, but got fixated on the tiniest symptom.
I've been wondering how people without anxiety approach an appointment. I go in there assuming that I'm going to be diagnosed with some terminal disease, I'll have to say goodbye to my kids and be dead in a month. But I assume most people go to the doctor with one mild symptom, assuming it's nothing bad and that the doc will give them a pill to get rid of it and they'll never think about it again.
I tried to do this with my last appointment, not particularly successful, but I tried.
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Hi, I can relate to this post so much, I had twitching in my calves, fingers, face, arms even my tongue! I freaked out of course but especially after googling my symptoms because of course als/ms comes up. When I say I was hysterical, that’s putting it mildly, I cried all day for months, lost weight from stress, went to emergency rooms many times, gp, neurology specialist, went on to multiple health websites and forums for hours a day and ended up being diagnosed with a mild case of peripheral neuropathy that has since been so much better since I knew I wasn’t going to die or end up in a wheelchair. That’s the good news, but since then I have developed a very real health anxiety issue that I am still seeing a psychologist for and on medication for panic disorder, I am currently going through a bad episode of health anxiety as I convinced myself I caught brain eating meningitis from having a swim in a local and river and having water go up my nose, even writing that I feel so silly but health anxiety controls your mind at times. Please, please, for the love of your sanity get off google, trust your doctors and have faith that the emergency department and all your tests are accurate when you get good results, best wishes!
