I feel like every day there’s something new on my body that hurts, or looks weird, or doesn’t feel right. Some persist for weeks or more and I fixate on them forever, and others come and go in hours to a couple days and I hardly remember even having them until I purposely look back (to try and train myself out of fixating on these things and convince myself they aren’t real). 

Up until the last couple years I’ve always been severely ill (Crohn’s disease), and in 2019 I had surgery to remove my entire colon. I had been housebound for two years, on tons of really strong/scary medications, was malnourished and dehydrated, and was truly on death’s door prior to surgery. I felt good for a year, but when the pandemic settled in I started to feel all these weird random pains. I’ve had follow up CTs and blood works, and my GI doc says I have a less than 1% chance of ever seeing my Crohn’s again. And the pains I feel now aren’t even the same, I just can’t stop worrying about them.

It’s like I can’t truly believe I’m healthy, and I’m constantly waiting for all the side effects of those meds or the chronic malnourishment and dehydration to catch up with me. I’m afraid I have kidney stones, lymphoma, breast cancer, ovarian cysts, gall stones, lupus, an ulcer, blood clots, impending stroke, psoriasis, and of course crohns - any 1-3 of a million things on any given day depending on what random pain I feel. I know how crazy it all sounds and try to track my health anxiety related thoughts to control it, but the worry and the fixations, let alone the symptoms themselves, are EXHAUSTING. I just want to feel safe and okay! Does anyone else’s anxiety drive them crazy with constant physical symptoms like this?