Aa
Please help severe health anxiety today
I have been stressed out for the last week because I am in fear that an ex gave me hiv. I haven't had the courage to get tested. So today I got triggered because I ate a chicken sandwich for lunch and it had no taste. Then I ate Doritos and they seemed to have no taste just salty so now I am in panic mode. Started tasting everything to see if it has taste, my breakfast seemed to have taste, I can still smell everything. I can taste pizza sauce but barely taste toothpaste etc. feel like I am dying. What if I have the hiv and it's causing me to not be able to taste anything? What if I have some other disease that is causing me not to be able to taste anything? Please help. No one to talk too. Thanks.
I don't think anyone here will be able to give you any better advice than you got on the HIV forum. Namely, if you won't test, you can not get peace.
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This anxiety has to do with me not being able to taste food. So what you are saying is that if I get tested I will be able to taste food? I am freaking out right now because I am thinking that I can't taste. So regardless of the fact if I have hiv or not I am panicked right now over the perception that I can't taste food. I would still be freaking out over that. Can anxiety cause loss of taste? I can still smell stuff.
No one can diagnose you from here, so all I can say is it could be psychosomatic. Try to relax to be sure you really did lose your sense of taste, and if still convinced then check with your doctor.
Not looking for a diagnosis just looking for a friend or someone who has been in the same situation or can relate somehow to maybe say hey I understand, I have been in the same place mentally and here is what I did and everything came out alright. Maybe someday I will be that person, that voice of comfort but today its me thats freaking out. I got great responses on the hiv forum but those responses dont necessarily apply to my anxiety today right now. I do thank you for responding though because it been a few times I am on here and no responses. I am alone and being able to post and get responses helps.
Well if you want that understanding conversation, the people on the HIV forum gave it, since they had tested before and explained that you will always be frightened until you test like they did.
So by your reasoning, I should never expect to get any more responses or friendly reassurances and help to my anxiety posts because (according to you) any anxiety I express concern about from now on will always lead back to my hiv concern and that's already been addressed once so....why should anyone on here try to provide any type of comfort to me from now on? It seems like you are saying get tested or just shut up. I guess you think getting tested will make all my anxiety just magically go away? Just like anyone who comes on here I need help not judgment on what I should or shouldn't do in regards to testing.
What you've been told is, if your anxiety has been triggered right now because you're stressed out by what's probably an irrational fear you have HIV, then the first step is to get tested. That will at least get you one step forward. As to your anxiety, there really is no such thing as comfort. Nobody saying there there everything is fine will change your life an iota. People here are trying to help you, not provide you useless comfort. You really really deep inside don't want comfort, you want release. That will only come with hard work through therapy, perhaps, that will help you learn not to think the way you're thinking. But you still have to take the first step toward the immediate thing that's bothering you, which is to get tested if you genuinely believe any contact you had is the kind that could give you HIV. What you're being told here by AnxiousNoMore, the best advice you can get, is that avoidance will just make this whole thing spiral, as it's doing. Take the first step and get tested if, again, you seriously did something that might leave you exposed, and second, get some help so you don't go through the rest of your life thinking like this every time something difficult comes around. The advice you've gotten is way more useful to you than comfort, believe me.
And let me add, if you really did have the kind of exposure that might lead to getting HIV, you're already avoiding, and it isn't helping you. I've had this miserable anxiety problem for more years than you've probably been alive, and I don't want you making the mistakes I have. Make a move. Peace.
Oh, and the taste thing. If you get tested and that goes away, you'll have proven it's anxiety. If you get tested and that doesn't go away, as you've been told, see your doctor.
Thank you. I understand what you have said and I agree. I have set up an appointment to see a psych that specializes in anxiety and will do my best to conquer my fear and get tested.
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