Why do i have to suffer with hypochondria?

[Mandah2386]

I ask myself this daily. Why me? Why do I always have to feel crazy, with all my symptoms and excessive awareness of every part of my body? Why do I have to spend hours scouring the internet for what are the causes for my latest symptoms? Why cant I be normal? Why cant I just go to the dr when I'm truly sick and why cant i trust my dr when he says I am fine? No one else in my family has this, except my aunt, and she's tried to commit suicide twice. I dont want that to be me. I want to be normal. I worry I never will be because I have no reason to be this way. I didnt lose a family member at a young age or been misdiagnosed by a dr. My parents do not suffer with mental health, nor do my siblings. Only me. I feel medicine will be a bandaid for my issue and I will never be able to get over it until I find out why. Anyone know why they suffer with this?

 

[Steven]

Hey there. I’ve thought about this before as well. I think it has a lot to do with OCD. Our obsession is checking our bodies over and over as well as checking dr Google and over and we do it compulsively so I definitely think it is linked to OCD.

 

[triceps]

I ask myself this daily. Why me? Why do I always have to feel crazy, with all my symptoms and excessive awareness of every part of my body? Why do I have to spend hours scouring the internet for what are the causes for my latest symptoms? Why cant I be normal? Why cant I just go to the dr when I'm truly sick and why cant i trust my dr when he says I am fine? No one else in my family has this, except my aunt, and she's tried to commit suicide twice. I dont want that to be me. I want to be normal. I worry I never will be because I have no reason to be this way. I didnt lose a family member at a young age or been misdiagnosed by a dr. My parents do not suffer with mental health, nor do my siblings. Only me. I feel medicine will be a bandaid for my issue and I will never be able to get over it until I find out why. Anyone know why they suffer with this?

I've often questioned why I don't have hypochondria. I sure have serious, absolutely constant generalized anxiety disorder but my worrying seems to focus on everything but health issues. If they ever figure out what causes the difference in the thinking, it might help all of us. My family is riddled with mental health issues ranging from all types of anxiety and depression to my brother suffering as a paranoid schizophrenic. I think any anxiety disorder is unfair and I've been waiting so many years for a medication that actually treats the disease versus tempering the symptoms.

 

[Richard G]

I ask myself this daily. Why me? Why do I always have to feel crazy, with all my symptoms and excessive awareness of every part of my body? Why do I have to spend hours scouring the internet for what are the causes for my latest symptoms? Why cant I be normal? Why cant I just go to the dr when I'm truly sick and why cant i trust my dr when he says I am fine? No one else in my family has this, except my aunt, and she's tried to commit suicide twice. I dont want that to be me. I want to be normal. I worry I never will be because I have no reason to be this way. I didnt lose a family member at a young age or been misdiagnosed by a dr. My parents do not suffer with mental health, nor do my siblings. Only me. I feel medicine will be a bandaid for my issue and I will never be able to get over it until I find out why. Anyone know why they suffer with this?

I know there is family history for me ...mom has anxiety...dad and his dad major depression...first cousin ocd... my doc says it is chemically caused in the brain...we can't help it. I had success on some meds but got off them due to side effects I know I must go back on them as the tradeoff is this debilitating h.a.

 

[Kaynil]

I can relate with you about having a relative with hypochondria that becomes a fear and a role model for what you want to avoid. So perhaps telling you my own reasoning about the possible origin can help you as well. The fact that you brought that aunt up shows how much of an impact she had on you. In my case, this other relative I felt horror with the idea of ending like her even before I even knew what hypochondria was. No one would take her seriously if she said anything about a pain she'd had for days because they would just assume it was psychosomatic. It was debilitating for her as she became older and dependent and no one believed her nor took action no matter what. I was growing up as that took place and it made an impact on me. Before I even realized I had decided to do all I could to avoid becoming like that. Now I think that's what backfired on me because I started scrutinizing every bad feeling. It is just something I grew with and I quickly realised that my stress and fear attached to it wasn't on par with the symptoms, so I don't know if you, similarly, brought more attention to your own body sensations precisely because you were afraid of ending up as your relative.

With that said, I feel even more strongly to tell you this: You don't have to have a clear-cut reason to justify suffering from hypochondria. It is easy to beat ourselves out into feeling bad because from our perspective we didn't have anything to cause it, it feels like stealing a spotlight, except it is a spotlight we never wanted. We're stuck with something we can't even explain how it came to be but affects your judgment and pops up at expected and unexpected times.

I think it was Eckhart Tolle, who once compared our obsession to find the origin with a person that has been shot an arrow and doesn't want to be tended until they learn who shot the arrow. In the end, it doesn't have the priority we think it does to find the origin as much as it is to accept our condition and find ways to cope and live with it. That you didn't have a bad past doesn't make your hypochondria any less of a burden today, so adding yourself guilt because you didn't go through what other people has will not help you. Sometimes things just are. So don't let yourself obsess and make yourself miserable over it if you can help it.

 

[Steven]

Love the anaology about the person being shot by an arrow. Great explanation.

 

[Titus1229]

I don’t understand either, I have had general anxiety for years and was triggered a little over a year ago into this health anxiety spiral. For me I think it had to do with acquaintances of mine being diagnosed with terminal illnesses at a young age. From that point on I’ve had this “ why not me “ though whenever I have an ailment that lasts over a couple days. I think they didn’t deserve to go through that anymore than I do, how can I sit here and say I don’t have cancer or ALS? When I certainly could, so I panic and go to do every test, waist a bunch of money and as soon as I get cleared my symptoms go away.