txmom
04-15-2007, 11:46 AM
Hello. I'm a 34-year-old mother and preschool teacher from Texas.
It has recently come to my attention that I'm probably suffering from GAD (generalized anxiety disorder) and probably have been for many years (intermittently, probably since childhood).
My anxiety usually seems to be focused on health concerns, on the safety of my teenaged son, and on the idea that my husband will leave me.
Sometimes I'm able to put one fear to rest (for instance, by going to the doctor and getting my health concern checked out) but my relief is short-lived, because I simply transfer my anxiety to something else, such as the idea that my husband has stopped loving me, or that my son will be in a car accident.
My anxiety seems to be getting worse as I get older. I've managed to drive away most of my friends with my constant worry and depression and need for reassurance.
As I get older, I seem to be losing my ability to "fake" being a normal person in social settings, and I find myself discussing the most inappropriate things with virtual strangers (such as gynocological concerns) in an effort to get some comfort or relief from my terrible, consuming worry: a dose of reality, some assurance that my anxiety is unnecessary or out of proportion. It puts people off. It embarrasses me. It makes people think I'm weird. I know why I'm doing it, but can't stop.
People at work are sick of hearing about my health concerns. They think I'm a hypochondriac. Maybe I am.
I was afraid to go in for a PAP test for ten years, because I was afraid of being diagnosed with cervical cancer (even though I had no more likelihood of having it than anyone else). The longer I waited, the more afraid I became of going in. I don't have medical insurance, and have to pay cash for medical services, or use public health clinics. This makes my anxiety worse. I worry about how I will pay for treatment, if I do get cancer or AIDS or some other catastrophic illness.
Finally, two months ago, the terrifying event I'd been dreading for a decade happened. I began to display symptoms of cervical cancer. Pain during and bleeding after sex, breakthrough bleeding when it wasn't time for my period. I was convinced this was it. I'd neglected to get my recommended annual cancer screenings for ten years. Now I had cancer.
I was so depressed and anxious and mortified that I could hardly function.
I couldn't eat. I lost ten pounds, because I couldn't swallow food; my throat was too tight. I alternated between not sleeping and sleeping for 14 hours straight. I had trouble going to the bathroom. I cried all the time. I was like a ghost in my family. Just... emotionally not there at all.
I began to have... not full-blown "panic attacks" but weird episodes where I'd pace rapidly up and down the hall or back and forth in my room. My hands and sometimes my face would get numb and tingly. My thoughts would be jumbled and incoherent, just racing. My heart would pound in my ears. I could not block out images of hospitals, invasive medical procedures, surgery, and death. I could not stop these thoughts. I wanted to escape out of my body, to somehow run away from it.
"I won't go to the doctor." I thought. "If I never go, then they can never diagnose me with cancer. I'll just stay right here at home and keep working until I drop dead. Or maybe I'll kill myself, if the pain and terror get too great."
At work, weirdly, I was better. I could function. I'm a good teacher; I love working with young children. Work distracted me somewhat during this time, and forced me to maintain a more "normal" facade.
Nevertheless, I was depressed, irritable, tense, and unable to take the pleasure I ordinarily would in little things. I'd get excited about the weather, or an art project or something, and then suddenly I'd remember that I was dying of cancer. This realization hit me like a ton of bricks a hundred times a day, bringing me down every time I began to take the slightest bit of joy or pleasure in the world around me. This knowledge would return, and drag me back into focusing on my sick, diseased, horrible body from which there was no escape.
Well, I quit having sex with my husband, because I was bleeding every time we did it and that scared me too much.
But one night I decided to try again, hoping stupidly that there would be no blood and the problem would've just resolved on its own.
There was blood afterward.
For some reason, this was the last straw. It changed everything. I couldn't live with this any longer.
I called my dad (it was the middle of the night) babbling hysterically, crying, telling him everything that was happening.
He promised to take me to the doctor the next day, and pay for it (we're quite poor).
So, the next day, he took me to the Planned Parenthood clinic.
I got a full exam- breast, pelvic, PAP, everything.
They found and removed a small polyp on my cervix, which turned out to be benign. That was what had been responsible for the bleeding.
I waited two weeks for my PAP results, and I won't even bother to tell you what that was like. You can probably guess, it was the worst two weeks of my life. Meanwhile, I did a lot of research on the internet about cervical cancer, symptoms, treatments, etc. This made me even more terrified, but compulsively, I could not seem to stop. It was also the only thing that seemed to calm me. Trying to distract myself or pretending to think of something else when I couldn't was too hard.
Finally, yesterday morning, I got my results.
Polyp benign, PAP test normal, negative for all STDs. Everything healthy and good.
At first I didn't believe them. I questioned the nurse over the phone about the PAP, until she finally read the report to me and said, "Well, there is one little thing here... it says one of the samples (they had taken two) was 'unsatisfactory', which means they didn't get enough cells on the slide to make an accurate reading."
I immediately panicked.
"Should I come back in and have another test?"
That wasn't really necessary, she said, because they had taken two samples (one from the outside of the cervix, one from inside) and the other slide was normal. If abnormal cells were present, they would've shown up there.
I started reading on the internet and discovered that PAP tests are far from accurate; the false-negative rate (rate of tests that read 'normal' when abnormal cells are actually present) can be as high as 12%.
I also read a medical study that said that in cases of "unsatisfactory" PAPs due to insufficient cell collection, immediate retests were recommended because such patients, upon being retested, actually did have a higher than average rate of cervical cancer.
So, instead of reassuring me, the "good" news from my doctor made me freak out worse.
I called back and demanded another appointment to get retested. I got one, for two weeks from now.
I'm still afraid to have sex with my husband, because I'm afraid that now that the benign polyp is gone, the bleeding will still occur, proving that the polyp wasn't the problem after all. My body still feels sickening and diseased. I look like crap; I don't even weigh a hundred pounds. I can't even drink water, my throat is so tight.
I am simply paralyzed by this horrible fear, and I can see that it's irrational.
I can see that it's out of proportion. I can see it's out of control, scaring people around me, and ruining my life.
I'm trying to think of proactive things I can do, such as try to get medical insurance (not easy; we really are very poor, but I'm looking into it).
I'm just... I feel so bad.
I've never been diagnosed with anxiety or anything psychological, but i'm pretty smart and i read a lot and I can just tell that i have an anxiety disorder. I know this isn't normal.
I'm worried about this; I'm worried about going crazy. I'm worried about driving my husband away with my horrible, dysfunctional behavior. I'm also worried about my gyn appointment in two weeks; that they're going to look in there and say, "Yep, you were right. We made a mistake. In fact, you're eaten up with cancer."
My life is terrible.
And it shouldn't be. I have a wonderful husband, a beautiful son, a job that I love, a nice apartment.
The terrible part about my life is me.
And that's the part I can't escape from.
Sorry for babbling. Thanks for listening.
It has recently come to my attention that I'm probably suffering from GAD (generalized anxiety disorder) and probably have been for many years (intermittently, probably since childhood).
My anxiety usually seems to be focused on health concerns, on the safety of my teenaged son, and on the idea that my husband will leave me.
Sometimes I'm able to put one fear to rest (for instance, by going to the doctor and getting my health concern checked out) but my relief is short-lived, because I simply transfer my anxiety to something else, such as the idea that my husband has stopped loving me, or that my son will be in a car accident.
My anxiety seems to be getting worse as I get older. I've managed to drive away most of my friends with my constant worry and depression and need for reassurance.
As I get older, I seem to be losing my ability to "fake" being a normal person in social settings, and I find myself discussing the most inappropriate things with virtual strangers (such as gynocological concerns) in an effort to get some comfort or relief from my terrible, consuming worry: a dose of reality, some assurance that my anxiety is unnecessary or out of proportion. It puts people off. It embarrasses me. It makes people think I'm weird. I know why I'm doing it, but can't stop.
People at work are sick of hearing about my health concerns. They think I'm a hypochondriac. Maybe I am.
I was afraid to go in for a PAP test for ten years, because I was afraid of being diagnosed with cervical cancer (even though I had no more likelihood of having it than anyone else). The longer I waited, the more afraid I became of going in. I don't have medical insurance, and have to pay cash for medical services, or use public health clinics. This makes my anxiety worse. I worry about how I will pay for treatment, if I do get cancer or AIDS or some other catastrophic illness.
Finally, two months ago, the terrifying event I'd been dreading for a decade happened. I began to display symptoms of cervical cancer. Pain during and bleeding after sex, breakthrough bleeding when it wasn't time for my period. I was convinced this was it. I'd neglected to get my recommended annual cancer screenings for ten years. Now I had cancer.
I was so depressed and anxious and mortified that I could hardly function.
I couldn't eat. I lost ten pounds, because I couldn't swallow food; my throat was too tight. I alternated between not sleeping and sleeping for 14 hours straight. I had trouble going to the bathroom. I cried all the time. I was like a ghost in my family. Just... emotionally not there at all.
I began to have... not full-blown "panic attacks" but weird episodes where I'd pace rapidly up and down the hall or back and forth in my room. My hands and sometimes my face would get numb and tingly. My thoughts would be jumbled and incoherent, just racing. My heart would pound in my ears. I could not block out images of hospitals, invasive medical procedures, surgery, and death. I could not stop these thoughts. I wanted to escape out of my body, to somehow run away from it.
"I won't go to the doctor." I thought. "If I never go, then they can never diagnose me with cancer. I'll just stay right here at home and keep working until I drop dead. Or maybe I'll kill myself, if the pain and terror get too great."
At work, weirdly, I was better. I could function. I'm a good teacher; I love working with young children. Work distracted me somewhat during this time, and forced me to maintain a more "normal" facade.
Nevertheless, I was depressed, irritable, tense, and unable to take the pleasure I ordinarily would in little things. I'd get excited about the weather, or an art project or something, and then suddenly I'd remember that I was dying of cancer. This realization hit me like a ton of bricks a hundred times a day, bringing me down every time I began to take the slightest bit of joy or pleasure in the world around me. This knowledge would return, and drag me back into focusing on my sick, diseased, horrible body from which there was no escape.
Well, I quit having sex with my husband, because I was bleeding every time we did it and that scared me too much.
But one night I decided to try again, hoping stupidly that there would be no blood and the problem would've just resolved on its own.
There was blood afterward.
For some reason, this was the last straw. It changed everything. I couldn't live with this any longer.
I called my dad (it was the middle of the night) babbling hysterically, crying, telling him everything that was happening.
He promised to take me to the doctor the next day, and pay for it (we're quite poor).
So, the next day, he took me to the Planned Parenthood clinic.
I got a full exam- breast, pelvic, PAP, everything.
They found and removed a small polyp on my cervix, which turned out to be benign. That was what had been responsible for the bleeding.
I waited two weeks for my PAP results, and I won't even bother to tell you what that was like. You can probably guess, it was the worst two weeks of my life. Meanwhile, I did a lot of research on the internet about cervical cancer, symptoms, treatments, etc. This made me even more terrified, but compulsively, I could not seem to stop. It was also the only thing that seemed to calm me. Trying to distract myself or pretending to think of something else when I couldn't was too hard.
Finally, yesterday morning, I got my results.
Polyp benign, PAP test normal, negative for all STDs. Everything healthy and good.
At first I didn't believe them. I questioned the nurse over the phone about the PAP, until she finally read the report to me and said, "Well, there is one little thing here... it says one of the samples (they had taken two) was 'unsatisfactory', which means they didn't get enough cells on the slide to make an accurate reading."
I immediately panicked.
"Should I come back in and have another test?"
That wasn't really necessary, she said, because they had taken two samples (one from the outside of the cervix, one from inside) and the other slide was normal. If abnormal cells were present, they would've shown up there.
I started reading on the internet and discovered that PAP tests are far from accurate; the false-negative rate (rate of tests that read 'normal' when abnormal cells are actually present) can be as high as 12%.
I also read a medical study that said that in cases of "unsatisfactory" PAPs due to insufficient cell collection, immediate retests were recommended because such patients, upon being retested, actually did have a higher than average rate of cervical cancer.
So, instead of reassuring me, the "good" news from my doctor made me freak out worse.
I called back and demanded another appointment to get retested. I got one, for two weeks from now.
I'm still afraid to have sex with my husband, because I'm afraid that now that the benign polyp is gone, the bleeding will still occur, proving that the polyp wasn't the problem after all. My body still feels sickening and diseased. I look like crap; I don't even weigh a hundred pounds. I can't even drink water, my throat is so tight.
I am simply paralyzed by this horrible fear, and I can see that it's irrational.
I can see that it's out of proportion. I can see it's out of control, scaring people around me, and ruining my life.
I'm trying to think of proactive things I can do, such as try to get medical insurance (not easy; we really are very poor, but I'm looking into it).
I'm just... I feel so bad.
I've never been diagnosed with anxiety or anything psychological, but i'm pretty smart and i read a lot and I can just tell that i have an anxiety disorder. I know this isn't normal.
I'm worried about this; I'm worried about going crazy. I'm worried about driving my husband away with my horrible, dysfunctional behavior. I'm also worried about my gyn appointment in two weeks; that they're going to look in there and say, "Yep, you were right. We made a mistake. In fact, you're eaten up with cancer."
My life is terrible.
And it shouldn't be. I have a wonderful husband, a beautiful son, a job that I love, a nice apartment.
The terrible part about my life is me.
And that's the part I can't escape from.
Sorry for babbling. Thanks for listening.