Hypochondria
(1)
For about 4 years now, I have thought that I have had cancer. This has never been diagnosed, as I was too terrified to see a doctor, or even tell my family about it. Yet it has been something that has bothered almost my every waking hour of my existence. For 4 years.
But now I am starting to realise that I may have hypochondria - "an abnormal chronic anxiety about one's health." A major part of this realisation is down to 7 Cups, and finally being open about how I have been feeling. I would especially like to thank @SmileySam299 who was an amazing listener, and definitely helped to guide me to this conclusion - and ultimately was the kickstart to me taking action.
This morning I finally confessed to my mother exactly how I have been feeling, and it feels so good to finally get this burden off my chest. Of course my anxiety hasn't been relieved fully, as:
A) I still need to go have the medical checkups to assure that I'm not actually sick, which unfortunately is still a possibility. But the more and more I research it, the more I realise that a very logical explanation is that I'm a hypochondriac.
B) As stated above, it's a chronic anxiety, meaning this is something I might have to learn to live with for the rest of my life.
(2) I separated this into two parts due to a character limit, at least on the 7 Cups app it wouldn't let me post it all together but I know i know it has a few bugs.
For anyone who is going through healthy anxiety, but may not know that it's due to them being a hypochondriac, I want to add a bit of information that helped me come to the conclusion and really reflected how I felt. As someone who never expressed these worries, it was very reassuring to have them finally put into words.
"The hypochondriac doesn't want to be ill, but nor do they want to be dismissed as 'just imagining it.' The paradox of hypochondria is that the sufferer often knows they are a hypochondriac even whilst maintaining they are justified in believing they are ill."
Research shows that hypochondria runs in families (as far as I can understand not genetically, but rather by being taught attitudes and behaviors by relatives) - which makes a lot of sense as many members of my family are apparently hypochondriacs, and I guess I have witnessed this anxiety throughout my childhood. Another thing that makes someone more likely tougher with hypochondria is if they have witnessed serious illness - shortly before I began to believe I had cancer, my grandmother was fighting it herself (she won, and is still a strong woman today), and I think witnessing her struggle affected me a lot.
I hope this will be helpful to any one in doubt, and if you feel like you could have hypochondria or if you think you are sick I urge you to seek help as soon as you can. Don't do what I did, and put it off for years, because surely it has just worsened over the years and left me with crippling anxiety that I'm not sure I will ever be able to shake.
And for any one who knows about or suffers with hypochondria, please leave whatever knowledge you have about it, as I'm still very uneducated on the matter and would greatly appreciate any information that could help me better understand and manage this condition.
Thanks a lot if you made it this far, I know it's a really long essay but this is the first time I have written about my fears and anxiety in a continuos and flowing (I hope) passage.
@SoloDolo15
It is such an inspiring story. Well done for speaking out and seeking help.
