Someone PLEASE talk some sense into me....geeze!!

[Amy1981]

Okay...I just need to say this "out loud", because I KNOW its irrational, if you agree...please tell me so, so that I can put this to rest and try not to think about it all weekend.

FREAKING HEALTH ANXIETY...so, for about a week or so now, I have been having some lower/mid back pain, not horrible, Id call the pain minor/moderate occasionally. The pain doesnt scare me but, I have had kind of a falling asleep/tingly feeling in both legs/feet. I have been seeing a chiropractor for about 3 yrs or so, due to back misalignments...and this isnt the 1st time Ive had the tingly feelings, (although I think this is the longest it has lasted) its happened in my arms/hands/fingers too. The cause, Im sure, is spinal misalignments. Ive went and had an adjustment twice this week, and there has been some improvement, but still tingly some of the time, and its feeding the anxiety. Can you guess what ugly thought keeps throwing itself at me? MS. I refuse to google MS symptoms because I know it will scare me, when it says numbness/tingling/pins needles/ect. That being said, if I lay on my back, pillow under knees (lessoning pressure on lower back), the tingling pretty much stops completely. Also, if Im up moving around, the tingling lessons, or goes away completely. One other thing, applying a heating pad to lower back, relieves most, if not all the tingling. IF this was the something scary I mentioned above, doing these things would not lesson, or make the tingling go away completely, right? PLEASE make me SEE and KNOW sense here? Man, Im past the "get freaked out by weird things going on with my body" crap...why is this making me nervous? :(

[maybe]

Hope ur feeling better! I myself have health anxiety and freak about every little thing my body does... Try not to google any symptoms cause that will just makers it worse

[robp]

Hi Amy, I know how you feel. My first bout of anxiety was health related. I became obsessed with heart attacks and strokes at the time. And I did the worst thing was Google what I was feeling...and of course this just re-enforced my fears. Even though I went through a bunch of tests that proved that there was nothing wrong, but my fears would just not let go. At least you know better than Google what you're feeling, so you have one up on that one.

The one suggestion I have for you is when you feel the nervousness coming on, try not to focus on it. And try some deep breathing exercises like this, deeply inhale and then slowly exhale..count 1 and so on. After a little while you will feel yourself calm down

[Amy1981]

Thank you for the responses guys...

I havent let health anxiety trap me in years...I dont know why Im allowing it to now :(

I think because this has been going on for so long, (and actually, if you hurt your back, a week isnt really that long for "back to normal" to happen, it could take several weeks)...but the tingly feelings are really starting to weigh on me. The 1st several days, nothing scary popped into my head, I KNEW my back was out of whack (if the tingling was caused by MS, it wouldnt be relieved by position changes, because tingling from that isnt caused by spinal misalignment, I only know this from a previous post I read on a different forum, years ago)..its just hanging on so long, that its breaking through and aggrevating the anxiety...UGH :(