What is Health Anxiety?
Do you find yourself constantly worrying about having cancer, diabetes, multiple sclerosis or any other serious health conditions? You are not alone.
Health anxiety is when you spend so much time worrying that you are ill, or that you are going to become ill, that this leads to an intense fear of illness. This then becomes so debilitating and exhausting that it can take over your life.
You may have health anxiety if you:
- constantly worry about your health
- regularly look at health information online, researching symptoms and trying to find a diagnosis
- frequently check your body for signs of illness, such as lumps, tingling or pain
- are always asking people for reassurance that you are not ill
- worry that a doctor or medical tests may have missed something
- avoid anything to do with serious illness, such as medical TV programmes
- act as if you were ill (for example, avoiding physical activities)
- avoid going to see your GP or miss hospital appointments
Anxiety itself can cause symptoms like headaches or a racing heartbeat, and you may mistake these for signs of illness. Also, if you are feeling stressed, your chest may feel tight, and your breathing might get faster. These are normal physical reactions to stress, but, if you suffer with health anxiety, you may believe that you are having a heart attack.
The problem is that, if/when you have health anxiety, you may think that relatively harmless physical symptoms are signs of serious disease.
If you have health anxiety you might fear getting a severe illness, such as cancer or dementia, rather than common, milder conditions, such as a cold. You might find you research a severe illness when you have mild symptoms, leading to a fear that you have it. You might then focus on health information about your feared diagnosis.
The result is that you feel significant distress and it is likely that you will become far more easily worried about the state of your health than other people.
Also, your anxiety and your behaviours which are connected to your health anxiety are likely to be having a serious impact on several important areas of your life, such as family and personal life, your social life and your working life/occupation.
Health anxiety is also thought to be related to obsessive compulsive disorder (OCD). Sometimes, the symptoms of OCD and health anxiety overlap, with a grey area between the two.
The two main choices for helping you to overcome health anxiety are Cognitive Behavioural Therapy or medication. These can be either a separate or a combined approach to treatment. However, because any improvement using medication generally depends on continuing to take the medication, Cognitive Behavioural Therapy is the preferred initial treatment.
CBT is an effective treatment for any form of anxiety, including health anxiety and OCD..
During your therapy sessions, it may help you explore the reasons why you first developed health anxiety. For example, it may have begun when a friend or family member suddenly became ill or died.
I am a very experienced therapist and I use the CBT model of therapy daily in my practice, so, if you want to begin the process of overcoming your health anxiety and you want to get your life back on track, please contact me to arrange your first therapy session. I would love to help you to get better. Thank you.
You can call me on my mobile (07913 979561) for a free, initial, 20 minutes telephone consultation or you can complete this Contact Form.