Can a hypochondriac make themselves feel symptoms?
Yes, hypochondriacs can make themselves feel symptoms because their anxiety and depression can cause physical sensations. This is called a self-fulfilling prophecy.
I live with a hypochondriac and it’s not fun. Basically, she stays a million feet away if your sick so she thinks she won’t get sick. That’s really not how it works.
You could touch an object if your sick, they touch it and they could get sick. She’s constantly worried about getting sick.
Consequently, one night I went to the ER. She drove and then she drove back home because she didn’t want to step foot into the hospital because of “sick people and germs.”
Do Hypochondriacs Feel Real Symptoms?
Can a hypochondriac make themselves feel symptoms?
Yes, people with hypochondria, now called somatic symptom disorder, can experience real physical symptoms. Accordingly, these symptoms can include:
Headaches, Fatigue, Indigestion, Stomachaches, Dizziness, Dry mouth, Muscle tension, Increased heart rate, Sweating, and Shortness of breath.
However, people with hypochondria may misinterpret the significance of these symptoms and become disproportionately worried about them.
For example, they might believe that minor health issues or normal bodily functions are signs of a serious medical condition.
They may also experience physical symptoms due to the anxiety associated with hypochondria, such as headaches or a racing heartbeat.
Signs of Hypochondria
Signs of hypochondria include:
- Firstly, regularly checking for signs of illness
- Fearing that even minor issues are signs of a serious illness
- Making frequent doctor visits
- Fourthly, avoiding the doctor for fear of being diagnosed with a serious illness
- Excessive talking about health
- Spending a lot of time online researching symptoms
- Lastly, focusing on a specific disease or body part
Hypochondriac Physical Symptoms
Hypochondria, also known as illness anxiety disorder, can cause people to misinterpret normal physical symptoms as signs of a serious illness. These symptoms can include:
- Firstly, aches and pains: Headaches, stomach aches, muscle tension, or whole-body aches
- Sensations: Vibrations, shaking, or buzzing in the arms, legs, fingers, hands, or feet
- Breathing: Changes in breathing patterns that are perceived as abnormal
- Lastly, bowel problems: Constipation or diarrhea
Other symptoms that hypochondria can trigger include:
- Firsly, Dizziness
- Fatigue
- Dry mouth
- Fourthly, increased heart rate
- Sweating
- Shortness of breath
- Lastly, Frequent urge to use the bathroom
People with hypochondria may also experience anxiety, which can cause additional symptoms like: Pins and needles, Difficulty sleeping, Jitteriness, and Chest pressure.
These symptoms are caused by adrenaline, and the same things that would make other people worry about their health can trigger an episode of hypochondria.
People with hypochondria may also exhibit other behaviors, such as:
- Firstly, making frequent visits to the doctor
- Avoiding the doctor
- Thirdly, talking excessively about their health
- Spending a lot of time online researching symptoms
- Avoiding people or places due to fear of catching an illness
- Lastly, exaggerating symptoms and their severity
Can Anxiety Make You Sick?
Can a hypochondriac make themselves feel symptoms? Yes, and they can feel anxiety that can cause nausea and other gastrointestinal issues.
When you’re anxious, your body releases hormones and chemicals that can upset your digestion.
For example, stress can slow down digestion, which can lead to bloating, constipation, and pain.
It can also speed up digestion, which can cause diarrhea and frequent trips to the bathroom. Some people may even lose their appetite.
Anxiety can also cause other physical symptoms, including:
- Firstly, headaches
- Backaches
- Other aches and pains
- Fourthly, faster breathing
- A fast, thumping, or irregular heartbeat
- Sweating or hot flushes
- Additionally, sleep problems
- Grinding your teeth, especially at night
- Dizziness
- Lastly, tiredness
Anxiety can also cause skin issues, such as hives, which are raised, itchy bumps that can appear anywhere on the body.
Chronic stress can also make you more likely to get sick because it can compromise your immune system.
Treatments For Hypochondriacs
Can a hypochondriac make themselves feel symptoms throught the power of will.
Health anxiety can severely impact a person’s quality of life, making it difficult to function or enjoy life.
It can also lead to work absenteeism, poor relationships, and limited interests.
Some tips for managing health anxiety include:
- Firstly, talking to your doctor or nurse
- Setting a “worry time”
- Practicing relaxation or mindfulness techniques, like deep breathing or meditation
- Making goals easy to achieve
- Lastly, getting reliable health information, but not too much
Treatments for health anxiety can include cognitive behavior therapy and medicines, if needed.
CBT can help you:
- Firstly, Identify your fears and beliefs about having a serious medical disease
- Learn alternate ways to view your body sensations by working to change unhelpful thoughts
- Thirdly, become more aware of how your worries affect you and your behavior
- Change the way you respond to your body sensations and symptoms
- Learn skills to cope with and tolerate anxiety and stress
- Additionally, reduce avoidance of situations and activities due to physical sensations
- Reduce behaviors of frequently checking your body for signs of illness and repeatedly seeking reassurance
- Improve daily functioning at home, at work, in relationships and in social situations
- Lastly, address other mental health disorders, such as depression
Other therapies such as behavioral stress management and exposure therapy also may be helpful.
Health Anxiety Medication
Can a hypochondriac make themselves feel symptoms and are helped by meds.
Antidepressants, such as selective serotonin reuptake inhibitors (SSRIs), may help treat illness anxiety disorder.
Medications to treat mood or anxiety disorders, if present, also may help.
Talk with your doctor about medication options and the possible side effects and risks.
Selective serotonin reuptake inhibitors (SSRIs)
In most cases, the first medication you’ll be offered will be a type of antidepressant called a selective serotonin reuptake inhibitor (SSRI).
Basically, this type of medication works by increasing the level of a chemical called serotonin in your brain.
Examples of SSRIs you may be prescribed include:
- Fluoxetine: Also known by the brand names Prozac, Sarafem, and Symbyax
- Citalopram: Also known by the brand names Celexa and Cipramil
- Escitalopram: Also known by the brand name Lexapro or Cipralex
- Paroxetine: Also known by the brand names Paxil, Paxil CR, Pexeva, and Seroxat
- Sertraline: Also known by the brand name Zoloft, this is often used to treat major depressive disorder in adolescents 12 and older
SSRIs can be taken on a long-term basis but, as with all antidepressants, they can take several weeks to start working.
You’ll usually be started on a low dose, which may be gradually increased as your body adjusts to the medication.
Common side effects of SSRIs include:
- firstly, feeling agitated
- feeling or being sick
- indigestion
- fourthly, diarrhea or constipation
- loss of appetite and weight loss
- dizziness
- additionally, blurred vision
- dry mouth
- excessive sweating
- headaches
- in addition, problems sleeping (insomnia) or drowsiness
- low sex drive
- difficulty achieving orgasm during sex or masturbation
- lastly, in men, difficulty obtaining or maintaining an erection (erectile dysfunction)
These side effects should improve over time, although some may be related to your underlying condition.
Serotonin and noradrenaline reuptake inhibitors (SNRIs)
Can a hypochondriac make themselves feel symptoms and are medicated with SNRIs. If SSRIs don’t help ease your anxiety, you may be prescribed a different type of antidepressant known as a serotonin and noradrenaline reuptake inhibitor (SNRI).
Generally, this type of medication increases the amount of serotonin and noradrenaline in your brain.
Examples of SNRIs you may be prescribed include:
- Firstly, Ventafaxine (Effexor XR)
- Duloxetine (Cymbalta)
- Desvenlafaxine (Pristiq)
- Lastly, Levomilnacipran (Fetzima)
Common side effects of SNRIs include:
- firstly, feeling sick
- headaches
- thirdly, drowsiness
- dizziness
- dry mouth
- in addition, constipation
- insomnia
- sweating
- lastly, sexual problems, such as low sex drive or difficulty getting an erection
SNRIs can also increase your blood pressure, so your blood pressure will be monitored regularly during treatment.
As with SSRIs, some of the side effects (such as an upset stomach, problems sleeping and feeling agitated or more anxious) are more common in the first 1 or 2 weeks of treatment.
Hence, these usually settle as your body adjusts to the medication.
How to Help a Hypochondriac
Can a hypochondriac make themselves feel symptoms and you can help them.
Here are some ways you can help a loved one with hypochondria, also known as health anxiety disorder:
Listen
Let them share their fears without pressuring them to talk. Be supportive but don’t show too much concern, and try to stay neutral in your responses.
Encourage healthy habits
Exercise, sleep, and a healthy diet can help reduce stress and anxiety.
Challenge thoughts
You can try drawing a table with two columns, writing health worries in one column and more balanced thoughts in the other. For example, you could write “I’m worried about these headaches” in the first column and “Headaches can often be a sign of stress” in the second.
Encourage professional treatment. Behavioral stress management or exposure therapy may also be helpful
How to Stop Being a Hypochondriac
Here are some self-help tips that may help with hypochondria, also known as illness anxiety disorder (IAD):
Track your habits
Keep a diary to note how often you check your body, look at health information, or ask for reassurance. Over time, try to gradually reduce these behaviors.
Challenge your thoughts
Write down your health concerns in one column of a table, and more balanced thoughts in the other.
Distract yourself
When you feel the urge to check your body, try distracting yourself with something else, like going for a walk or calling a friend.
Get back to normal activities
Try to gradually start doing things you’ve been avoiding, like socializing or playing sports. Remind yourself that the chances of getting sick or injured are low.
Practice relaxation
Try breathing exercises or other relaxation techniques, like progressive muscle relaxation.
Limit health information
Most importantly, Avoid searching the internet for possible diseases, and apply filters to your apps to limit health news.
You can also try setting a time limit for how long you spend reading health news each day.
Sum It All Up
Can a hypochondriac make themselves feel symptoms? Yes, because they make themselves feel real symptoms.
So, living with a hypochondriac is nothing short but interesting. I can’t even imagine being one and what they must go through.
Being so afraid of getting sick. It’s part of human nature, you’re bound to get sick sometimes. Not that it’s any fun.
Some of the medicines I’ve taken before, especially Effexor. Hence, I will never forget that med. It made me a total zombie. I don’t recommend it.
Being a hypochondriac in this day and age with COVID and other diseases has to be really difficult. I wish you guys the best of luck (sincerely). Until next time…
Articles About Hypochondria
-Hypochondria (Illness Anxiety): Signs, Symptoms and Treatment
-5 ways to support a loved one with health anxiety
https://happiful.com/how-to-support-a-loved-one-with-health-anxiety
-Health (hypochondriac) anxiety test
https://ocdla.com/hypochondria-test
Have a Good One,
Cindee Murphy, One Voice In The Vastness Of Emotions
“The trouble with being a hypochondriac these days is that antibiotics have cured all the good diseases.”–Caskie Stinnett
“A hypochondriac is one who has a pill for everything except what ails him.”-Mignon McLaughlin
“After obsessively Googling symptoms for four hours, I discovered ‘obsessively Googling symptoms’ is a symptom of hypochondria.”-Stephen Colbert
“We are becoming a nation of sissies and hypochondriacs, a self medicating society easily intimidated by pain and prone to panic. We understand almost nothing about the essential robustness of the human body or its ability to meet the challenge of illness.”-Norman Cousins
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