Imagine waking up totally normal. You flip over to your other side, tell yourself its going to be a great day and then suddenly...wait whats that I feel? Why does my head hurt you ask? Why has my head been hurting for weeks you wonder? That wonder then spirals faster and faster until suddenly the feeling takes over. And your in a panic. And nothing can help you except the nagging urge to check your symptoms online, call a Dr, and look for reassurance in everyone around you.

This is just a small dose of what its like to live with hypochondria. Living with the constant fear of poor health is but another reaction to living with anxiety. No matter how many Dr appointments you go to, how many unnecessary blood tests and exams are done, and how minor others may make the symptoms feel for you;none of this matters. Living with health anxiety is living on constant edge.

You notice everything. Every freckle, every ache, every small pain, everything. And no matter how hard you try to ignore the symptoms when they come on, you cant. you cant because by trying to ignore them you are giving them even more. Feeding their desire to take you over.

And so you make another appointment. And its the fourth one this month. And at this point not even the doctors want to deal with you. You are written in their charts as just another anxiety case. And this frustrates you. It frustrates you because now having that title, the doctors seem to ignore your symptoms and brush them off. And you leave the office unsatisfied. Worried that something is very wrong with you. Even if the Dr says there isn't.

And sometimes this constant state of panic leaves you. And your in control again. And finally at peace...but then the next day you wake up with a stomach ache that wont go away. And the cycle repeats. Over. And over. And over again. And you feel sad, and depressed and even more anxious. And it becomes less about what your feeling and more about the possibility of what could be felt a few days from now.

You stop planning anything in the worry that when that day comes you wont feel well, or you will need to go to the Dr. Or that perhaps you may not even be around by the time the plan arrives because you will be on your death bed. And people tell you your being dramatic, but to a hypochondriac it feels all to real. every psychosomatic symptom is more real than the next.

Health anxiety is not spoken about as much as other anxiety disorders, but it is just as real and just as debilitating. So for those of you suffering; know you are not alone. perhaps the only way to cure this is to learn from others suffering, learn the feelings they have felt and how they overcame them.

So anyone suffering from hypochondria out there;lets stick together and break the stigma and educate. No longer must we live in our own minds.