Scared of being old.

[Sandieandie]

I have been diagnosed many years ago with OCD. I have a phobia and that is Cancer and now I believe I have developed Thantaphobia which is fear of death. I have struggle with anxiety and depression since I was 26 years old. Now that I am in my mid fifties I now fear for my life every single day. I cannot seem to put it out of my mind and it impacts my life every single day. Does anybody else experience this and can anybody help me with this? I live alone as my sons are grown up and I have minimal contact with anybody. I am so very scared.

[Jeff1943]

Nobody wants to die before their time. But when you have anxiety disorder all our worries are magnified ten times over. This is why you fear death. Accept this irrational fear of death, accept it calmly and without constantly generating fear hormones that continue to keep your nerves over sensitised.

You have many more years of healthy life ahead of you, do not spend them frightening yourself half to death every five minutes. Get on with those things that give you happiness and pleasure and accept the fear of death for the time being.

Anyway, death is only like moving from one room into another.

[Sandieandie in reply to Jeff1943]

Thank you so much for your response. It has enlightened me somewhat and I know that I am wasting my life waiting for death to come. It happens to us all. I must let go of it for the time being but how is the question?

[Jeff1943 in reply to Sandieandie]

You do nothing. You do not reject your intrusive thoughts about death. You must not fight against them. Accept them utterly for the moment. Agree to co-exist with them for the time being.

Do not nourish them with fear, this only ensures their continued existence. When you understand that only ''masterly inactivity' can restore your quiet mind them you are beginning your journey to recovery.

[Sandieandie in reply to Jeff1943]

I fail to see how this can help. I am alive and AI feel like I am wasting my life thinking like this every single day.

[Jeff1943 in reply to Sandieandie]

Something in your past caused you to experience anxiety overload. Whatever the problem was/is your body responded to it with fear, too much fear hormone causes the nervous system to become over sensitised.

When this happens it can present as health anxiety such as with you. Sensitised nerves cause us to exaggerate small worries and concerns ten fold. In your case the normal reaction to avoid premature death has become exaggerated out of all proportion to the reality of the threat.

The way to overcome this intrusive thought is to recover from the nervous sensitisation which is causing this problem.

You respond to the flash of first fear with second fear. You are fighting your condition. To recover you need to stop feeding your nerves with extra fear thereby allowing your nerves to desensitise.

But fighting the symptoms only causes more stress and tension. So you must respond passively and instead of fighting the symptoms you should Accept them for the time being i.e. to not be provoked into fighting your feelings: after all you now know that your nerves are tricking you over this obsession with death. You know that you are in no more danger of dying than the next man or woman.

So you agree to co-exist with your bad feelings for the moment. You do nothing. When you feel the bad thoughts coming do not shun them, let them come as you now know they are no physical threat to anyone and that means you.

Frame your mind to Accept your feelings, it will take time and persistence. Do not ask how long. To begin with you will only be able to glimpse this new attitude. But eventually you will fully embrace your new viewpoint. You stop reacting to the feeling of death with fear, you stop flooding your nervous system with adrenaline, gradually your nerves become less and less sensitised until they have recovered normality. That is the point when all your symptoms of anxiety disorder, including the irrational fear of early death, resolve and you regain your quiet mind.

[Ubud2021]

Hey there 👋

When I was little, I had a phobia of natural disasters happening. Tornadoes, Earthquakes, Floods, Volcanos, and so on... Every time the wind would blow a little, or it started to rain, I would fear for my life. Even to this day, I have a little phobia of natural disasters. Not as bad as they were when I was little.

Of course, our phobias are different. But, the same thing happens to us. We both are extremely scared. And fear for our lives. I am sorry that you are going through this, and are going through it alone. When you discovered your phobia of cancer, what kinds of coping skills did you use? Have you tried using similar coping skills? Do you talk to a therapist? Have you discussed coping skills?

There are also many meditations out there to help with phobias. You can look some up on YouTube, or the InsightTimer app. It has over 40,000 free meditations. Just make sure you click on the free version, and you won’t be asked to pay or anything. It’s very helpful, and my favorite meditation tool.

Best of luck. 💕

[Tikirob]

I have ocd and have had that fear for most of my life. I also have the same concerns about I have lived a life I have wasted and continue too by worrying it away.

Having OCD is limiting, it is a disorder of guilt, worry, overthinking and doubt. I remember in treatment about 4 years ago a clinician told me that she knew people who were really sick who lived a more joyful life than me. I found it hard to believe that a person with a disease I fear most could be living any better than me at the time when I was physically healthy.

Yet she opened my eyes to the matter at hand - a life spent on worry is not honoring the present moment. You could live to 85 have 30 years to live with worry, now imagine that sentencing from a judge, “I hereby sentence you to thirty years of worry” that’s harsh! But you and I would call that “normal” because of OCD, The key is to replace the sentence with a better noun, “I hereby sentence you to thirty years of wonder, laughter, beauty, great conversations, good food, success, dreams fulfilled etc.”

I struggle every day to be productive more so now. I worry about the how abs when, but my dreams are starting to give my OCD a run for its money. I wish you the best.