Terrified I might have Oesophageal Cancer!!
Posted , 3 users are following.
Hello!
I've been suffering from a lot of anxiety during the past year, mostly about my health.
About 3 weeks ago I had a disturbing dream in which I was diagnosed with esophageal cancer. Being the anxious person that I am, I used Google and read that there are many cases where people had cancer dreams which prompted them to see a doctor and then turned out to in fact have it. This scared me a lot.
I then started to worry immensely about having esophageal cancer and again used google to see if I had any of the symptoms. "Coincidentally" I began to experience the typical symptoms associated with the cancer: difficulty with swallowing (food getting stuck in throat constantly while eating) and chronic indigestion (burning in stomach). I have never had acid reflux/GERD so I don't think it's that. Because of my history with anxiety, I'm trying to convince myself that it's my anxiety and hypersensitivity causing the symptoms. I'm totally freaking out!
Oh and I did talk to my GP. I have a barium swallow scheduled for tomorrow and he also referred me to a gastro specialist who I assume will perform an endoscopy.
Any wise words? Can this really just be my anxiety? I'm a 25 year old female btw.
0 likes, 2 replies
pratik2003 kim00708
Posted
Hello,
its a dream and googling symptoms is the worst stuff that one can do.. Google always scare prople and its better not to do...you are suffering from anxiety ... Don't ever never Google symptoms
AlanJM kim00708
Posted
I think that food getting stuck in your chest is something that needs medical investigation, so it is something more specific than general anxiety. Having said that, it is possible for nervous tension to create swallowing problems because the muscles that propel the food down towards the stomach need to be properly relaxed in order to work properly together. At age 25 it would be very unusual to have oesophageal cancer, but your doctor seems to have done the very sensible thing in referring you for a barium swallow test. An endoscopy would also indicate whether there are any specific physical problems. My advice would be to ask for a sedative for this. You will need to have somebody to accompany you home afterwards, but it means that the procedure does not normally entail any difficulty created by your own natural tension about it.