Afraid of not being able to tell the difference...

[ArykaLinn]

I think one of my biggest fears with my panic attacks/hypochondria, is that I wont be able to tell the difference between an anxiety attack and if something is actually wrong. I'll call my Mom crying, and as usual, she'll yell at me and tell me it's anxiety. When I ask her how she knows she always says "Because you get it all the time!"

But no matter how hard I try not to, I can't help but worry that it's not actually anxiety...that it's really a health problem that is similar to anxiety and doctors are just overlooking it because I'm what seems to be a healthy 20 year old. My BP is always great, same with EKG's, chest Xrays, ect...But I'm always afraid of that "what if" factor.

What if it's not just anxiety anymore...What if this time it's the real deal and I end up dying because I ignored it...

Does anyone else get this?

[PMarshall76]

I can relate to this. I've gone through this a couple of years ago. I always thought there was something wrong with me and had all kinds of tests done. My best advice to you is to continue with your therapy just in case, but in the meantime try your best not to focus on your symptoms.

Hope this helps

[kdbelcher]

Honestly it sounds like your fears are getting the best of you. The likelihood of there being a physical/medical problem is slim to none. Try to be real with yourself. You are young, you are healthy, your doctors haven't found anything physically wrong with you. You know you have a problem with anxiety and panic attacks. So try to talk to yourself rationally. Remember you can either focus on the problem at hand ,your anxiety, or you can worry about a problem you probably don't even have. I'm not saying that it's wrong that you feel this way. You have a genuine fear about what is going on with you. However, as someone who use to experience panic attacks and sometimes feel like I couldn't breathe and had pressure in my chest, I know what it's like for your physical syptoms to scare you. I use to be so scared but I began to just slowly tell myself that my fears were irrational. I didn't feel better overnight. I didn't believe that I was ok and that it was just anxiety overnight. However, as I keeped on fighting my fearful thoughts with rationality and truth I slowly improved.
Good luck. Not to be trite but keep on keepin on. If you fight you will make it through.