VERY INTERESTING

[tam2006]

I DON;T KNOW WHERE TO START BUT  I WILL TRY.....FOR SOME REASON WE ARE SO OBSSESED WITH OUR HEALTH THAT IT;S GETTING REALLY ANNOYING AND WE DON;T KNOW WHY DO WE HAVE THESE FEARS....MY QUESTION TO EVERYONE IS TO GO BACK TO OUR CHILDHOOD MAYBE WE ARE ALL ALIKE SOMEHOW....I GREW UP WITH MY MOTHER ONLY..MY DAD DIED IN A CAR ACCIENT WHEN I WAS 1 YEARS OLD,,,,MY MOTHER WAS VERY STRICT AND I HAD GRANDPARENTS,AUNTS,AUNCLES TO RAISE ME ......I DIDN;T CARE ABOUT ANYTHING OR ANY DESIEASES UNTIL I FELL IN LOVE AND GOT MARRIED I BECAME VERY OBSSESIVE AND ABOUT 2 MONTHS AGO I STARTED HAVING HEALTH ANXIETY ...IT;S ESPECIALLY WORSE AND TERRIFYING IN THE MORNINGS.........SO PLZ JUST DESCRIBE YOUR CHILDHOOD HOW U GREW UP AND MAYBE WE CAN UNDERSTAND WHAT CAUSES IT AND THEN WE CAN GET HELP AND GET BETTER TOGETHER........... :)

[athinalev]

I remember as a child,  also stories of parents friends/relatives getting/dying of cancer. Then when i was 17 my mom died of cancer, buti was anxious way before age 17. i also wasnt emotionally supported by my parents. i was always made to feel like a nuisance. i was terrified of going blind as a child,it consumed me for years, it stole my childhood. this illness really sucks. i wish i could just trust that the symptoms that come on are harmless. but then i think "what if"
we are our own worst enemies.

[athinalev]

I hope that your sister is going to be ok. My father is a prostate cancer survivior, and my niece is a rhabdomyosarcoma (rare chilhood cancer) survivor-I guess we have to remember that not everyone who gets cancer dies. i always think the worst, which is what makes me such a hypochondriac. i think this website helps. it encourages me to realize that what im feeling (as real as it feels/seems) IS MY HYPOCHONDRIA. it is such an irrational disease,it really is.

[zoey]

Hi. For me my hypochondria probably started to start at age 7 or 8 when I developed some kind of rash on my neck, and thought I was going to die. The fear at the time was easily overcome by reassurance from my mom/dad. Further on I had a few hypochondria attacks when I was 12/13 thinking I had cancer (by then I knew that it existed... and probably thought it was the worst disease one can get) And I also got hypochondrias about malaria, plague, aids, etc... Many times I had minor attacks regarding appendicitis. Up until age 14 or 15 I started getting major cancer hypochondrias and ever since cancer was the major issue. I think that our brain automatically assumes the worst, and in our case it's "cancer".

My parents were generally nice and supportive, no exposure to death in the family when I was young. However, television, teachers and misrepresented common sense might've contributed to this.

One other thing that is (i think) contributing to this is self-consciousness. I think that I want to feel accepted and be "perfect" and "disease-free" so that people will love me and so that I can get a girl friend. Many times when I get a hypochondria, I think that girls will not like me anymore because of that specific thing. This sucks too.

The most things I have found to be effective against this are: Ignoring symptoms (after checking once with doctor), absolutely no self-checking, only looking and admiring, reading positive articles instead of negative ones (e.g. this forum), writing down a list of things on your mind. I think a great deal of "relapses" is due to zero-memory, and the fact that we forget that initially right after being reassured we felt OK.

The thing that scares me at this stage is the idea that this hypochondria beast is still sitting on my back and can wake up any minute, e.g. from a sensation or something. But while in a hypochondria attack, I think the most scary part is pain/death/evolution of symptoms and/or physical appearance. Like mentioned in this forum before, remember that Cancer is highly over-rated. People don't think of it as a preventable disease, however, if you look at the statistics, many cancers that constitute the large percentage of high mortality rates are preventable (e.g. lung, colo-rectal) and just a couple of others fill up the rest of the top percentile. Most cancers are not that common. (check out canadian statistics: http://www.cancer.ca/ccs/internet/standard/0,3182,3172_14279__langId-en,00.html)

Hope I've helped.