Health Anxiety OCD, Health Anxiety, Hypochondriasis. I may be jumping the gun here because some health experts don’t view health anxiety as OCD. I’m not a doctor, medical expert, or medical professional, but I personally view it as OCD once the symptoms get bad enough because the symptoms are obsessions about having a specific disorder. There isn’t a ton of research on whether this is a part of OCD or a separate issue, so I’m going to talk about it anyways and put this article in both categories.
Disclaimer: I am not a doctor, therapist, social worker, etc. Nothing in this article is to be perceived as medical or treatment advice. This is for educational and entertainment purposes only.
If you are coming here looking for Contamination OCD, that will be its own separate post because there is a lot to unpack there.
What is Health Anxiety OCD?
What is Health Anxiety OCD you ask? It is the obsession that you some disease or disorder and the compulsion of seeking reassurance that you don’t have said disease or disorder.
I’m sure you have heard of hypochondriacs. You’ve probably met some in your life. The Oxford Dictionary defines a hypochondriac as “a person who is abnormally anxious about their health.” I’m sure you can be anxious about your health and not fall into the OCD category. Either way, it may be beneficial to read on.
Remember, obsessions are recurrent and persistent thoughts, impulses, or images that cause distressing emotions such as anxiety or disgust. American Psychiatric Association. You may persistently think that you have a specific disease or disorder. Compulsions are repetitive behaviors or mental acts that a person feels driven to perform in response to an obsession. Id.
My Health Anxiety
Take me for example. When I was first diagnosed with GAD, I was terrified that my therapist missed something and that I was actually Bipolar or Schizophrenic. Now, I’m not saying anything negative about those disorders and people can have perfectly normal lives with those disorders. I just didn’t want them and I was terrified I had one of them.
For me, this started before I had my OCD diagnosis, but I definitely fell into the obsession and compulsion categories. All day I would be freaked out, I obsessed about this for hours each day. It made my work and home life hell. Have you ever focused so hard on your hearing just to see if you’re hearing things? I have some tinnitus, so I’m always hearing things, but my stupid OCD brain tried to focus so hard to see if I would start hearing things.
Honestly, my biggest compulsion is, and has always been, reassurance seeking. I believe I previously linked this study, but here it is anyway. I spent hours each day researching the signs and symptoms of Bipolar Disorder and Schizophrenia. Honestly, I can’t tell you how many self assessments I took. My therapist probably hated me because I asked about them so much.
Remedy
ERP. The remedy is almost always ERP. I told myself that I definitely had them and I wrote out narratives about how bad my life would be if I was diagnosed with one of those disorders. Again, if you have one of these disorders, I’m not disparaging you. I wrote about how I would go crazy, my wife would leave me, I would lose my job. I wrote all of this and re-read it over and over again. The goal was to get as anxious as possible and then sit with the anxiety. I didn’t allow myself to perform any research, ask for reassurance from anyone. The process of habituation is a pain, but it works.
Not One Size Fits All
Health Anxiety OCD can be about anything. It doesn’t even have to make sense because OCD isn’t logical. Here’s some illogical health anxiety that I’ve read about:
- Someone who never had any sexual experiences or contact worried they had syphilis.
- Really any STD fits this category.
- Wanting an MRI because you’re terrified something is wrong with your brain and there is no way to fully know.
- Thinking you have COVID even though you haven’t left the house or interacted with anyone in months.
- Eating some meat and believing you have Kuru even though you’re not a cannibal.
- I’ve never seen this one obviously, but Kuru is a real disease. Just wanted to work it in somehow.
Conclusion
As shown, I think Health Anxiety can definitely be an OCD issue if they obsessions get bad enough. ERP narratives worked for me. No matter how many assessments you do, how many doctors you see, or how many articles you read, you will never get the reassurance you need to defeat this. You need to face your fear and sit with it.
Tell me what you think in the comments. Whether you agree its OCD, whether you think I’m a moron, or if you want to share your own experiences.