Freaking myself out

So some of you know that I’ve been dealing with gastritis and reflux flare up for the last month. Dr says it’s anxiety brought on by recent stress. She did full blood work, H Pylori test and B 12 deficiency tests which all came back normal. Then she poked around and listened to my stomach and gut and said sounds good. There was one spot, dead center at the top of my stomach that was a bit tender when she pushed and I told her. She didn’t seem concerned but just said I was due for my colonoscopy since I’m almost 55. This calmed my anxiety down a bit but I still have symptoms. Then, this afternoon, my son came over with my 3 year old grandson. I picked him up and he drew his knees up around me as normal but one went into that same spot in my stomach which was tender. It felt a bit queasy for a few seconds then I freaked and instantly thought “ oh shit...abdominal aneurysm or stomach cancer and instant flare of panic. I talked myself through it but where did that even come from??? Now I’m trying to mask my anxiety with family here and freaked.

[perkofawallflower]

I have had the same thing happen to me this week. I had sharp stomach pains. I went to the ER and they did a work up of labs and. cT scan. I thought I had kidney stones, or an abdominal aortic aneurysm or cancer. Everything came back fine. Now I just practice deep breathing or talk myself through or I talk to my boyfriend who is very supportive and he brings me back to reality.

[Jeff1943]

Lovemybear, you need to do the opposite to what comes as instinct to recover from health anxiety.

Don't fight it, fighting only causes more stress and tension.

Don't resist it, resisting only creates more fear, accept the symptoms for the time being.

Don't try to avoid it, head straight for it, pass through the storm.

Don't look for a quick cure, let time pass, let lots of time pass.

The more willing you are to accept anxiety the quicker it will leave you.

[CrazyRed in reply to Jeff1943]

Can I ask, how do you accept anxiety? It doesn't quite make sense to me how you do that.

[Jeff1943 in reply to CrazyRed]

Acceptance is part of the method for recovering from anxiety disorder in all its forms (including health anxiety) devised by Doctor Claire Weekes and set out in her first book 'Self help for your nerves' (U.K. edition) or 'Hope and help for your nerves' (U.S. edition).

When she says acceptance she means acceptance for the time being not permanently of course.

By adopting an attitude of acceptance we stop stressing and fearing our symptoms. Thus we stop flooding our nervous system with the fear hormone that keeps our nerves over sensitised - and produces the symptoms we know only too well.

You learn to accept your symptoms for the time being because you come to understand that the symptoms are not real illness, they are fake symptoms produced by over sensitised nerves. Although they are uncomfortable they are not life threatening and will not disable us. Anxiety has its limitations and does not have the power to do that.

The stomach is the part of the body most sympathrtic to anxiety.

So you know you are in no danger, you understand the way these fake illnesses are created by our jangled nerves and with these reassurances we can face the symptoms for the time being without feeling the need to fear them. So we stop or stem the fear hormones from feeding our nervous system and with time the sensitivity resolves and we feel anxiety no more. But it does take time, acceptance takes much practice and persistance in order to achieve recovery.

Those books are available from Amazon or pre-owned from ebay for just a few pounds ir dollars. The book is quite short and written in a way that is easy to read by people with nervous fatigue. Although written many years ago it continues to sell well and is one of the most popular self-help books published in the past 50 years.

You may well decide that it could be of great help to you.

Sorry if I've told you about this book before but I lose track of who I've told and who I haven't.🤔