Obsessive fear of loved ones dying? Help please?

[charlynn]

I'm sorry if this is lengthy, but I hope you take the time to hear me out <3

Hi. My name is Charlynn. I joined this forum a month or so ago. I'm 16 years old. My anxiety issues basically revolve around being afraid that my loved ones are going to die and also about health. Sometimes I think I'm gonna die. Sometimes I fear that words people say are signs that someone I love is going to die. I really don't want to live this way. I guess how my anxiety started was about a year ago, I had a close friend of mine go through a terrible situation. Her dad passed on in an unexpected situation. His arteries had cracks in them and they burst when someone mugged him because i guess he got scared. Ever since that day, I've been asking myself how I would feel if that happened to me. There are so many accidents happening nowadays and I'm thinking that it might happen to someone I love too. I suffered through this "fear of loved ones dying" for a few months until I stopped worrying about it and started worrying about something else. Then, a few weeks back, I went out with that particular friend and I guess it triggered my anxiety again.. remembering how upset she was and how she might still be hurting inside. Ever since then, I'd been having irrational thoughts about this again. And sometimes I'll feel like I'm gonna die, for no reason at all. And then all of a sudden, everything thats happening to me, i think im gonna die. When I have a headache, I think I'm gonna die. When I feel dizzy, I think I'm gonna die. I really don't want to go to a doctor because my family cannot afford it right now. My family has no idea about my anxiety issues and neither do my friends. The only person that knows is my boyfriend. & he's really supportive and all. I joined this forum to find a peace of mind and just hope someone has a way for me to snap out of this and live on happily and as carefree as I was a year ago before all this started. But I have to say though, in a way, my anxiety really did change me. It help me be a better person. Being scared of what I say being a sign of what might happen, I limit myself from saying bad things and from judging people.

Have you ever felt this way before?? if so, how do you shake the feeling? One minute I'll be fine, the next I'll be worried sick.

[Cuchculan]

I think at some point in time we all go through the stage of having fears / worries of loved ones dying. It is only once it consumes us that it becomes a real problem. I like to look at those around. Then ask myself, ' is there any reason why they should die '? They are not ill. I know is but a game of chance at times. Death happens. I have long since come to accept that fact. Once I accepted the fact I found I didn't worry as much about those I loved dying. You can spend your own life fearing death so much, that you forget how to live. So if you feel such thoughts coming on, just try and find something else to do. To distract your thoughts. Take your mind away from the situation. It can be done. Just have to believe in yourself.

[marc]

On a positive note, it is good that you don't judge people and refrain from saying bad things.
Death is very difficult for all of us to deal with. My mother and father passed away in around a
four month period; my mother in September 2012 and my father in January 2013. I try to not
think about it as it robs whatever time I have left on earth to enjoy myself.