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its been 3 weeks maybe 4 weeks now where i had this pulling dull ache under my right pectoral muscle. that bothers me when twisting or stretching. its never intense or debilitating but its becoming annoying. massaging does lil help. i do get slightly short of breath which i have been scene for at 2 different hospital visits for severe anxiety. i went for a follow up at a local urgent care where i had my side examined and the doctor didnt think anything of it even with proof of results from xray and labs that were done. ( i had 2 xrays done near that area that didnt show anything malignant with my heart, lungs etc.) i was sent home with anxiety meds and so on. it went away with rest but today reaching to the high cabinet it was achey again. i do work in veterinary so not sure if handling a massive great dane with a lot of force caused this issue. i also sleep on a old mattress on the floor due to some remodeling going on. im worried i developed cancer or some serious disease thats going to take me out. its consistent and i see lots of things related to intercostal strain/sprain. anyone able to guide me to reassurance?

A year ago, I started having occasional bouts of foul-smelling, cloudy urine. Not a strong ammonia-like smell but more like bottom-of-a-pond. Pretty bad. I have a history of UTIs, and even though at that time the culture was neg for bacteria, I assumed it may a precursor to an infection, so I would start drinking 100% cranbery juice (8 oz in the morning and 4 oz at night) for about a week and taper off. EACH TIME, the bad smell would disappear after about a day of doing that. Well, the bad-urine-smell episodes disappeared for several months and I all but forgot about them. Fast forward to this past April. I had some blood work done, mostly routine, and everything came back normal except for my kidney function. Creatinine was 1.18 (ref range 0.5-0.97) and GFR was at the very cusp at 60 (ref range > or = 60). I pushed the fluids and we retested a week later, and it came back in the normal range but still far from optimal: Creatinine at 94 and GFR at 79. As a busy mom, I went on my way. Well a few weeks ago, the bad-smelling urine returned, as well as some sediment in the urine. Once again drank cranberry juice, it went away, and I decided to try a supplement with cranberry in it to see if that would do the same. Five days later, the smell returned, and I started connecting the possible dots with kidney, so last week I went to the doctor. Urine was neg for bacteria again, so they ran some blood work. Kidney results were worse, Creatinine at 1.32 and GFR at 53. :(((( I am only 39, soon to be 40. I am really worried. Had a follow-up with my doctor today who is a bit concerned about why it's bouncing around and wanted to repeat the blood work again since I've once again been pushing the fluids. But she also ordered a renal ultrasound and wants me to see a nephrologist. I can't get into those appts until Aug 4 and Aug 13, respectively. I am in knots waiting for the blood results, that they'll be even worse, and about what the u/s will show. I can't stop worrying that this is the beginning of the end, that I'll leave my kids without a mom and not be here to watch them grow up. 💔

Hello everyone- where do I even begin? It's 3:30am- I've maybe slept 30 minutes tonight because a tongue twitch woke me up- after a week of having new twitches all over my body and going down the ALS rabbit hole. i know I have anxiety- have been on Wellbutrin since April, dose upped in July. I am 34 year old mom of 2 and the thought of any symptom I have being ALS have put me in a bad spiral! Ugh! history- I had a DVT a few years ago during my pregnancy- healed fine. The leg that had that has recently been having some mild aches. I attributed this to some circulation issues post clot & went down the rabbit hole there- trigger anxiety to a level I didn't even know was possible. The next day- I noticed a few twitches here & there in my calf muscle occasionally.. now I'm HYPER SENSITIVE to every little thing my body is doing.. I now notice every little twitch... throughout the day- 1 in my calf, 1 in my thigh, 1 in my arm, shoulder, other calf, foot, hand... just a quick little twitch- that's it. Google symptoms- convinced this is ALS & go down that rabbit hole. the anxiety has been unreal since- I am losing sleep, I've lost weight due to no appetite, am checked out from my kids & husband because I'm so consumed with every little symptom & the twitches are happening more frequently & I notice every single one... tonight I got somewhat calm- then my jaw twitches (1st time) sends me in a panic.. can't sleep. Doze off finally- and wake up to a tongue twitch/spasm. Everything I've read says that is almost always associated with ALS & here we are- 3.30am, unable to sleep. i am seeing my doctor in 2 days- to discuss overall symptoms & anxiety. i have no pain (just that dull ache in the calf) no weakness that's at least noticeable or new (I'm out of shape so yea.. lol) no speech issues or falling... but the rabbit hole.. i would appreciate hearing similar experiences, symptoms... also reading so much that most twitches are caused by stress/anxiety. Seems crazy an emotion can trigger physical symptoms but wow... thank you all.

hiya. some weeks ago i started having this constant feeling of something stuck in my esophagus. i was convinced i had oesophagal cancer. i got a chest x ray and ultrasound, and everything seems ok, plus the feeling has gone down, so it doesnt worry me as much. but now, im scared about leukemia. i have some red spots in my right leg, a slight fever, and feel often tired and shaky. my throat hurts ocasionally. im getting blood testing tomorrow. until then, i am terrified.

Well, I was bitten by a dog, 8 days ago. It was the 3rd time the dog bites me. I received a tetanus vaccine two months ago the first time when a dog bites me. Since third days ago I started feeling jaw problems, pain in the chest and stomach, and faster heart rate. Of course, I googled symptoms because I am an anxious hypochondriac, and google told me that I had some symptoms of tetanus. I went to a doctor and he told me that my symptoms are far from tetanus and checked for neurological problems and all is good and that is pure psychological thing doe to fearful trauma. He did mention I can have new tetanus shot and reset a cycle with a course of 4 shots. But still, there is always a fear that I am going to get it and it's making me nervous and a little panicking. Damn this anxiety fear.

Intrusive thoughts are a true pain in the ass. I keep having them I am a long time ocd/health anxiety sufferer I keep having horrible scary thoughts. Like planning my kids funeral if they get sick. Thats 1 example I will take any ideas or advice

Hi everyone. I’m new here looking for some additional support because I feel super alone and crazy since no one around me understands my health anxiety. It is so severe I think I’m going to go into cardiac arrest every minute of the day , even though I have had 6 EKGS, stress test, echocardiogram & now a Holter monitor. I just can’t turn it off. I finally decided to go on medication last week and I start new therapy Monday. I just feel so crazy. It sucks and it is debilitating. I am only in my early 20’s, I don’t want to be this miserable. Any advice?

I have been battling off and on with my 3rd BT scare in 9 years. Headaches move around, seem worse when changing position (but better when laying down/sleeping), worse when lifting stuff, pupils different sizes, odd feeling one side of body etc..... I have had a lot of these symptoms before with my previous scares. I had two ct scans of my brain during previous scares and now I am concerned these scans actually caused me to get a brain tumor. i called my neurologist and he said it didn’t sound like a brain tumor but he wanted me to get an MRA bc it sounded blood vessel related. Of course I overanalyzed every portion of the phone conversation but was able to accept his expertise and felt better that it most likely wasn’t a brain tumor. Took my family to get snow cones and on the way home I smelled a burning smell like someone was burning something. I live in a rural area but asked my wife if she smelled it and she said no. My mind of course jumped to seizures. When I got home i could smell the bacon we had cooked before snow cones. I woke up smelling bacon all night (re-inforcing) the concern with seizure. Not doing great this morning as a result!

I'm 26 now, I have always had anxiety about many things. I'm so scared of dying and not knowing where I'm going that I'm constantly in a freak out about something. Lately past week or so its been breast cancer. I came here to see if someone could help and found that I'd posted about this fear before about a month ago. Something must of made it go away now I'm just wondering if anyone can help me this week has been miserable I am constantly having panic attacks, left work over it and my family is going nuts. Sometime in 2017 I read an article about checking for dimples and what not saying they were a sign of breast cancer, I immediately freaked and begged my wife to take me to urgent care that night. She refused as she was fed up but eventually gave in the next day or so. To be clear we have no history of cancer in our family. We finally went and the woman examined me I distinctly remember because she was pregnant ( my anxiety convinces me things didnt happen sometimes) it wasnt a dimple I had found but a slight dent under my left boob and ONLY when I flex. She felt around and did an examine but didnt find anything of concern told me breast are naturally lumpy and mine were larger so it was nothing out of the ordinary. Now I'm here and I've had check ups since multiple doctor visits with blood tests, chest xrays, ct scans, cdcs everythings all come back normal. I had wondered would this be the case with breast cancer wouldnt something small have shown up if this disease was in me? It's been driving me crazy I've had this for nearly 2 years and I rarely think of it. Because usually its melanoma or skin or heart disease or something new. I'm just afraid that now that I'm 26 I dont have much longer on this earth. Please I'm begging someone to help me, tell something that can help with this anxiety because 9 times out of 10 I'm sure that's what it is. Please help, 26andscared

Hello, Newbie here. just trying to share my pain and worries. Does anyone worry excessively about their parents? I mean, I worry constantly to the point If : 1. they call/ text me in a weird hour My heart races 2. their last seen on whatsapp is not recent, I will panic I mean, It's really tiring and I guess there have been several trigger. one big one was my Dad's Emergency Heart bypass a few years ago. We were so lucky that we found it before anything bad happen. He did not have any symptom and was just randomly checking. We were so grateful that it was found without any heart damage and that now he is taking medicines to control his risks. The thing is, he was always super healthy even before the surgery: normal blood pressure, exercise 5 days a week, eats healthily, etc. he just had slightly (10%) high cholesterol . this really threw me off and I've always been super worried about him ever since. I always dread his bi-yearly check up. and am sick with worries if the time has come for him to do check up. I am grateful that his check up has always come out great but I still cannot stop worrying. 2 years after that, My mom has developed piriformis syndrome which prevented her to sit too much. she is now so much better but it comes and goes. I know this is normal and she just needs some lifestyle changes. and again, I should be grateful. I just cannot shake the memory when Dad has called in the morning a few months back saying that mom is really hurting and needed to go to the Emergency room for this. This has come to a point where I cannot concentrate at work, I obsessed over every little "pain" they have and just overly worried about them all the time. I check on them all the time and I know this can be annoying for them as well. Furthermore, I am terrified if they decide to go the doctor for something, and this prevents me from reminding them it's time for their checkup!! this is horrible. it is a good thing they want a check up. but I tremble every time and this is exhausting. just sharing my thoughts. it would be great if anyone would chip in on how to overcome this and/or has the same experience. I'm quite exhausted.

I've been trying my harderst to get my anxiety under control but I've been failing. I've been obsessed with my throat lately and getting throat cancer. Everyone I show says they see nothing wrong, I have no pain or discomfort, no swollen lymph nodes or pain of any kind. The more I think of it the more I feel a lump in my throat when I swallow. And i think the veins in the back of my throat look weird. I'm only 25 years old and I'm always scared of one thing or another but this really has me by the throat. Can anyone help?

I don't know if anyone really knows about the subject but I'm terrfied of getting head and throat cancer from HPV. A couple months ago i was here with fear of als. It crippled me, i was in bed for weeks. My mom finally took me to the hospital, i was prescribed ablifiy and hydralazine. I had to stop abilify due to losing insurance. Now im here. 4 years ago some woman pushed my wife against a wall and gave her an open mouth kiss. There was no sexual activity whatsoever. Just a kiss that lasted seconds. Idk that person so I have no way of knowing if they have hpv. My wife isn't concerned but I AM. Since oral cancer can be spread through oral sex and I have no way of knowing if this woman had oral sex with someone who had hpv and spread it to my wife and in turn to me. I am terrfied of getting head and throat cancer and as of know there is no sure way to test for hpv inside mouth. I am scared and right back to where I was. Can anyone help me ? Please. I have only ever had one sexual partner as has my wife.

Hi I joined this forum two days ago. And I have seen at least four people here including myself fearing they have MS. Yes we might have googled our symptoms. Tingling in body, weird sensations etc. The problem with Google is, it will always bring up medical reasons. Anxiety is not adequately mentioned anywhere in the descriptions. Also for MS, it is mentioned that sometimes it doesn't show up on MRIs, It's different for everyone, doctors can't diagnose it for years, the earliest symptom is tingling. This leads many of us to assume that we have MS. Yes we need to stop googling. But now we have done it and developed the fear. How to come out of it is the question I am still battling with.

Hello everyone, I’ve been off and on this site for awhile. Let me just keep it simple.... back in October that’s when I started my HA FEAR. My hotspot is my left calf. And of course I twitch everywhere else sometimes but majority left calf. Ive seem more than 3 doctors and they told me it was ALS. I was good for awhile, I got a new job, etc. started working out more and more. I had an appointment last month with a neurologist but I felt like I was okay. A month later I twisted my left ankle in basketball cause I tripped on my friends foot. Then I reinjure my ankle cause I was dancing and I guess I slipped on some water on the floors anyways my head has been saying “what if it’s the beginning” ive had twitches since October and I know something more sinister would show by this time now so I calm down a little but it’s always there. I’m going through a brake up right now, I dropped my friends and don’t go out as much anymore. I sleep most of my days. Just a lot going on rn and I don’t know what to do. I’m 25 and I feel like I’m going no where in life and everything is falling apart. Thanks for reading this.

I am new to this forum and I am in your exact boat. I have been worried about ALS for 6 months ever since I had a brother in law diagnosed with it and started having twitches. I posted my story in my intro here. Today was my neurological appointment, and the Dr told me I was the 4th person this week that had presented with severe twitching all over the body and not a single one had ALS. She gave me a complete neurological exam and was told I passed with flying colors. I could have an MRI if I needed for peace of mind but in her professional opinion it was not necessary. She then told me I had something I had never heard of and explained my symptoms (muscle twitching, perceived weakness, trouble finding words (not slurring), fatigue, numbness, etc). Functional Neurological Disorder/Disease - FND. Often brought on by trauma, chronic stress/anxiety, panic attach, or even infection. In short, it is when you have no problem with the hardware in your brain (no tumor, cancer, stroke or structural disease such as MS or ALS) but there is a software problem in the way the brain is sending signals. I have scanned the document I was given below and the website it references. I did a search on this forum and only found 2 posts under FND so not sure how often it is mentioned or known. The big thing is it gave me a real explanation for my symptoms and something to believe in other than all the worse case scenarios I had been imagining in my head. It explains why the twitches don't stop even when I feel calm and why the jerkiness and trouble walking are not just in my head. And the great news is it is very reversible with therapies and other treatment. I encourage research on this and even googling it (yes, finally something positive to google). Having this knowledge helped my symptoms immediately. I hope this helps. Links to the websites in the document: http://www.neurosymptoms.org and http://www.fndhope.org

I wanted to share very briefly what I have been going through the last month. Im a 39 year old male and Ive had HA off and on since I was a child. Some months are great and some months are bad. My most recent episode started with me having internal trembling when I was in bed. Whenever I would wake up throughout the night I would have sensations of my limbs trembling (non-visible). I've had this off on through the last year, but it was becoming more persistent. So, I made the mistake of googling what might be the cause. Of course many things can be the cause, but I zeroed in on ALS (which I guess internal vibrations is not a common ALS symptom). This is when all the crazy stuff started to happen. At the time I started to Google ALS the only symptom I had was internal vibrations. The more I read the more I started to manifest symptoms. The first new symptom was that my hands started to feel stiff and I started to have a lot of trouble typing (within one day of googling ALS). I'm graphic designer so I type and use a mouse all day long. Next my legs started to become very weak. Both legs from my thigh to my feet would become very wobbly and felt that I had just worked them out. My legs felt like they were falling asleep and would be tingling, almost ticklish. I then started looking for foot drop and I started walking funny and favoring one leg over the other because one leg was weak and tingling more than the other. Next came twitching and spasms at night mainly, but some during the day as well. Next I started remembering back that there were times when I had thought I was slurring my words. The slurring started to get worse and I was concentrating on my voice and speech constantly. My neck began to hurt and my voice began to be more raspy and hoarse (almost no voice at times). My tongue started feeling awkward in my mouth and I began to inadvertently bite it. Next I started checking reflexes and noticed that I was very jumpy and my fingers would constantly twitch when I would fan them out. This all happened within two weeks from when I first started googling ALS. My inclination is that many of these ailments/symptoms already existed, but I'm just more aware of them because Im looking for them. I still have all the above symptoms and I'm still constantly checking all parts of my body and I find new symptoms that I think point to ALS every day. I'm a little over three weeks into my ALS fears and my mindset and more importantly my body is really feeling the affects of my anxiety. I'm sore all over and I have the urge to cry and my throat feels tight (can't cry though). I'm sharing all of this because there is a big part of me that knows a lot of these symptoms are very likely due to anxiety and my ability to manifest very real symptoms. I also thought it my be therapeutic to express what Im going through and also help anyone else who has had these symptoms and is battling HA. I look forward to the day that some of my symptoms subside so I can get myself out of this viscous ALS fear cycle (ALS symptoms seem to mimic anxiety symptoms almost perfectly at times). Thanks for letting me express myself and feel free to reply if you can relate.

Does anyone else here have health/illness anxiety? I've had generalized anxiety, and at times, panic disorder for the past 12 years (I'm in my early 30's). Most of my anxiety was more related to social situations, academics, and big crowds. After having my first child about 2 years ago, it seems the health anxiety started. I had complications after the birth, including a severe infection and preeclampsia (let me add that I absolutely hate hospitals and they give me anxiety). After everything resolved, I began paying attention to my heart rate constantly. For a little while I was repeatedly taking my blood pressure and heart rate, even though both were great. It was almost if I was looking for something to be wrong. At times, I would also get the chest tightness/breathing issues that I know are associated with anxiety (had a chest x-ray, EKG). At the beginning of last month I ended up with the flu. I got pretty sick with fevers of up to 102.5, rapid heart rate at times, terrible cough. Went to the ER twice and they took chest x-ray, EKG, listened to lungs, ran blood work, everything looked fine. After recovering for a few days, I caught a gastro virus which came with a low fever. I went back to the ER, panicked that I had pneumonia or something. Everything checked out fine. A week later, my head was hurting, I had chest tightness, heart palpitations, and a stuffy, burning nose. I went back to the ER in a panic and they told me that it was a sinus infection and started me on antibiotics. I was sick for a good 3 weeks. After everything resolved, I began to have panic attacks and general anxiety throughout the day, convincing myself that I wasn't better and something must be wrong. Anxiety is a vicious cycle for me, it turns into faster heart rate, crying, nausea/stomach tightness and chest tightness. I have lost about 5 pounds and most recently convinced myself that something is seriously wrong because I'm not intentionally trying to lose weight (thanks, Google). I started tracking my calorie intake and realized I wasn't eating enough. So now I'm obsessively checking my weight and heart rate and forcing myself to eat more (its tough because of the nauseousness from anxiety). Most recently, bloodwork showed slight anemia, but the next week I took another test and it said it resolved. I think it was from not eating. My doctor ordered a final blood test before the last one, that I only went in for a few days ago (to check on the anemia, which has resolved, per the last test). I'm waiting for those results and having severe anxiety about it. I'm convincing myself that there is something else seriously wrong. I'm at witt's end here. Has anyone dealt with anything similar?

i figured it's time to join a forum because i'm so tired of keeping everything bottled inside. i got a concussion in may and ever since then i get anxious every time i hit my head. yesterday, i hit my head against the edge of my laptop and the first thing i said was "ow...oh now i'm worried" because i was immediately worried about getting a concussion. this morning i woke up with slight head pressure and i'm really tired (but i'm also a busy college student). i have no other symptoms besides that and this anxiety, but somehow i am convinced that i have a concussion. i don't only have anxiety around concussions. in fall 2018, i got a virus from the common cold that made me pass out and i was sent to the hospital. i had an abnormally elevated heart rate. since then, i've developed a fear of passing out and for a while, i was obsessed with checking my heart rate. every time i have to give a presentation or speech, i am now scared i'm going to pass out in front of everyone and end up in the hospital again. if there is a sickness going around, i assume i'm going to catch it. sometimes i think that i'm going to get cancer and not even know. i have such irrational fears and i'm so scared of dying. wow, things just got deep. i've been trying to go to my therapist and the good news is that i am the kind of person who wants to fix my issues right away. i don't like feeling like i can't control what i have, and perhaps that is why i have anxiety. i'd appreciate any sort of comment because i hope i'm not the only one who feels this way. that is why i joined this forum.

Hi guys i am a 20 yr old male and for the past 2 weeks I have had twitching throughout my body first it started in my eyelid and now it happens throughout my body randomly in different places any place in my body such as shoulder back butt forearm practically anywhere . I keep worrying that it is either als or some type of terrible disorder. I defiantly have health anxiety and worry about any little thing. I just am worried about this and I feel that posting on here and hearing others will help me tremendously. My twitches happen at random even at times when my anxiety flares up I do not notice them more than usual. They also can happen at anytime anywhere even if I’m not anxious nor thinking about them. Also when I go to look at them typically they are not there nor twitching only have seen my eye and leg and shoulder do it very few times. That’s how fast they come and go. They are 1-3 second twitches every time and only in my eyelid persist more than that or they’ll twitch for 1-3 seconds on and off for a couple of minutes . I’m very active I ran a mile today and did 100 push-ups and sits up yesterday and the day before that. I just am worried it is something worse and that it is not yet progressed because it’s only been 2 weeks. Please help

About 9 months ago I had sex for the first time. It only lasted about 2 minutes before I noticed he wasnt using protection so I quickly told him to stop and leave. I'm 18 and I'm very scared of std's. So I asked him 24/7 did he have any std's he always said no I even ask him so much till the point where he gets mad and fustrated and told me to go get tested if I didnt believe him. I have since then developed health anxiety. I've been on google ever since the sexual encounter. I've convinced myself that I've had HIV and cancer and a brain tumor. I cant even say these words because everytime I hear or say them I get really weak and sweaty and anxious. Everyday I wake up feeling terrible and I'm really scared to go to the doctor. I stay up late on google just feeling so much worse. No matter what I do I always think I'm dying soon it's always on my mind I cant enjoy life. I have brain zaps, and my skin itches for about 10 minutes everyday and then It leaves, I have really fast heartbeats of over 110 every day, I havent had any weight loss, I have a rash on my leg, I get sweaty sometimes and hot flashes. I havent had any flu like symptoms even tho I do have upset stomach sometimes. I am constantly checking my body everyday for new symptoms and sensations so I can google it and feel even worse. If anyone has these symptoms when they are anxious please let me know I'll feel more relaxed. I just set up an appointment to the doctor next week but I really want something to take my mind off of this until then

Hi guys... new here I’ve been reading many posts which seem to help me a bit! But I had a few questions.. I have been getting tingling/ pins and needles sensations in both my feet non stop. I had it for a few weeks and it goes away then comes back for no known reason. Had an mri of brain and cervical spine recently and all is completely normal. Just had a full work up of blood tests, absolutely perfect on everything. I have severe health anxiety and both my neurologist and primary care say I need to get ms out of my head. But I just don’t understand why these sensations keep coming back when I don’t even feel particularly anxious. I get other anxiety symptoms like tense muscles, sore muscles in arms and legs on occasion but this pins and needles is really stressing me out and I can’t calm down. Any one else have persistent symptoms like this?? Please help.

Yesterday I had another breakdown and went to the ER. Second in a week. They ran blood tests, tested urine, did a scan of my chest for heart and lung health everything came back negative. I had a bit of headache last night from crying that went away. I slept fine, I woke up this morning when to psych urgent care and got some meds to hold me over i was fine. When I got home I was a little stressed from a fight but I was fine ate a burrito and the pounding in the back of my head started and I immediately jumped to brain tumor wondering why this woman didnt scan me for one, so sure the doctor is wrong and just wanted me gone. Had full on freak out the banging sounds like my heartbeat but in the back of my head. I'm so scared I want to control this but I never can. I have a psych evaluation set up and I've been given hydralazine and abilify. I'm just so lost I dont know why this is all happening. Muscle twitches all over are worse now. Can this really all be from anxiety?

Hello everyone, just came back from my pcp appointment and let me tell y’all. Note: IVE BEEN FEELING ALOT BETTER ON MY OWN THINKING RATIONALLY, TRUST ME IVE BEEN THERE WHERE I FELT LIKE I COULDNT USE MY HANDS, LEGS. FELT LIKE I COULDNT WALK OR DRIVE, EVEN TEXT. LOST ALMOST 20 POUNDS DUE TO THIS HA. IVE ONLY GOTTEN 30 HOURS OF SLEEP IN A MONTH, SEEN MULTIPLE DOCTORS. I WAS 140, NOW IM 160 I FEEL LIKE I OVER SLEEP NOW HAHA AND ITS GETTING BETTER EVERYDAY. She was getting mad at me because I wasn’t focusing on the things I need to focus on haha. (I go to a university hospital and If you read my past post I’ve seen a lot of pcp just wasn’t mine cause she was on medical leave but she knows about my information since it was noted” Well to sum it up, she knows that I’ve been going through many ALS fear for some months now and she knows about my fasciculation's in my left calve (my hotspot) and all over. she said, “you don’t have ALS, we don’t look for twitching in ALS, we look for real clinical weakness.” She also said “you’re 25 years old, your muscles are probably telling you... hey I need to move.” I told her I haven’t been exercising or anything at all just labor work. She also explained, if you’re working out and you can barely curl a 5 pound weight come see me. She then asked me if I wanted to see a neurologist and I was kinda caught off guard, I told her “I do but I feel like I’ll be feeding into my anxiety. You don’t think i have ALS right?” She looked at me like I was crazy cause she just explained everything about ALS to me haha she said “NO.” she said “well I’m going to put the referral in and it takes months to see one anyways so if you feel like you don’t need to then don’t.” its funny because the doctor was telling me I should be worried more about diabetes and heart diseases because of my family. My parents also see my pcp so she’s very familiar with my family and she knows that diabetes runs in my family. So now she wants me to eat more healthier and work out more. i actually have an appointment with a neurologist on Monday cause someone canceled, I was kinda happy. so next Monday I have an appointment with a neurologist and I’ll keep y’all updated but just wanted to share my follow up.

Before I begin speaking any, I guess I should give a little background on who I am and what I have been going through. My name is Daniel Hall and I am 18 years old. I'm currently a student at Lincoln Memorial University in Harrogate, Tennessee; I am studying conservation biology as I have always had a love for nature. I have always been a hypochondriac. I can remember multiple times throughout my very young life (6-15 years old) where I was having episodes of what I now know to be anxiety. These episodes were mostly due to the usual--cancer worries, tumor worries, etc. In my junior year of high school--to my great dismay--I was in A.P. Biology class and we watched a documentary on Steve Gleason and his journey with ALS. Ever since, it has been my biggest fear; however, it was never affecting my life in any way... until about 2 months, 1 week, and 3 days ago. I began having a twitch in my neck. I honestly don't believe it twitched more than two or three times and then stopped. Anyways, ALS had popped up in my mind a few days prior as I had read about someone famous being diagnosed with it (I believe), so, I immediately Googled "muscle twitching" and found that one of the first things to pop up was amyotrophic lateral sclerosis--ALS, or as it's better known, Lou Gehrig's disease. As many of you can imagine, an immediate panic went through my body and I freaked out internally, but managed to keep my cool as I knew it was super rare and that I most likely didn't have ALS. That didn't matter, though, as within hours I was twitching body-wide, head-to-toe, non-stop. 24/7 fasciculations. Luckily, my school was just about to begin Thanksgiving break and I was able to have a week to research (wish I didn't), mope (still do), and manage to get over my first bout of anxiety. I found that fasciculations are rarely the presenting symptom of ALS, and that body-wide fasciculations are even more rare as a presenting symptom. In fact--I've never read a story of body-wide twitching being the presenting symptom of ALS ever. Queue the happy, fun, and enjoyable Daniel. Back in business! That didn't last long, however, as I began to notice a tingle in my left arm which I knew had nothing to do with ALS. I began wondering if this is maybe MS or neuropathy or whatever other inconvenient but non-life threatening disease I could imagine. Then I began to notice an odd weakness in that arm. It only felt weak; I could still perform any action that I could before the feeling of weakness, but it definitely felt weak. Queue the anxiety! Within a weeks time this went away. I'm going to make the rest of this as short and undetailed as possible as this is beginning to really drag itself out. After the perceived arm weakness came perceived swallowing issues. I was having trouble swallowing, I had choked on my water maybe two or three times, and I was absolutely freaking out. The next symptom was nasal speech that was due to a very small sinus infection that I began dealing with. The perceived swallowing issues went away immediately. Then came perceived slurred speech. My tongue felt huge and was "dragging" in my mouth. It felt heavy. The perceived nasal speech went away as soon as my sinus infection went away. Then I finally accepted that I wasn't slurring and this was all in my head. It worked! I stopped worrying and had no more anxiety--or so I thought--and was out of the rabbit hole. I wasn't slurring, and life was ready to be lived from Mr. Daniel Hall! Until I began working out and noticing that my left arm was sore longer than my right :). I strained it. Very easy to do. I used to work out a lot, but quit after the beginning of my health anxiety over ALS. When I went back to working out, I went full force and full effort. I was sore for nearly a week! Anyways, this soreness led to more perceived weakness and tightness that has now went away as my focus has shifted to a new symptom--speech changes. Last night, my girlfriend and I were laying on her couch watching a movie, and I said something to her. Her reply was "your voice sounds different." I don't believe the panic was as bad as it has been before, but it was awful. She immediately knew what she had done, and she apologized and tried to calm me and reassure me. I was beyond the realm of peace from reassurance. I panicked and was anxious all last night and all today. I have been non-stop honed in and focused on my voice and the way it sounds. The point of all of this is to show the effect that anxiety can have on our lives. I joined this forum only days ago and already have seen countless threads of people worrying about ALS. I am 18, have no family history of ALS (or any neurological diseases in fact), with a family history of severe anxiety. Everyone on my father's side relies on anxiety medicine. I have just started anxiety medication not too long ago, but it is not helping as much as I'd like it to as I am letting this fear take control of my mind. The fear is irrational and is of something that I don't have and couldn't control if I did have it. It's funny, too; I can go on someone else's thread and reassure them and give them all the 1,000+ reasons why they don't have ALS, yet I seem to make the faintest connections from dots of information that aren't even real--dots of information that are just made up in my world of fear. I hope some of those who are having problems with ALS fears, or health anxiety in general, can read this and take a step back and look at their situation from a more mature and less anxiety-ridden view. I also hope that I can get some support from those of you who have been through these fears and understand the struggle. Anxiety is a real illness that can sometimes take a greater toll on an individual and those around them than a very genuine and very serious illness, but unlike those illnesses, anxiety can be conquered if it is recognized, understood, and an attempt is made to get rid of it, and support can make all the difference in the world when trying to accomplish those three things. P.S. Sorry for rambling on. My mind has been in a fog due to all of my anxiety, and thus my writing is very random and uncoordinated.

Hi guys, I'm new to the forum but have been observing fro some time. I'm 25 years old and have been struggling with health anxiety seriously for nearly 2 years. Around 2 years ago I had my first big health anxiety scare over ALS due to perceived weakness and muscle twitching. After numerous trips to the doctors, neurologists and therapists I finally got my life back in order after I realized that it was all caused by anxiety. Fast forward to just before Christmas and health anxiety struck again with a lymph node worry (all fine), stomach cancer worry (also all fine) and now I'm stressing about ALS once again. I was in my car the other day and I tried to whistle along to a song and it didn't come out as strongly as normal, my brain went into full panic mode about bulbar onset als. (I know it sound ridiculous). Since then I've been super paranoid about the way I am talking and the way I swallow food. I'm finding it hard to swallow food but I'm hoping it is just an anxiety symptom that is causing my throat to close up. I get myself so worked up that I can't sleep more than about 3-4 hours a night and I throw up nearly every morning because of how worked up I have made myself. The stupid thing is, currently I can still whistle, my voice isn't slurred and I think my swallowing is normal (with the exception of the anxiety). I'm probably being ridiculous but I can't help it and all my family and friends are getting fed up with my worries all the time. I've gone back on Citalopram 20mg and have signed up for more CBT so we'll see how it goes. I just hate health anxiety so much and I needed a bit of a rant and some reassurance.