How To Recognize Cases Of Hypochondria, And What To Do?
The need to ensure our well-being and take care of our own physical integrity is one of the factors that have most influenced the evolution of our brain and our behavioral patterns.
For example, this is why we suffer from fear or anxiety, unpleasant and even painful emotions that, however, we experience relatively frequently because they are useful for our survival.
However, sometimes this predisposition to detect danger signs where there are none can cause problems, and hypochondria is an example of this. Here We will see how to recognize hypochondria, as well as some tips to overcome it
Especially in recent times, in which the high population size and the dynamics of the globalized world have given rise to several pandemics and epidemics, the line that separates a reasonable level of concern for one’s own health, on the one hand, and an unjustified obsession with the possibility of having diseases, on the other, is somewhat blurred.
However, it is always possible to recognize extreme cases in which the perception of the state of one’s own body becomes so biased towards pessimism that it is totally incompatible with reality This is what happens with hypochondria, which not only does not help prevent serious health problems, but also becomes a problem for those who develop it.
Hypochondria, or hypochondriasis, is a psychological disorder characterized by the propensity to believe that one has a disease, despite there being no reasonable reasons to reach that conclusion.
This causes them to see evidence of having a pathology in a wide variety of small, unimportant events or that they do not say much about one’s state of health.
Here we will see some of its most distinctive characteristics.
1. What indicates that anxiety due to hypochondria is not justified?
As we have seen, people with hypochondria have a great facility for believing that they suffer from diseases, to the point that this propensity to become distressed by supposed signs and symptoms of pathologies erodes their quality of life.
Here it is important to stop and think about the difference between what we can consider reasonable reasons to suspect that one has a pathology, on the one hand, and the objective reasons to think so They may seem equivalent, but they are not.
For example, some alterations linked to chronic pain can be very difficult to objectify, since ultimately what their presence indicates is the existence of a sensation of pain. In cases of this type, there is no objective reality on which the idea of ”I have a disease” is based, but it is reasonable to think that something is wrong in our body.
Thus, hypochondria has to do with giving too much importance to events or phenomena that should not be attributed to an illness.
2. It is not a simple obsession with health
To say that a hypochondriac is an individual who shows excessive concern for his or her own health would be inaccurate In reality, hypochondria is based on a more specific type of concern: it is not the need to gain health by having a perfect body, but the fear of losing health.
3. Gain strength through rumination
Psychological rumination is what happens when a disturbing idea or mental image comes to mind over and over again, making us wish it would disappear from our consciousness. In the case of hypochondria, this happens a lot, because as we assume that there is a problem in our body Almost any stimulus or sensation that we judge as abnormal can lead us to think about the possibility of having a pathology
In turn, exposing ourselves to these unpleasant situations several times causes anticipatory anxiety to grow, given the possibility that with a new day new signs will come that we have an illness.
4. It lasts over time
hypochondria It is a persistent alteration, lasting months It’s not a matter of having watched a documentary about the effects of processed food and spending an afternoon thinking about it.
To do?
These are several tips that can help people who have developed hypochondria.
1. Attend psychological therapy
The first and most important advice is to have help from psychologists, since only through this procedure will you have personalized attention and intervention measures adapted to the particularities of your case, and also from professionals specifically trained for interventions of this type. Of course, keep in mind that therapy is a process that requires commitment, and abandoning it prematurely can mean going back to square one.
2. Keep a diary in which you write down what you feel
It is important that you get used to seeing beyond the thoughts and feelings linked to hypochondria; The ideal is that you not limit yourself to experiencing them yourself, but also learn about how and when they arise.
Through this process of psychological “reverse engineering”, in which you begin to detect the thought patterns behind hypochondria (when it is expressed), it will be easier for you to understand the extent to which these ideas are irrational.
To achieve this, something very useful is to keep a self-registration: a place that you should always have on hand and where you can write down basic information about what you think, feel and do at the moments in which hypochondria manifests itself, noting the place, date and time, and what happened just before, during and just after each of those experiences.
3. Create routines that keep you away from rumination
Although you may not notice it, hypochondria does not arise spontaneously from your brain, but rather “feeds” on certain habits and contexts to which you are frequently exposed. Therefore, a good measure to adopt is detect situations or contexts in general that tend to drag you into hypochondria, and opt for other options
For example, if you notice that every time you visit YouTube you end up watching videos about diseases, it may be good to choose another way to fill part of your free time on the Internet, or visit many videos on other topics so that the algorithm stops recommending those contents to you. Or, if for whatever reason many people in your group of friends are doctors, you can ask them directly not to talk about their work when you are with them. The idea is to expose yourself to different situations, either by modifying your context or exposing yourself to new ones.
4. Don’t try to block the discomfort
Hypochondria gains strength when we try to completely leave all the anxiety-inducing thoughts it generates out of our consciousness. It is much better to gain ground accepting that for a time it will cause us restlessness and discomfort
Are you looking for psychological support against hypochondria?
If you think you have developed hypochondria and are looking for psychological help to treat this problem with the support of professionals, we suggest that you contact us. In Cribecca Psychology We have several experts in psychotherapy with a lot of experience offering treatment for this type of problems, as well as other psychological complications: generalized anxiety, post-traumatic stress, depression, phobias, relationship problems, OCD, etc.
We currently serve in-person psychotherapy sessions in Seville, and also in online therapy sessions by video call. If you want to know how we work, you can read more about us on this page.
