How to stop thinking about death

[lcdream]

I am doing a little better (I guess) on my meds lately but still think CONSTANTLY about death and aging and the passage of time. It's not a suicidal thought - just a general thought that I will die someday and might be alone and frail and incapacitated as an older person. I realize it's obsessive, and I have tried to stop it by replacing it with a good thought, distraction, etc, but nothing seems to work.

The problem is that it is not an irrational fear (like being abducted by aliens, or needing to wash my hands 200 times) - death is actually going to happen with 100% certainty, and the likelihood of being alone when I am old is very high.

How can I stop these thoughts? Has anyone else obsessed about this and successfully stopped? I haven't always obsessed about this... only during this depression. I just want to go back to the state of denial I was in...where death would cross my mind once in a great while, but didn't affect me.

[Blessed]

When you find out how to get back to that please let me know!!!!!

[Enduronman]

1. We're all human.
2. Everything that is born, at some point dies.
3. It is the cycle of life.
4. It is the only way that this planet earth, and our entire species still exists.
5. Why spend every day (or overy other day) comtemplating and thinking about the only (1) thing that you know is for sure in life,..
6. While also thinking about 100's of other things that NO ONE is even sure of...the future.
7. You only get (1) shot at this, why waste it..life can be bountiful, if you let it.
8. Try a new method. The E-Man Method...Forget the past, live for this day and make the best of this (1) day, and only have hope for your future..
9. Why continue to make life, more complicated than it already is friend...
10. As one of our members signature (used) to state, "we're all in this together, and no one is gettin out alive"...Let's just make this time together, the best that we can...

There's a new perspective, maybe it'll help, maybe it won't...but I took that (1) chance that it may.

Blessings..

E-Man :)

[hypochondriac1993]

Dude you just described my anxiety. Its a huge part of that and of my depression.like that's verbatim of what I would have wrote. I never knew anyone else worried about that like I did!!

[Dahila]

I was like that up to 4 weeks ago when I lost my very close friend to cancer. Now i try to appreciate every day..... I stop thinking about aging, I am already old hehehe

[Blessed]

But how do you stop thinking about it??? It's in my every waking moment and drives me nuts

[Enduronman]

But how do you stop thinking about it??? It's in my every waking moment and drives me nuts

(1) single friggin word: Acceptance.


:)

[Blessed]

You make it sound so easy :) I'll just be honest I'm a hot mess right now

[Enduronman]

Well friend, you've got (2) choices:
1. Don't accept it, even though you can never change it...and be a hot mess...
2. Accept that it will happen someday when you're 96....and live life to the fullest, happily...

[Gingerbreadelf]

I struggle with thoughts of it too, they come and go, and get worse when my anxiety is bad. but fear of death is natural on some level, humans fear death, because if they did not, the need for survival or to live life, would not be there. but like any anxious thought, you simply have to move on from it, do something else. Neurotic thoughts as these will only go around in circles in your mind to no end, they are pretty useless.

A friend of mine once told me, you can't sit an analyze anxiety because it's not a thought, it's a feeling, you simply have to ignore it and go do something else. he was quite right. There is no point in trying to analyze your fear of death and make it go away, cause you won't really be able to. and really, when you are out living your life, not thinking about your fear, you may gain some healthy perspective on it.

Good luck, I know how it feels, believe me.