HM
05-26-2008, 02:06 AM
Hi again people,
This must be the third post I’ve made in about as many days regarding my ‘heart’/ chest pains, so I apologise if any one’s getting maybe a little tired of reading about it. I’m abroad at the moment and feeling a little isolated, so really this is the only place I have to vent about what I’m going through.
Basically, I’m continuing to have anxiety about my health. Recently, or today rather, it’s been a lot better, but at the moment I’m having a bit of an ‘attack’ and I thought it be cathartic/distracting for me to come on here again and describe what it is I’m feeling at precisely this moment and about ‘what has happened’. Hopefully it will help me and, possibly, others who experience the same health anxiety that I do (if only to show they aren’t alone).
Like I said, things have been better - today I’ve felt generally relaxed – no racing heart beat, palpitations, or even that much pain.
Until this evening! I’m sitting at my lap top and all of a sudden I get a dull, knawing pain right in the centre of my chest, that I convince myself is coming from ‘in deep’ and isn’t my chest wall or muscular, but my heart! (It does actually feel like it’s coming from inside?).
Suddenly my heart rate increases, I get that feeling of dread, mostly over the fact I know I’m going to panic and also because I ‘fear’, again, that I’ve got heart problems.
It then turns into one of those classic spiral situations – I get anxious and tense-up, this increases the pain and then the pain reinforces my anxiety, so on a so forth until I’m feeling pretty bad.
My mind then becomes really irrational - despite the reassurances I’ve had from two doctors and all the tests I’ve had done, I can’t help think that there is something wrong. For example, I start to think that the doctor did find something unusual on my ECG but didn’t tell me about it, because he didn’t want to increase my anxiety and he thought it was an irregularity that was resulting just from the panic and not from an underlying problem. In other words I ‘try’ and find loop-holes in their assessment.
Then I get out probably the worse piece of equipment to own if you suffer from this sort of worry– the ‘heart rate and blood pressure monitor’. I take my reading, I see that both my blood pressure and heart rate have gone up and instead of completely believing that this is due to the anxiety, I can’t help to think it’s possibly demonstrating that there is, like I fear, something going on that is serious.
I then go on the web and I Google things like ‘chest pain’ or ‘heart problems’ and I read descriptions of both anxiety related chest pain and that associated with cardiac infraction aka ‘heart attacks’. I read that heart attack pain feels ‘crushing’ and begin to believe that you could describe my pain as ‘crushing’ also, I then read (for probably about the 100TH time) that you also get pain elsewhere such as the arms. I too have had pain in my arms (in particular the left arm, which is apparently not a good sign) and gradually I become more and more worried about my health.
I’m now very anxious. I start to try and reassure myself and ‘try’ to relax, but it’s impossible. I can’t help but move my legs in a nervous kind of way, I’m fixated on what’s happening in my chest, my heart rate and any other sensations I can relate to having heart attacks. I get headachy, maybe a little dizzy and definitely a bit scared. I try doing deep breathing and relaxation techniques but find that concentrating on my ‘breathing’, normally just turns into concentrating on my ‘heart’ and it doesn’t help, at all.
So I’m left having what in realtions to other panic episodes is quite a minor attack, but feeling very stressed out, and very depressed.
I know that these problems are in my head (at least I hope they are), that these pains are, in all probability, due to anxiety, but I can’t believe it’ 100%, and if there is any element of doubt, any at all, I just can’t relax – I can’t get-on with my life!
I’ve suffered from anxiety for a long time, but my anxiety has never been as debilitating as this - apart from in the early days when I had OCD.
Tonight hasn’t even been that bad compared to others, I wouldn't even go as far a calling it a 'panic attack' per say. Previous episodes have left me in tears, literally crying like a baby and I’ve always thought of myself as quit a strong, robust type of person.
Anyway, that’s a description of what happened. I do feel better after writing this. It’s quit long so I don’t imagine many people have read this far, but if you have, thanks. Any advice would be much appreciated.
Harry
This must be the third post I’ve made in about as many days regarding my ‘heart’/ chest pains, so I apologise if any one’s getting maybe a little tired of reading about it. I’m abroad at the moment and feeling a little isolated, so really this is the only place I have to vent about what I’m going through.
Basically, I’m continuing to have anxiety about my health. Recently, or today rather, it’s been a lot better, but at the moment I’m having a bit of an ‘attack’ and I thought it be cathartic/distracting for me to come on here again and describe what it is I’m feeling at precisely this moment and about ‘what has happened’. Hopefully it will help me and, possibly, others who experience the same health anxiety that I do (if only to show they aren’t alone).
Like I said, things have been better - today I’ve felt generally relaxed – no racing heart beat, palpitations, or even that much pain.
Until this evening! I’m sitting at my lap top and all of a sudden I get a dull, knawing pain right in the centre of my chest, that I convince myself is coming from ‘in deep’ and isn’t my chest wall or muscular, but my heart! (It does actually feel like it’s coming from inside?).
Suddenly my heart rate increases, I get that feeling of dread, mostly over the fact I know I’m going to panic and also because I ‘fear’, again, that I’ve got heart problems.
It then turns into one of those classic spiral situations – I get anxious and tense-up, this increases the pain and then the pain reinforces my anxiety, so on a so forth until I’m feeling pretty bad.
My mind then becomes really irrational - despite the reassurances I’ve had from two doctors and all the tests I’ve had done, I can’t help think that there is something wrong. For example, I start to think that the doctor did find something unusual on my ECG but didn’t tell me about it, because he didn’t want to increase my anxiety and he thought it was an irregularity that was resulting just from the panic and not from an underlying problem. In other words I ‘try’ and find loop-holes in their assessment.
Then I get out probably the worse piece of equipment to own if you suffer from this sort of worry– the ‘heart rate and blood pressure monitor’. I take my reading, I see that both my blood pressure and heart rate have gone up and instead of completely believing that this is due to the anxiety, I can’t help to think it’s possibly demonstrating that there is, like I fear, something going on that is serious.
I then go on the web and I Google things like ‘chest pain’ or ‘heart problems’ and I read descriptions of both anxiety related chest pain and that associated with cardiac infraction aka ‘heart attacks’. I read that heart attack pain feels ‘crushing’ and begin to believe that you could describe my pain as ‘crushing’ also, I then read (for probably about the 100TH time) that you also get pain elsewhere such as the arms. I too have had pain in my arms (in particular the left arm, which is apparently not a good sign) and gradually I become more and more worried about my health.
I’m now very anxious. I start to try and reassure myself and ‘try’ to relax, but it’s impossible. I can’t help but move my legs in a nervous kind of way, I’m fixated on what’s happening in my chest, my heart rate and any other sensations I can relate to having heart attacks. I get headachy, maybe a little dizzy and definitely a bit scared. I try doing deep breathing and relaxation techniques but find that concentrating on my ‘breathing’, normally just turns into concentrating on my ‘heart’ and it doesn’t help, at all.
So I’m left having what in realtions to other panic episodes is quite a minor attack, but feeling very stressed out, and very depressed.
I know that these problems are in my head (at least I hope they are), that these pains are, in all probability, due to anxiety, but I can’t believe it’ 100%, and if there is any element of doubt, any at all, I just can’t relax – I can’t get-on with my life!
I’ve suffered from anxiety for a long time, but my anxiety has never been as debilitating as this - apart from in the early days when I had OCD.
Tonight hasn’t even been that bad compared to others, I wouldn't even go as far a calling it a 'panic attack' per say. Previous episodes have left me in tears, literally crying like a baby and I’ve always thought of myself as quit a strong, robust type of person.
Anyway, that’s a description of what happened. I do feel better after writing this. It’s quit long so I don’t imagine many people have read this far, but if you have, thanks. Any advice would be much appreciated.
Harry