Am I just applying OCD logic to this or is it a genuine concern?

[BelAnna]

I'm panicking at the moment! A week and a half ago I found a red patch/spot on my bust and I'm scared that it could be a form of cancer (there's a particularly nasty form that involves inflammation rather than lumps). I cannot get to a GP because of my contamination OCD so am spending a lot of time panicking that I might be very ill. 

I have not had health anxiety directed towards my own health before so this isn't typical for me but I have worried about other family members.

Do you think this is just my OCD playing on a minor issue or a cause for real concern?

Edited October 8, 2018 by BelAnna

[gingerbreadgirl]

I think honestly it'd be worth getting it checked out just for peace of mind x

[BelAnna]

Thanks Gingerbreadgirl. I thought it was healing yesterday but now I'm not sure. I might wait two days and if it's not gone then I'll have to try to face going to the GP (I'm terrified of catching a virus and/or seeing anyone vomit so haven't been to the GP for three years!).

Edited October 8, 2018 by BelAnna

[Lynz]

The inflammatory type of cancer you're talking about tends to involve the whole breast and isn't concentrated on one area like a spot. It's probably just something benign like a cyst. Get it checked out anyway as you should get any change to your breasts checked to be on the safe side, but I wouldn't worry about it. Also try and avoid any compulsions like rechecking it a lot or googling about it. Make the doctors appointment and forget about it until then.

I suffer from health anxiety so I understand how you feel. What helps me when I'm really bad is to mentally delay any worrying, for example I'll think "ok, I'm going to the doctors on this date, so I refuse to think about it or do any compulsions until then", often by the time my appointment comes around the urge to worry has gone, and I'm able to gain clarity on the situation and can see whether it is a genuine health issue or one that my OCD has blown out of proportion.

[BelAnna]

Thanks Lynz, I've been feeling really anxious about this and I'm hoping it's just PMS that's making me anxious. I'm not sure whether to wait for a few days to see if it goes or to just make an appointment anyway?

My concern is that it has been there for at least two and a half weeks (probably longer- I only noticed it in the mirror) so should have healed by now and that this might be an early symptom of IBC before any other heaviness/peau d'orange/redness appears... g'ah I hate google!

 

Edited October 8, 2018 by BelAnna

[dksea]

5 hours ago, BelAnna said:

(I'm terrified of catching a virus and/or seeing anyone vomit so haven't been to the GP for three years!).

Sounds like this is something you should be working on too

Regarding your spot, its perfectly fine to get something like that reviewed if it doesn't go away on its own in time, but there are lots of reasons, most of them benign that we can have physical symptoms.  Could be a rash, could be a bug bite, could be an irritation, could be a pimple, etc.  Since its not presenting some immediate threat its best to try and deescalate the anxiety and the OCD response.  Don't let yourself ruminate on it.  Don't research symptoms on the web, etc.  Make the doctors appointment if it stick around, then  do your best to put it aside.  Not always easy, but even in the rare case it is something significant, thats what doctors are for, to help, and worrying about it won't do you any good.

 

[BelAnna]

8 hours ago, dksea said:

Sounds like this is something you should be working on too

Regarding your spot, its perfectly fine to get something like that reviewed if it doesn't go away on its own in time, but there are lots of reasons, most of them benign that we can have physical symptoms.  Could be a rash, could be a bug bite, could be an irritation, could be a pimple, etc.  Since its not presenting some immediate threat its best to try and deescalate the anxiety and the OCD response.  Don't let yourself ruminate on it.  Don't research symptoms on the web, etc.  Make the doctors appointment if it stick around, then  do your best to put it aside.  Not always easy, but even in the rare case it is something significant, thats what doctors are for, to help, and worrying about it won't do you any good.

 

Thanks Dksea, 

Yes I definitely need to work on the contamination side of things too- if I do have to face going to the GP then that would be pretty much at the top of my contamination ERP hierarchy.

I let the anxiety get away with me last night and now i'm feeling dissociated and keep thinking I'm going to die (I know that cancer isn't a death sentence but I'm very scared of the one type  that it could be (IBC) because it is only diagnosed at grade 3/4). I think I will have to face the GP even if it's just to give me peace of mind.. The spot has been there too long for an acne spot, doesn't look like a bite really and looks like a patch of blood vessels. I also have some other issues with discolouration so think I'll get it checked. I'm worried that it if it's anything then it's my fault because I use lots of chemicals (hand foams, wipes, antibacterial soaps) and I'm overweight, which is another risk factor.

Now I feel like if I get it checked and the GP says to watch it and come back in a week or two that I'll struggle with that. Do you think I can just ask for a referral to a clinic for an ultrasound of it?

Edited October 9, 2018 by BelAnna

[dksea]

20 hours ago, BelAnna said:

I'm worried that it if it's anything then it's my fault because I use lots of chemicals (hand foams, wipes, antibacterial soaps) and I'm overweight, which is another risk factor.

Cancer is not that simple.  Most chemicals have nothing to do with cancer.  Being overweight doesn't mean you'll get cancer or even if you do that its because you are overweight.  You can worry about it, but that won't change anything one way or the other, so what good will it do?  Now trust me, I have been through health worries before, I know how hard it can be to walk away from those anxieties but thats what you have to try and do.  You have to not let yourself ruminate on "what ifs", especially about something that itself is a "what if".  Do your best to apply CBT to this.  Don't ruminate.  Don't check websites.  Don't constantly check your body. 

 

20 hours ago, BelAnna said:

Now I feel like if I get it checked and the GP says to watch it and come back in a week or two that I'll struggle with that. Do you think I can just ask for a referral to a clinic for an ultrasound of it?

Its understandable to feel anxious in a situation like that.  You could ask your doctor if it would be alright to get a referral to get it checked out, but if she/he says no, lets wait, then thats what you have to do.  At this point you have a symptom that has many possible explanations, many benign, some not. But neither you, nor I are medical experts (unless you are by chance a doctor/nurse with knowledge of oncology and/or dermatology I suppose ;-) ) so listen to the experts!  Let them do your job and do your best to not dwell on it, not ruminate on it, not engage the compulsions.  Again, I fully get that its easy to say that and often hard to do it.  I appreciate it won't be easy.  But I can also tell you from personal experience that I have been down this road (well not exactly, I'm a guy) with health worries and panicking doesn't help.  

Maybe a real world example will help.  I currently live and work in Japan.  Last winter I had some time between my old job and my current one so I decided to enjoy the holidays at home in America with my family.  I decided to fly home from Thanksgiving (end of November in the US) to Christmas.  Six weeks of relaxing and fun!  Well the day before my flight I got up in the morning to run a few errands.  I went in to the bathroom to pee and was shocked, and I mean seriously shocked, to see bright red urine in the bowl.  Now I know thats not normal.  And I know that I hadn't eaten any food that might change the color of my urine.  So I called my local doctor, whom I was on my way to pick up a prescription from anyway, and let him know what was happening.  I got to the clinic, they took a urine sample, and described my symptoms.  Already the urine was less red than before.  He calmly told me that it was probably a kidney stone.  Drink lots of water, take some medicine he prescribed that would help, and I was perfectly safe to fly.  Now for a normal person that would probably be it.  They might be a little nervous, but they'd probably not obsess over it too much.  Well of course I'm not normal.  My fear, despite his assurances to the contrary was that of course it was some kind of cancer or other fatal condition.  This was it, my life was about to be over.  Despite the anxiety I was able to fly home and start relaxing a bit.  Unfortunately for me, a week later some more red urine.  I was still waiting for test results from my doctor in Japan but I let the anxiety get to me and drove myself to a local walk in clinic.  The doctor there listened to my story, took some tests and told me...its probably a kidney stone.  They did agree to do an MRI though to check just in case.  So I went in, had the MRI and....you guessed it...kidney stone.  Now you might think the moral of the story is "hey, go get it checked out, insist on the scans, it'll make you feel less anxious!"  Except I still felt anxious for awhile after because I kept letting myself wander in to "what ifs".  Sure they found a kidney stone, but what if there was also cancer!  It took some active application of CBT to push myself back into non-OCD mode and because I let myself get carried away i spent the first few weeks of my vacation very anxious and less able to enjoy things.  Oh and also, because of the lameness of the US medical care system I had to pay a couple thousands dollars out of pocket for the various tests and scans.  So not only was I anxious for awhile for no good reason, I spent a fair amount of money to confirm what my Japanese doctor later confirmed anyway.  If i'd just waited a few more days I wouldn't have needed the extra tests to get the same answer.  Hopefully in the future i"ll handle the situation differently.  Hopefully I'll be more calm and rational.  Maybe I won't, but I hope I will. 

Anyway, thats a long winded way of saying that I understand where you are coming from, and I understand the desire to get answers now.  But even when you do you'll still have to handle the "what ifs" of OCD anyway, and panicking doesn't usually result in beneficial outcomes.  Take reasonable precautions, talk to your doctor when you can, and go from there.  Its ok to get yourself checked out when you aren't feeling well but it shouldn't be your first step in most cases and when you do get checked out its often a good idea for those of us with OCD to make sure we listen

[PolarBear]

Stop Googling. Stop it. Stop it! STOP IT!!!!

 

Edited October 10, 2018 by PolarBear

[BelAnna]

On 10/10/2018 at 07:42, dksea said:

Cancer is not that simple.  Most chemicals have nothing to do with cancer.  Being overweight doesn't mean you'll get cancer or even if you do that its because you are overweight.  You can worry about it, but that won't change anything one way or the other, so what good will it do?  Now trust me, I have been through health worries before, I know how hard it can be to walk away from those anxieties but thats what you have to try and do.  You have to not let yourself ruminate on "what ifs", especially about something that itself is a "what if".  Do your best to apply CBT to this.  Don't ruminate.  Don't check websites.  Don't constantly check your body. 

 

Its understandable to feel anxious in a situation like that.  You could ask your doctor if it would be alright to get a referral to get it checked out, but if she/he says no, lets wait, then thats what you have to do.  At this point you have a symptom that has many possible explanations, many benign, some not. But neither you, nor I are medical experts (unless you are by chance a doctor/nurse with knowledge of oncology and/or dermatology I suppose ;-) ) so listen to the experts!  Let them do your job and do your best to not dwell on it, not ruminate on it, not engage the compulsions.  Again, I fully get that its easy to say that and often hard to do it.  I appreciate it won't be easy.  But I can also tell you from personal experience that I have been down this road (well not exactly, I'm a guy) with health worries and panicking doesn't help.  

Maybe a real world example will help.  I currently live and work in Japan.  Last winter I had some time between my old job and my current one so I decided to enjoy the holidays at home in America with my family.  I decided to fly home from Thanksgiving (end of November in the US) to Christmas.  Six weeks of relaxing and fun!  Well the day before my flight I got up in the morning to run a few errands.  I went in to the bathroom to pee and was shocked, and I mean seriously shocked, to see bright red urine in the bowl.  Now I know thats not normal.  And I know that I hadn't eaten any food that might change the color of my urine.  So I called my local doctor, whom I was on my way to pick up a prescription from anyway, and let him know what was happening.  I got to the clinic, they took a urine sample, and described my symptoms.  Already the urine was less red than before.  He calmly told me that it was probably a kidney stone.  Drink lots of water, take some medicine he prescribed that would help, and I was perfectly safe to fly.  Now for a normal person that would probably be it.  They might be a little nervous, but they'd probably not obsess over it too much.  Well of course I'm not normal.  My fear, despite his assurances to the contrary was that of course it was some kind of cancer or other fatal condition.  This was it, my life was about to be over.  Despite the anxiety I was able to fly home and start relaxing a bit.  Unfortunately for me, a week later some more red urine.  I was still waiting for test results from my doctor in Japan but I let the anxiety get to me and drove myself to a local walk in clinic.  The doctor there listened to my story, took some tests and told me...its probably a kidney stone.  They did agree to do an MRI though to check just in case.  So I went in, had the MRI and....you guessed it...kidney stone.  Now you might think the moral of the story is "hey, go get it checked out, insist on the scans, it'll make you feel less anxious!"  Except I still felt anxious for awhile after because I kept letting myself wander in to "what ifs".  Sure they found a kidney stone, but what if there was also cancer!  It took some active application of CBT to push myself back into non-OCD mode and because I let myself get carried away i spent the first few weeks of my vacation very anxious and less able to enjoy things.  Oh and also, because of the lameness of the US medical care system I had to pay a couple thousands dollars out of pocket for the various tests and scans.  So not only was I anxious for awhile for no good reason, I spent a fair amount of money to confirm what my Japanese doctor later confirmed anyway.  If i'd just waited a few more days I wouldn't have needed the extra tests to get the same answer.  Hopefully in the future i"ll handle the situation differently.  Hopefully I'll be more calm and rational.  Maybe I won't, but I hope I will. 

Anyway, thats a long winded way of saying that I understand where you are coming from, and I understand the desire to get answers now.  But even when you do you'll still have to handle the "what ifs" of OCD anyway, and panicking doesn't usually result in beneficial outcomes.  Take reasonable precautions, talk to your doctor when you can, and go from there.  Its ok to get yourself checked out when you aren't feeling well but it shouldn't be your first step in most cases and when you do get checked out its often a good idea for those of us with OCD to make sure we listen

Thank you so much Dksea, this was really helpful and I'm sorry for not replying at the time. I'm so glad you're well but that must have been scary for you. It's so difficult in these situations because even some normal non-OCDers would panic a bit! The OCD definitely latches onto the doubt though- if something is possible, however unlikely then the OCD plays on it.

I've not had a GP check yet but will book one this week. Thanks again .

Thanks Polarbear, sound advice, which I have now finally taken after scaring myself stupid!

Edited October 14, 2018 by BelAnna