"IT'S NOT A TUMOR!" - Arnold Schwarzenegger

     Yes, I am one of those people that thinks a head ache means a brain tumor and a stomach ache means appendicitis. Whatever the worst possible scenario is, that's what's happening to me. In my lifetime I've been "afflicted" with scurvy, kidney stones, cataracts,  multiple heart attacks, and anything you can imagine that wouldn't even make sense for an 18 year old girl to have. I remember overhearing my grandmother say that a distant relative was diagnosed with prostate cancer. Me, being about 10 years old and an already suffering from anxiety and hypochondria, said, "Oh no.....I might have that." Then my grandmother had to delicately explain to me that prostate cancer was something only boys could get. I didn't understand why until I realized that prostate was a fancy doctor term for male genitalia. So at 10 years old, while all the other children were playing and eating dirt (I don't know what kids do) I was worried about getting prostate cancer *face palms past self* Eight years later and nothing has changed. Well except now I know to research diseases before openly expressing that I have them in front of my family.

     To make matters worse, I also have a fear of the doctor. I only make doctor's appointments when it's absolutely necessary and there is no way out of it. This fear probably stems from the fact that I like to live in denial. "Was that a sharp pain in my side? Let's pretend that didn't happen while I'm actually subconsciously obsess over it until I forget about it an hour later." The truth is, if there's something actually wrong with me, I really don't want to know about it. I know that sounds dumb considering if I just go to the doctor they can probably fix whatever's wrong with me instead of it festering in my body and growing worse until it kills me. But I like to live life the fun way. And yes I do mean fun. You see, now I can play all sorts of games like "What disease could this be?" and "How long do I have to live?" These games are made possible by the various sites Google has provided me from searching my symptoms. Web Md is bookmarked on all of my devices and it's my most frequented site. Which is such a mistake if you have anxiety and are plagued with thoughts of disease. At one point I needed an intervention and my family made me delete the symptom checker app I had on my phone.

     But let me explain to you my screwed up logic behind my constant need to identify with medical ailments. In my mind, I feel that if I think of all the horrific possibilities that my ailment could be, then none of those will come true. You know all of those Facebook articles you read that are about some horrific disease that takes over someone's life? Well in those articles the person affected always says, "I just never saw this coming" or "I had no idea" or something that shows the disease just came out of the blue. So in my head, I've equated that with if I can think about every worst case scenario for my ailment then it couldn't possibly be that because the worst ones always sneak up on you. So if I expect to have a brain tumor everyday then I have a better chance of it not happening. I mean, what are the odds? .....probably really high now that I said that. You have to admit.....it kind of makes sense right? Yea....probably not. Anyway, I've been thinking about this because I'm starting college and I'm required to go to the doctors. My appointment is tomorrow and, as you can tell, I'm  not looking forward to it. But hopefully they'll say I'm as healthy as a horse and I can go on living in denial and ignoring that suspicious looking mole.

                                                Until next time,

                                                            Go eat a pineapple and avoid Web Md