I can't stop thinking about dying ...

[adifferentname]

I wonder if anyone else suffers with this. It's beginning to ruin my life. Since I became a mother I think about it all the time, working myself up into total terror at the thought of leaving my lovely dd witn no mother. She's 3-and-a-half and is totally devoted to me, as I am to her. I've had a lot of problems in the past with anxiety and depression so I'm no stranger to how thoughts and fears can take you over, but these thoughts are new to me and I don't know how to handle them. I lie awake in the early hours getting lost in scenarios in which I die, suddenly, and she's left with dp who does his best but is pretty flaky about most things. We have no immediate family to turn to and few friends with kids. We really are a unit of 3 people. I'm in my 40s and I keep hearing stories of people dying of heart attacks / brain haemorrhages or getting cancer and they fill me with such terror. I get sweaty and panicky. I also feel like it's ruining my every moment. I'm doing something like tidying up dd's things and I'll think 'who will do this for her if I'm not here' or I see her reach another milestone and I feel tragic that I might not see another. It affects me in so many ways it's hard to list. Dp's under a lot of work pressure and I don't want to worry him with this.

I hate to sound so miserable. I have financial worries and some health concerns (constant headaches and exhaustion) but generally I'm with a partner I love with an adorable daughter and I wish I could pull myself together.

TIA

[adifferentname]

I'm sorry this is so long. It's embarrassing. I've changed my name because I post fairly frequently and yes, because I'm ashamed of myself.

[Pixiefish]

I feel like this a lot of the time. It doesn't help that my dad's an undertaker so i feel that it's alwasy been close to home. i'm scared of dying but also of the people close to me dying. I do think I should go to see the doc though as it runs my life at times and I need to do something.

So in answer to your question, no you're not alone although i have no answers

[starlover]

hi adn... please don't be ashamed! i think you'd be surprised how common this is!
it can be a form of ocd, recurrent thoughts although that's not always the case.
I too think a lot about dying, every headache is a haemorrhage, every pain in the chest is a heart attack etc etc...; luckily i am coping ok with this at the moment but it sounds like it's really beginning to affect you.

It is definitely worth going and talking to your GP about this. they may refer you for something like cbt, which is a therapy that can hel pyou change the way you think about things. It can particularly help with what they refer to as negative automatic thoughts (nats) and give you ways to overcome it.
they may also be able to prescribe something just to give you a boost while you make some headway with your feelings

[starlover]

oh and tell your dp! it's true that a problem shared is a problem halved... and knowing he is there for you will make things seem better

[adifferentname]

thanks pixiefish. How long have you felt like this? Does it affect you all the time?

[Blandmum]

I worry, not about me dying, but dh. THis is driven in part because he has had a few life threatening conditions, testicular cancer, pancreatitis and now has a chronic leukemia. He is is also in the RAF and has 'done' several recent wars, Afghanistan and Iraq (twice). Ir ended up taking over my life and I went to see the GP. He refered me to the community psyciatric nurse who was very helpful and now I ostly keep it under control....i get a bit twitchy when dh comes up for his check up.

See your GP and ask for help, CBT can be excellent for this sort of thing.

[adifferentname]

thanks starlover. It does help to know I'm not alone. Like you, i imagine every bodily tinge is something horrible. But I do at the moment have a headache 24-hours a day pretty much. I have done for a couple of months but it's particularly bad right now.

My trouble with talking to dp about it is that he's in dire straits himself at the moment and is taking ADs. He needs me to be strong and I'm crumbling. In the past when I've had frequent mental health problems he's been the rock.

[starlover]

the headache you have right now is most probably stress-related.
but go to the doctor... get it checked, just to put your mind at rest...

[adifferentname]

martianbishop, you are VERY strong to deal with that. I worry, too, about dp but so far he's been physically quite strong.

[Blandmum]

No, I'm not, I ended up a gibbering wreck, and still do on times!

Seeing the CPN was a massive help and I can't recommend it too much. She sort of 'gave me permission' to worry in a 'normal' way.....if that makes sense? Everyone else had said, 'Oh don't worry' She said, 'it is OK to worry, but not to the point that it wrecks your life. When you get tense do this' and that was so helpful.

I got quite bad about the whole thing....not strong at all, a real wuss.

[shrub]

i may be on the wrong track here but thought it was worth mentioning a book that has really helped me change the way i think power of now i also go to a buddhist group to meditate every week. helps train the mind and gives a healthy distance between the self and the emotions. i am a more peaceful person now, dh has noticed a big difference especially over xmas when the group wasn't running! i'm aware there can be a stigma attached to the whole buddhist/meditation thing, i didn't go for years thinking it will be too academic or full of flaky hippies! have found it very practical, the people lovely including doctors and builders - a real eye opener!

[Lonelymum]

ADN, I would say that your headaches are related to your anxieties and are not a cuase for separate anxiety. I too think you should go to your GP if he/she is someone you can talk to. I found it very hard to express my anxieties to my GP and haven't received the help I know I need, but if you can talk it through with your GP, I feel sure they would be able to recommend a way forward for you.

[adifferentname]

I can't face going to the GP to be honest. I have such a history with them now that I feel they just sigh when I walk through the door. I was on ADs for a long time and also saw various therapists in the past and was on a high risk watch for PND etc. and even had a health visitor poking around for the first year of dd's life. I feel that if I return they'll start thinking I'm 'unfit' and it will jeapordise my life with dd.

Gotta go bathe dd now but thanks so much already for your help.

shrub, I'm totally not against Buddhism. it's a good suggestion. Thanks.

[Blandmum]

What I did was to ask for a double appointment, as I thought I would end up in tears, incapable of telling the poor guy what the problem was.....and I was right!

I realise this can be hard if you don't have a good relationship with your GP. Don't worry about the 'unfit mother' thing.....you are not unfit,

[Lonelymum]

Try another GP in the same practice?

[megandsoph]

Why on earth do u feel ashamed?? I'm am sure it has crossed most parents minds at one point in time. I'm am exactly the same. I'm a single mum with no family with in 200 miles and no friends where I live, my ex dp who was staying with me has just moved back to leeds. Every night I lie in bed worrying about something happening to me. I'm petrified of someone breaking in and getting me too. Just tonight I taught my 4.9 year old how to dial 999 in an emergancy just incase

You aren't alone xx

[anotherme]

Yes I recognise all of what you've said in detail. The headaches, the sleepness nights spent in terror, the hypervigilance about every tiny twinge - I get weird sensations like flooding or numbness in my head and no matter how many times it happens I still believe that my life is in danger. I have even been driven to considering suicide in the past by the sheer strain. I also have obsessive fears and very detailed "imagined scenarios" about losing my children, or my husband. I can reduce myself to tears simply by letting my mind wander.

I have been living with this for years, and haven't found doctors very much use at all. They just don't understand, IME. I manage to control the more severe panic symptoms and have developed breathing and positive relaxation to help me keep it at bay. The headaches don't respond to pain killers but do - eventually, with practice - start to respond to breathing/relaxation. Massage helps too, especially facial. I do it myself (!) and it helps a bit.

I'm so sorry you are going through this terrible period. I hope you find your way out of it. It is truly miserable and lonely, I know. I don't know your circumstances, but I know that in my case I have been living with colossal and unreasonable personal stress for too long, and this illness is the result. If you can say the same maybe you could think about how to begin alleviating it. I have found it a very slow and painstaking process. Is there an unresolved trauma of some kind, perhaps, which is haunting you through these symptoms?

Good luck in finding some relief from this awful frightening illness. I'm sure there must be other people here who have useful practical advice. I just wanted you to know that you are not alone, and that it gets better.

[Pixiefish]

I've been worse since I had dd ADN. i'm not like this all the time as I do try not to let it get to me. It's worse at night. I remember one night being unable to get to sleep as I had the vision that when I went to work in the morning and we had an epidemic of some killer horrible disease and i'd not be allowed home to see dd again incase I passed it to her. Totally irrational thoughts and fears I know but hard to control at times

[edodgy]

Hi i have been feeling exactly the same as you and yesterday I had an appointment with the local mental health worker and am now embarking on a program of congniative behavioural therapy. I've lost alot of people including both my parents and like you have no immediate family other than my dp and my 2.8 year old dd, i also have a 8 week old ds. My councillor told me yesterday that i have heightened stress/anxiety over death etc which is causing the panic attacks and that this therapy can train my mind to stop this. It sounds like its what you need I was getting so bad i cant leave the house unless im with my dp and I also worry about people I love dying as well which can make me very controlling. You have my sympathy as its a horrible fear to live with but it is treatable. You can asked to be reffered for councilling by your GP or HV, please get help as i waited too long and wish i'd done it alot sooner.

[adifferentname]

megandsoph, anotherme and edodgy, thank you so much for sharing your stories.

I have such a long long history of 'mental health' problems now, it's way too complicated to really explain, and way too depressing. But for a number of years before i got pregnant with dd I saw both a CB therapist and a psychotherapist. My anxiety was so high that I wasn't eating or drinking anything much at all (I had an enormous fear of vomiting) and was leading a very narrow life. When I got pregnant it seemed like a bit of a miracle and I was much better mentally for the pregnancy and the first year of dd's birth then she got a chest infection and was in hospital for two nights quite seriously ill, dp's father died, we all had a very powerful tummy bug and those things combined seemed to trigger everything off again. At first I would lie awake terrified about things happening to dd - absurd things like her being kidnapped and dangled in front of me screaming while someone held me back. Or her being tortured in front of me while i was tied up and couldn't help. Then it's gradually moved over to something happening to me and again, dd being in a vulnerable position which I can't help her out of.

I guess now after so much therapy I should have some way of controlling these thoughts but I don't. I think I know why some of them come, there were traumatic and confusing elements to my childhood and family history. But knowing these things doesn't help. Nothing helps. I'm truly at a loss and despairing. All I keep hoping for is for dp's stresses to lessen so that I might be able to call on him for some help.

[mummytosteven]

Have you ever been diagnosed with OCD? You might find a book called "The Imp of the Mind" by Lee Baer helpful - it's about unwanted unpleasant obsessive thoughts.

[adifferentname]

I'll look for that, mummytosteven. Yes I do definitely have some OCD. It's taken various forms over the years. Oh, blimey, I'm so sick of myself.

[mummytosteven]

have you ever tried medication for the OCD? sometimes that can really help.

[adifferentname]

No I haven't. I am beginning to think that some kind of meditation might be a route to try. I've tried everything else. Pre-dd I developed a drink problem at one point as I tried to block out the unwanted thoughts from my mind. It sometimes feels there's just no escape.

[Rowlers]

I felt like this after DD was born - from when she was a few weeks old.
Can't remember what sparked it off. I think I had a lumpy breast which I convinced myself for a couple of days was cancer. It was just me being daft but thoughts of dying set in and I could not shake them. I thought about it day and night and had sleepless anxious nights.
I eventually told DP who has in the past had similar thoughts for different reasons.
He assured me that it was just my head playing games and that it would pass.
It didn't seem to be much help at the time but I forced myself to get up and do something whenever I started down that line. If I was in bed I forced myself to think of something totally irrelevant.
It did take a long time but slowly the thoughts became less regular and now I don't have them often at all. And if I do, they go very quickly.
That's not much help is it, but wanted to share it.
I thought about posting on Mumsnet at the time but didn't have the courage.