Health anxiety and sunburn
I’m an 18 year old female and I’ve been dealing with daily anxiety for the past seven years. One of the things I struggle with the most is health anxiety. I’m constantly worried about getting terminal illnesses or cancers. Skin cancer has always been one of the things that scare me the most. I played sports since I was very little till about two years ago so I’m no stranger to sunburns and only one blistered to my memory. However now after every sunburn I’m thrown into a state of unrelenting anxiety for a few days because I’m absolutely terrified of getting skin cancer or god forbid melanoma later in life. I got a bad sunburn yesterday and barely slept all night because I felt like I was having a heart attack I was so scared and caught up in my head and anxieties. To my knowledge skin cancer doesn’t run in my family but I’m still absolutely terrified.
@RetroRiver
Fear not: I found this online <3
Overall, the lifetime risk of getting melanoma is about 3% (1 in 33) for White people, 0.1% (1 in 1,000) for Black people, and 0.5% (1 in 200) for Hispanic people.
https://www.cancer.org/cancer/types/melanoma-skin-cancer/about/key-statistics.html
That seems very difficult! Anxiety is no joke and no fun! I know! Sending good vibes your way! Have you tried meditation or other anti-anxiety tricks?
I have, yes i just find it hard to stick to routines like with meditation or journaling but when i do do them it does help so i will definitely be trying to do them more consistently
I also struggle to stick to routines! I just try to keep reminding myself to be mindful in the moment. It is NOT easy! None of this is! But you can do this!
@RetroRiver Hi, thank you for being so open about what you are feeling. It sounds like health anxiety has been a heavy burden for you, especially when it comes to fears around skin cancer. Getting a sunburn and then feeling so anxious afterward must be exhausting. It makes sense that your mind would race and that sleep would be hard after feeling that level of fear. You’ve been dealing with this for a long time, and the worry sounds really intense. Even though skin cancer does not run in your family, the fear still feels very real and upsetting. You are not alone in this, and many people here can relate to that constant worry about health. I hope you can be gentle with yourself right now and remind yourself that fear does not equal fact.