Is this health ocd?

Maybe it is, maybe it isn't. The thing is if you're in therapy you should speak to your therapist about it and ask them. OCD can and will change themes. It is all handled similarly (different exposures same thought). I am a paramedic with somatic and health concern ocd as a main theme. I can relate to what you're saying. Talk to someone... this maybe something else. Don't let it take your career but keep yourself healthy. The job is taxing and as a care taker you know how important self care is. Stay strong and seek professional advice.

For example, I recently saw a tiktok where someone was explaining how hard it is for them to answer the question “how are you doing today?” because even on the best day they’re still in a lot of pain and I could feel panic flare in my chest. It made me feel like what is the point of continuing to live if that is what your life is like? Why keep going everyday if it’s always just going to be pain? How do you not spend every second angry? Then that thought brought on another wave of fear at having to mourn a previously pain-free life. A week ago I would have NEVER felt that way, but now I can’t comprehend thinking any differently. Again, I have chronic mental illnesses and I’ve been through the experience a life without trauma, but it didn’t make my feel anything close to the amount of fear I have right now. I’ve always felt rather matter of fact about health, including my own, but now the idea of being sick or dying is horrifying. This is especially hard because I’m a healthcare worker, so I face this reality everyday. I used to be able to feel empathy and compassion for people in that position while still understand that life has meaning and you can choose to find joy. Now, I can’t look at a chronically sick person without feeling such an overwhelming amount of fear, both for them and myself. It’s debilitating and I don’t know what to do because I thought I’d finally found my calling working in medicine.

Another example is seeing someone say the way they deal with anxiety and pain from illness is by imagining what they will do once their pain is gone. The person who said this acknowledged that it may be unrealistic/idealistic to think this way, but that it helps. This caused another bout of spiraling and anxiety. I know a week ago seeing a post like this wouldn’t have bothered me, but now my brain is screaming at me to tell me this is one of the worst things imaginable. It feels like I don’t even have access to my thoughts or beliefs from a week ago, and like I’m struggling to understand why this thought didn’t scare me last week. My biggest concern is that I’ll never be able to reshape my thinking to what it was previously, and I’ll live in this state of fear that keeps me from doing my job. I liked the way I thought better before, and saying that triggers my ocd and makes me think you’re never going to get better and the only thing you can do is move forward now. What if I liked the way I used to think better but can never go back to it, which resembles my exact fear with getting a chronic illness diagnosis.