I’ve been there, OP. At various times I was sure I had breast cancer, ovarian cancer, lung cancer, and COPD (I DID have a bad case of GERD/LPR, causing shortness of breath, reduced lung function, and a persistent cough).

The only two things that ever helped me:

1) My best friend. I was clearly being a hysterical nutcase, but instead of arguing with me all she said was “if you are really sick, I’ll be there for you, you won’t be alone”. When she said that I cried and something in me relaxed that I hadn’t known was clenched.

2) Zoloft. I took it for about 2 years, weaned off it and have been in remission since.

Best of luck to you.

Hugely helpful thread, and I would put MONEY on it being perimenopause coupled with OCD. Perimenopause is terrible for OCD because everything is weird and overlaps with truly dangerous things (hot flashes and night sweats are cancer signs; the bleeding mentioned above could be a gynecological cancer; etc). Here's the thing - if you have already had an ultrasound and your endometrium was a normal thickness, and a CT scan, and nothing turned up, and the bleeding is regularly midcycle -- you're almost certainly good. But NOTHING in this world is certain, and that's why you need to treat the mental health component.

You need to switch SSRIs. Lexapro is not considered great for OCD. I had severe health anxiety/OCD and 150mg of Zoloft is the only thing that makes a dent in it. I think the best are considered Zoloft, Prozac, and Paxil. But you need to see a psychiatrist who specializes in ocd and understands which meds are very and that you need to be on a high dose to make a difference with ocd. There are so many posts on dcum about health anxiety and I wish more people understood that it is a form of OCD and that it needs a very specific medication treatment.

I’ve been where you are many times before - spiraling, googling, incessant checking behavior. Get Freedom From OCD by Jonathon Grayson and The Worry Cure by Robert Leahy.

This is a very helpful thread.

Perimenopause. Btdt.

If you’ve already had a normal ultrasound, then you really shouldn’t worry.

They quickly identified an abnormally thickened uterine lining when my breakthrough bleeding was persistent. Biopsy was normal, but I dealt with bleeding that got worse over three years and the thickened lining prompted another biopsy—also normal. Another year of worsening bleeding and thick lining led to a hysterectomy. By that point I had heavy bleeding with clots the size of golf balls, soaking through super plus tampons within 20 mins. When I passed my entire lining at once (the size and shape of a hamburger), I knew I needed all of this to stop.

Anyway: not cancer. Just perimenopausal stuff that got worse over 3 or 4 years and we decided it was enough already.

You are fine.

Sorry pressed submit too soon!

...so you'll need to go to one of the clinics that actually will hear you. Most are out of pocket, but their fees aren't unreasonable. Try Discovher (in Alexandria but does virtual visits): https://discovherhealth.com/

This is totally 100% periomenopause. It'll get much worse and unpredictable too. Doctors, by in large, have no interest in treating this or any of the symptoms for menopause.

Anonymous wrote:I'm the OP! I want to really thank everyone for their replies. Deep down, I am fairly sure this is nothing because I had a CT scan and an ultrasound not long ago and because the blood is cyclical (and judging from threads here, fairly common. Which I did not know.) My dr. is not concerned.

It is what the bleeding represents. I cannot stop checking myself. Like, I go to the bathroom and cringe and pray. I keep looking "down there." I am in a major OCD spiral and I cannot go on like this (I am also working all weekend preparing for a trial, barely functioning all while wondering if I will bleed).

I do not know what drug to ask for or if it's a drug that can help. I am on my maximun dosage for SSRI. Does anyone know of any health anxiety support specifically, or a center that deals with this?

OP, my traumatic health history included a rash of unknown origin (that was at the time being investigated as part of a possible lupus diagnosis. I already had an autoimmune disease that was severely life-disruptive and this period of uncertainty about drove me nuts. I was in the headspace you describe).

Like you, I had very good providers who were not doubting the seriousness and sincerely working to diagnose the problem. But meanwhile the rash was coming and going (sometimes over 1-2 days! insanely frustrating) and it was very provoking every time.

I started seeing a CBT therapist who said: lean in. The rash looked most like something that could be created with blush. I spent a few weeks intentionally painting this rash on myself. I know it sounds completely bizarre, but it helped A LOT.

This is what leads to my advice: get some liquid rouge or red paint or whatever you need to use to intentionally paint spotting into your underwear. (Use crappy underwear obviously.) Wipe with washcloths dark enough that you get no information from that one way or the other. Over time, your brain will get the message: there is no need to “check,” the spotting is definitely there.

It’s been 23 years. The rash was a very rare drug reaction. I don’t have lupus. And you will be OK too.

Good luck. Let us know how it goes?

Hi OP, I have been reading your posts with interest and I can feel your distress coming through. Here’s a couple of suggestions. They focus on CBT-type strategies for managing panic and obsessive thinking.

1) Compartmentalize. Write down your worries, and put that pad of paper aside for right now. Later today, set aside 20 minutes to worry about what you’re feeling. Think through—what if it is something bad? Will I be able to survive that news? Have I survived something bad in the past? What things helped me? How do I feel in my body when I’m scared? Does my stomach hurt? Is my heart racing? Notice those things. Write them down. When 20 minutes is up, take that piece of paper and crumple it up and throw it away.

2) Practice breathing exercises. Do alternate nostril breathing or box breathing. Box if you are already breathing shallowly. Do this for 5 minutes. Time it. Did you know that you only inhale out of one nostril at a time?

3) Focus on sensations. Go outside and identify 5 things—something you feel, something you smell, something you can hear, and something you see. Take your shoes off and feel the mist on your feet (if you’re in the DMV).

4) Spend 20 minutes with extended heat or cold. Can you access a hot tub? Do you have a pool nearby? Even sitting down with a heating pad under your legs.

There are other tools, but hopefully this gets you started. Your body is in an extended fight or flight mode and you’re searching for danger. Until you’re able to see your care team, there are strategies to help with calming down the parasympathetic nervous system.

Also, I think you should try and see someone who can do a more thorough medication review for HA/panic. You don’t have to figure it out yourself, but you can and should say “this is not helping enough. I need better strategies.” If you’re in the DMV I can provide suggestions.

Also, I’d step away from work unless it feels like it’s a good distraction. Getting ready for a trial sounds like it would ramp up anxiety for anyone. And you have leave, and FMLA, and you should use it.

I'm not in the medical field, so I will not give you any medical advice. But I wanted to say that I take liberal amounts of Inositol daily and it has changed my life.
My anxiety and OCD are almost gone, and I feel so much less depressed than I ever have. Read up on it, ask your doctor if it's ok (It's just a B vitamin), and try it. I hope it helps you.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:My guess is you’re addicted to Klonopin and experiencing anxiety related to that/withdrawal/rebound anxiety. You can’t just quit it cold turkey, you need to taper down and possibly be given an anticonvulsant to prevent a seizure.

This post screams of mental health crisis, not medical crisis.

Klonopin withdrawal is hard but it's not going to produce health OCD like this specifically.

OP, do see your mental health provider.

I'm not OP, but someone keeps posting on here whenever people bring up intermenstrual bleeding and spotting that women have health anxiety. Sure, some folks are anxious and could benefit from therapy and this probably includes OP. But it's not crazy to be worried about intermenstrual bleeding. I can tell you that I was NOT worried about my intermenstrual bleeding until I mentioned it to my gyn and she was like this is NOT normal and made me get a ton of tests including an operation. It wasn't cancer, but she made me go through a lot before being willing to say that. So, insisting that perimenopausal women who are having bleeding are worry about it irritationally isn't fair or right.

For example, ACOG guidelines state that any woman 45 or older who is having intermenstrual bleeding for more than six months should get an endometrial biopsy. Is that necessary? Probably not. Personally, I think my gyn was being super CYA and put me through a lot unnecessarily. But the medical establishment does not agree with your assertions that there is no need to worry about bleeding.

I encourage you to re-read the OP. She is describing intrusive anxiety symptoms that are so extreme that she feels the need to qualify that she is not considering self-harm. She already has an appointment for thorough investigation of the bleeding's cause and also has pretty reasonable basis for belief that it's not for a grave cause.

That is the combination of facts--physical and mental--that people, including me, are responding to in this specific thread.

If you have not had health-related PTSD it may be impossible for you to understand the degree of disruption to her regular functioning that she is experiencing and asking for help with. I have had it (similarly, because of complex health problems that involved painful and protracted treatment) and so I do understand it.

Exactly. OP didn't say "I'm worried about spotting and bleeding." She described herself in crisis over her worry about the spotting and bleeding.

What OP *doesn't* need is people acting like her level of fear is appropriate for the symptoms she is experiencing. Enough concern to go to a doctor, yes. So much concern that she is checking herself 30 times a day, obsessively reading the internet, unable to do her job, and experiecing so much distress she considers life not worth living in her current state? That is not a reasonable reaction, and pretending it is only reinforces to OP that there is probably something terribly wrong with her.

I’m pp. whenever someone posts about intermenstrual perimenopause bleeding on this board, there is someone who speaks up and tells the person she has health anxiety and the bleeding is normal and she’s being unreasonable to worry about it.

And yes, I got very anxious just like op did, thanks to my gyn. Who is no longer my gyn because she unnecessarily fueled anxiety over this. So I do understand it. But whoever is telling women to stop posting about bleeding intermestrually needs to stop doing that because it is fine and good for women to discuss perimenopause.

OP I have random spotting and bleeding all the time and it never occurred to me to worry about it.

Anonymous wrote:It is perimenopause. But even if it is cancer, you have to believe that you can handle it. You can and you will. Avoiding and wanting reassurance that it isn’t cancer isn’t how you deal with health anxiety. Acknowledging that the likelihood is low but not zero but you will handle it regardless is how you do it.

This is actually a good point. Endometrial cancer is usually pretty curable

Op, this breeding sounds totally normal to me. I hit perimenopause and was bleeding all the time pretty much. I did have some uterine polyps they removed and it didn’t really stop the bleeding. They also tried progesterone which works for some women but didn’t really work for me. I ended up with an IUD that pretty much stopped it.

I think our culture has this fake view that women can continue to live their best life in the 40s and 50s just like in their 20s and 30s and then it makes you feel like a freak when you experience natural effects of aging, which include — for many women— frequent incontience, random bleeding that can be very heavy, exhaustion, and other symptoms. Of course, see your doctor to find out what relief you can get but you shouldn’t feel like this is weird or alarming. It’s super common but the media focus on “50 is the new 30” or whatever obscures what is pretty common and natural.

I’m also a lawyer. I’ve been wearing pads pretty much every day since I was in my late 40s as I worry too much about urine leaking and potential break through bleeding.

This is going to sound very random but have you tried eliminating sugar/starches out of your diet? Going low carb and taking a daily power walk did wonders for my body during perimenopause.

Cutting carbs and getting regular exercise regulated my cycles, decreased my anxiety and made me feel fantastic. I went from being prone to UTIs to not ever getting them.

I kind of suspect that you might be experiencing insulin resistance.