Health Anxiety

[VilyaMorgan]

I don't know where to get better help. I'm 30 years old and my life has been taken over by health concern OCD/health anxiety. I've had CBT therapy for it on the NHS (I'm in England). I can't afford a private therapist. I did genuinely try with the CBT and I really had high hopes that it would work but I have frequent and debilitating panic attacks. I've stopped leaving the house. My friends and family are starting to set boundaries around how much I talk about my health. I'm not angry with them... I get it. I can't be that fun to be around right now. I feel like I'm not me anymore. All aspects of my personality, all of my hobbies and things that I loved are gone. All I can think about is my health. I've even considered asking to be committed because the fear is so intense. I'm not suicidal. I don't want to die. But also, sometimes it feels like I spend so much time worrying that I'm going to, if it's going to happen anyway, could it hurry up? You know? It's not the same as wanting to die. It's just so intense. I feel like I've lost myself to this.

Is there anything different to CBT on the NHS? Are there mental health teams I can contact?

[Nafpaktos]

Have you checked out OCD-UK (ocduk.org) or the forums there? They have a number of good webcasts, including some on health anxiety if I remember right.

And have you seen the documentary Nadiya: Anxiety and Me [h ttps://youtu.be/atvImgNSq6E]? She has PTSD, but can’t address that until she treats the panic disorder. It seems likely that your panic disorder is now making the health anxiety/OCD worse. Fortunately, panic disorder is relatively easy to treat and so many with health anxiety and OCD are also able to recover.

Don’t lose hope. Not every therapist necessarily has the expertise to treat you, but that doesn’t mean that none do and it doesn’t mean you can’t acquire the knowledge that then allows you to reduce some of this distress yourself.

Lastly, here’s a very good — and very long! — interview about OCD that I found quite valuable:

004 - OCD: The Serious Issue of a Ridiculed Illness Prof. Paul Salkovskis

[h ttps://youtu.be/atvImgNSq6E]

(In case it isn’t obvious, links don’t display properly here so delete the space between the “h” and the “ttps.”)

For help itself you might try the Oxford clinic, if you have not already: oxicptr.web.ox.ac.uk/clinic.

[scotsil120]

Have you been able to match up with a ERP trained therapist for your health OCD? Many therapists claim to know how to treat OCD but they are not trained in ERP which stands for Exposure and Response Prevention therapy. ERP is the gold standard treatment for OCD and is under the umbrella of CBT but it is different and the therapist must be specifically trained in ERP. I work for a company called NOCD and we specifically treat people with OCD. We are located in the US but we treat members in Europe. May I suggest you look at NOCD.com and get in touch with our care Dept? My name is Scott Silver and you can say I referred you. I hope you reach out as we have helped so many members in Europe. We take insurance and for those without insurance, we even have payment plans as low as $95 per week. It’s definitely worth checking into and I can assure you will get the help and care that you need. Heath OCD is common and we have experts that can help you with this so you needn’t suffer. Alternatively, check out Nathan Peterson on YouTube. He is excellent and has hundreds of wonderful helpful videos on OCD and you will find him helpful. If you have any questions please feel free to reach out to me. Good luck!