Cancer worries are breaking my family
Posted , 4 users are following.
Hi, I've been battling health anxiety for years. About 7 years ago a family member died with pancreatic cancer, over the next 3 years I was convinced I had it too, this lead to severe anxiety and a bunch of horrible symptoms. After blood tests and 2 ultra sounds my doctor told me it was just lactose intolerance, gas, and stress. Fast forward 4 years to 2022, I started having gastric symptoms again. Mostly a dull stomach ache that sometimes goes to the center of my back, of to the left side of my back. My poop had a weird yellow color and even bits of undigested food. This has been going on and off for about 2 months. I finally got an appointment with a gastroenterologist, but they only had an opening in December. The problem now is, whenever I tell my husband I'm worried I have pancreatic cancer, and I break down, he just gets angry.. He can't deal with my health crisis because he thinks iI have nothing at all, although I'm sure I must have something, even if it's not as serious as pc. He says acting like this makes him feel depressed and uncomfortable, and that makes me feel depressed and sad because I dont Want to burned him with these things! I have to pretend all is well even though I'm so stressed and scared because if I don't, I'll upset him.. As if my health anxiety and possible gastric disease wasn't enough, now I have to worry about being a mental burden to my family.
0 likes, 3 replies
siim44924 Sofi4563
Posted
Really bad to hear your husband don't understand what you are going trough. It's really supportive to have someone by your side who understands your situation. I'm having all kinds of symptoms and my brain has thought all kind of different illnesses. Last couple of days it's messing with my stomach.. a lot of gas and random pains which just appear from thin air. I am dealing with health anxiety almost 4 months soon. Never google your symptoms, worst thing that you can do. What helped me is anxiety guy youtube page and his videos. I'm also listening his podcast via spotify. He was having same thing for 10 years but he didn't gave up and finally he found his inner peace. It's really inspiring. If you want to have a chat then just feel free to write me.
kieran35167 Sofi4563
Posted
Sorry I can't be of any help but just reading through this I'm going through the exactly the same thing as you,
My dad passed away 2 years ago of cancer and now I cannot get the thought of me having it out my head, every feeling in my stomach and I'm telling myself it's the worst I dread going to the toilet just in case I see something there which could be the worst, the doctors have done blood test and samples a few months ago that came back clear and that put my mind at rest for a few months and now it's all back,
Sorry I can't give you any answers but hopefully it's helps you a bit that I'm going the same?
jan34534 Sofi4563
Posted
i’m sorry you are going through this but I can tell you from my own experiences that The mind will create fears that are not based on reality. I know how awful it feels. I thought for the longest time I was going to have MS because my aunt had it. I had horrific symptoms such as numbness and tingling, floaters in my eyes, and ringing in my ears, muscle twitching, weakness, and many more. I was absolutely convinced it was starting to happen! Well nothing happened. My testing was normal. Every single one of those symptoms was a result of stress and anxiety.
so just because you think you’re going to get that disease really means not much at all. It’s just a thought.
I also had your gastric symptoms of the pain that feels like it’s going through your back, weird colored stools, undigested food. I can also tell you that those symptoms were also related to my stress and anxiety. Because of all the anxiety, I developed gastritis which is an inflammation of the stomach lining. That’s what caused those symptoms. Nothing serious. you may be dealing with the same thing.
for your sake and for your family sake you have to stop going to the worst case scenario because it is very unlikely that is what is going on. you are torturing yourself for no reason. every family has some kind of an illness in it but that doesn’t mean that one specific person is going to get it.
I would highly suggest that you get some counseling for over thinking and anxiety and stress.
also go on YouTube and look up something called therapy in a nutshell. The therapist name is Emma and she is excellent. She has a series of short videos on anxiety, worry, stress, over thinking, and so on. I think you would benefit from watching this. I watch one or two of her videos a day and they helped me a lot.
I was stressing out my daughter who is an adult but I was telling her everything that I was worried about considering my health and it literally wore her out and one day she just started crying and told me that this is too much for her, she wants me to be happy but this is really stressing her out. From that day and I stopped doing that. I love her so much and I could not put her through that anymore.
your gastric symptoms sound so much like mind in so much like what anxiety causes. It does not sound anything like cancer. So please think about getting some counseling. You can do it virtually like I do and it works great. It really helps to vent to somebody who is not emotionally involved. But venting to our families constantly is just too much for them. I do hope you start to feel a little more relaxed. there are some great breathing meditations on YouTube for stress and anxiety to calm everything down. take care everything‘s gonna be OK!