Anxiety? or Heart related problems?

[bryanguy]

I am 25 year old healthy male.  i have been dealing with a wide variety of symptoms for over a year now, and i am not sure if it is all anxiety related or not.  some of the symptoms include:  chest pain, pain in my left side(rib cage area) feeling like my heart is stopping, dizziness, numbness in my lips and left arm, wierd heart beats, sluggishness, dizziness..  Naturally i feel like i have some sort of heart issues.  However i have been going to doctors contantly.  Going to urgent care many times, even the emergency room a few times.  I have had tons of EKG's, 2 stress tests, an Echo ultra sound, CT scan of my chest, ultra sound of my abdoman,  and countless blood tests of all sorts,  even had a 2 week heart monitoring device.  NOTHING at all from any of those tests.  So the doctors say that its just all anxiety but its a constant thing that i feel most every moment of the day,some type of symptoms.  Its so hard for me to get out of bed everyday, because the only time i feel close to normal is when im laying in bed.  I am fearful of getting out of bed and getting ready for the day because i know its just going to be another day of feeling horrible.  However i do it anyways because i have responsibilities. But i am in constant worry that i am going o have a heart attack or something is going to happen to me. I take anxiety medication,  (Ativan), and sometimes that helps me out, sometimes it doesnt, but regardless of whether i take it or not, i always feel these symptons in some way or another.  I used to exercise on a regular basis at the gym.  Now i barely do anything because i am scared that i will bring on some type of symptoms. and often time it does when im exercising now.  Bottom line is, this is causing me so much grief and i cannot enjoy my life at all, and i just dont know what to do, or what my exact problem is.  Does anybody have any advice or any idea what they think these symptoms might be from?  If its just anxiety thats great, but why do i feel symptoms constantly rather than just little bouts at  a time?  Please someone respond and help me out.  Thank you.

[pookie970]

what great advice i feel the same way

[cj29]

My initial anxiety came from concerns with my heart.  Your experience mirrors so many of ours here on the forum.  I went through multiple test that said my heart was fine, but I did not believe my doctors one bit.  My 'what if?' thinking would take over and I knew they were wrong because I was constantly feeling symptoms like yours.  Remember, that when we suffer from anxiety, especially health anxiety, we tend to focus on the symptoms that justify our thoughts.  In my opinion, we tend to catastrophicsize and we misinterpret even normal everyday symptoms.  I still feel every heartbeat, palpatation, and can see my pulse throughout my body, but have learned that it is a normal day to day function and it is a good thing that my heart beats strong:).

Have you sought help for your anxiety?  Counseling can do wonders for what you are experiencing in my opinion.  Only by accepting and confronting this will you get over it in the long term.  I went what you are going through awhile back, so please know that it does get MUCH better and can be confronted and you can thrive with this..keep us posted!