Hi. New here. Anxiety is eating me.

[PurpleQuokka]

TW: extreme fear, cancer, catastrophizing, thanatophobia, bites

I have been coping pretty well since this pandemic began, despite setbacks and challenges along the way; despite concerns my aging mother may have cancer (she had surgery, and it was precancerous - removed it and she's fine!) and my partner may also have cancer (also turns out so far, fine). I'm still absorbing that, thankfully, things are okay with them.

The problem is me and my fear because one event threw me into a full anxiety loop where I can't stop thinking the worst will happen. Someone else would say I'm catastrophizing. Someone else would say I have genuine concerns, but I'm blowing them out of proportion. I don't know. Either way it is awful.

What happened? I was bitten by a cat (not mine, I don't even have a cat atm) and it ran away. I was immediately in shock and I felt like passing out, my knees like rubber. But I managed to clean the bite and bandage it, and was told to go to the ER. I went to the ER, and they x-rayed me, and I began showing signs of infection later and had to take antibiotics and steroids (prednisone).

Almost two weeks later and the injury has healed on the outside at least, but my arm still hurts. I've been referred to an orthopedic doctor if it doesn't improve more in the next week or two.

I'm going through withdrawal from the prednisone but also more pain and symptoms of anxiety that are making a major impact on quality of life (including looping thought and inability to consistently focus on what someone's saying, nausea, stomach pain, feeling wobbly when I stand up, sleepiness alternating with hypervigilance, etc)

My partner observed what happened and we both think it is a cat belonging to the neighbor who lets both their cats roam outside and neither have collars. The neighbor has been contacted and the cat was put under observation and is supposed to get updated shots. Supposedly this means I am 'in the clear' and okay, as it came out of quarantine recently.

Meanwhile... I'm 'what if-ing'. What if we got the wrong cat? What if it was really sick but it was acting friendly to me before it bit? What if, what if, what if?

I am looping through this over and over and it's literally making me sick to my stomach. And replaying what happened in my head, and feel so stupid I pet the dang thing. I never would have if I knew this would happen. I now don't want to pet any animal unless I know the owner, and moving forward this is wise anyway.

Whatifwhatifhwhatif.... I keep trying to distract myself and think about other things. If I try to google anything about my situation, I get more anxious and nauseated and want to pass out.

I was really thrown off guard by all this and if you asked me 3 weeks ago if I was anxious, I would have said no. I was concerned about my mother and my partner's health, but not anxious. I told myself not to worry until we had more information from doctors that sounded concerning, and we did not have that.

I have an underlying condition, btw, where I can react to new medications and treatments badly a lot more than the average person. It can be life threatening in itself. So taking antibiotics and prednisone wasn't exactly easy, on top of the side effects from the drugs.

I've been through a lot in a short period of time and I'm afraid of going through more. I don't feel safe or reassured. My partner is worried I am cracking, and I suppose I am. We're hoping I can find a path through this and stay safely at home while I do, too. We both have at-risk conditions for COVID and are already nervous I had to go to the ER recently.

Thanks for listening. I don't know how often I can check back here because even just writing or talking about this makes me severely anxious.

[langedechu]

hey,this seems like a very complicated situation and i'm sorry it's stressing you out. i hope you can get through all of it and if you ever need to talk to someone please make another post or dm me and we can work it out. for now, i'd definitely say to play it safe and just focus on some things at home that make you happy, i.e. reading, drawing, watching tv, going for a walk, cooking, as stress relievers. best of luck x

[PurpleQuokka in reply to langedechu]

Thank you, thank you, for responding so quickly.

I'm feeling kinda alone with this and I don't want to be a burden.

I'm trying to be compassionate with myself even though I have been hard on myself over all this.

Yeah. It is very complicated. I feel like it's too much and I'm in over my head.

I don't know how much my therapist can do, and we've been doing good work together so far - but this may be above his paygrade, so to speak.

I'm trying to work with my doctors based on what we know - or think we know - and not so much my anxiety. But I'm beginning to think maybe I need to at least bring up my anxiety to one of my doctors and talk about how it affects medical decision making.

This is hard. I'm taking it one moment, one day at a time and distraction seems to be the only thing getting me through any given moment right now.

I've spent some time reading things totally unrelated to my fears, and did some drawing both related to and unrelated to my fears, I've watched funny clips on Youtube and am watching the Mandalorian (have to get through season 1 so I can see the new season), and I bake meals more than I cook, really. I'm trying to do odd tasks around the house that need getting done, anyway, even if it just feels like I'm going through the motions.

So, I'm not *totally* fetal in a ball crying so far. But believe me, I've been so emotional that I have broken out into tears here and there. The stress has been too high and it's gotta come out now and then.

It's bad... I've suffered from anxiety on and off my entire life, and have some PTSD from a traumatic upbringing and past bad relationship choices (current partner is great though!). And for whatever reason, I was doing fine, doing better than some of my friends even during this pandemic, and then this happened. I'm not doing so well now.

Thank you for your kind offer to talk more. It helps and I appreciate it. I'll try not to cry now.

[langedechu in reply to PurpleQuokka]

we all have times where we feel like it's too much to handle. sometimes the best thing to do is cry. let it out. holding it in doesn't help either. glad to hear you've been spending time on things you enjoy. it is definitely not a bad thing overcoming fears step by step. it takes time, and, if you try to do it all at once, you'll go nowhere. and I'm also serious about talking more, my main goal in life pretty much is to make people happy. i had a friend this year who tried to end his life and it was just so (scary at first) eye-opening. I never want someone I know to go through that again. please reach out if you need it. love always 🖤

[kvolm2016]

Sorry to hear about what you have been dealing with in the health of your family and now this incident added to it. Easy to understand why this might have been the incident that pushed you past what you could handle. Since you are already working with a therapist for the anxiety, now is definitely the time to have the therapist teach you or remind you of the coping strategies you can use to deescalate when the catastrophizing and looping thoughts present themselves. Do you have coping strategies that you already use? There are many different ones to try so if what you have been doing isn't working, learn/try something new!