Surgery

Feeling pretty good, except tomorrow I have to go for a cataract surgery pre op check up. Hopefully it won’t be a big deal, but am anxious because of my OCD. Just worried about my Blood Pressure, which is normally a little elevated, but overall I feel fine. I get very anxious obviously because of the OCD. Hopefully all goes well.

I need to vent to someone, anyone who would understand. I turned 37 yesterday I had a great birthday except for the fact I was scarily bloated and felt like I couldn't breathe most of the day. I have a bad gallbladder and I've had stones since at least 2011 but I rarely have issues with it. I haven't had an attack in 5 years and recently I got a scan on my abdomen because I started counting calories in early March to try and lose weight and that is the only time I have gallbladder issues is when I'm eating less calories and exercising. I'm not like most people who get attacks when they eat junk food. So I started getting symptoms and I went in for a scan and it came back abnormal and I was supposed to have a video visit with the doctor on Tuesday but I moved it to Friday (tomorrow) because I didn't want bad news before my birthday. I CAN NOT stop ruminating about this and I compulsively Google and read reddit posts about people who had their gallbladder out and how much pain they were in and how much they regret it and have chronic diarrhea. I learned about a gallbladder flush in early 2021 but have been to scared to do that and I'm in a fb group with a lot of people who do the flushes and even some have said a stone has gotten stuck while doing it and it was EXTREMELY painful (if you've had gallbladder attacks you know. So now I'm literally spiraling in my head about how if I do the flush a stone could get stuck and it will be emergency surgery or If I don't try a flush I'll have to have surgery anyway. Like the flush feels like a literal mental block I can't get past. There's an ER across the street but I literally went in the other day cause I was feeling super bloated after having starbucks and felt short of breath. I asked the lady if I needed emergency surgery if they could do it there and she said no they would have to transport me and the nearest hospital is 10 minutes away. Another roadblock to keep me from even wanting to attempt a flush. Gallbladder issues run in my family. My mom had hers out when she had me and back then in the 80s it was a huge surgery and she even has a big scar down her stomach. My aunt and uncle got theirs out and they both regret it. Everything I've read online scares the shit outta me. I've started taking my supplements to try and heal me and I'm going to be trying to clean up my diet. I stopped drinking alcohol 9 months ago. Anyway, tonight my mom got into it with me cause I live with her cause my mutiple health problems and she said she's sick of hearing about my health issues and she told me she talked behind my back about me to her friends at the dog park and about how I made my birthday all about me. What she was saying is I kept complaining about my gallbladder and her friend said "oh that's how they are at that age, she's a teenager right?" And my mom said "no, she's almost 40." It made me feel like absolute dog *sh*t and I just went into the bathroom and broke down in tears and started looking up apartments. I have been living here for 4 years and I can't seem to get better to get a job and move out. I'm so sick of my mom and my family not understanding or even trying to understand how hard it is living with anxiety and OCD. I have such a legit fear of surgery that I passed on ankle surgery 4 years ago despite being told I'll probably have ankle arthritis some day and need either an ankle replacement or ankle fusion. I had my wisdom teeth out in 2014 that's the only surgery I've ever had an even though I had no pain afterwards I still dealt with a bunch of bs and I'm just not mentally, physically or emotionally strong enough to do it. I guess I'll just go back to shutting my mouth and talking to a.i. about my health scares cause at 37 years old I've just learned that no one gives an f about you and you just gotta learn to suck it up and put on your big boy pants. I just feel so stuck and defeated everyone 😔

2 days ago I decided that I will do my bloodtest, last time i was in 2017 and for some reason when i stood up I started to feel dizzy and I couldnt see anything, I didnt fainted but i was close to it,the nurses quickly layed me down, and then i was fine, but the whole day my body was shaking. I was afraid of blood test, and i always avoided it, but my health anxiety got worse cause i was afraid everytime that i have cancer but i cant check it cause im afraid of bloodtests. This year i had to do other medical tests and now they asked me to do bloodtest too, and 2 days ago i said okay this week i will face this fear. And i felt excitet, motivated and happy that finally i will face my fear. I did not cared if i faint cause it might not happen but if does I can handle it, i will feel good after i wake up. But someone after some hours, the fears came up, and i wanted to face them (cause people say you need to challenge the thoughts) so i tried to challenge them and find ways that i will handle those scenarios, but after time i got stressed cause i didnt know how to respond. If i faint and then vomit and feel sick and vomit alot of times cause im also panicking to the point they have to take me to the hospital... this jist scared me. I dont know how to handle that panic. The body will react to the blooddrown so either way i will feel bad. And im afraid of it and I cant deal with that fear.I dont know what to do if i will feel sick the whole day, if i will vomit the whole day and faint because of stress. This might be catastrophising but now these thoughts comes up, if i imagine myself being there and getting my blood drawned, i imediatelly feel the panic and these scenarios come up and then i dont know what to do so i just panic... Last night i asked help from others and it helped that some said that its pretty rare that you will vomit after blooddrawn, people who do are sick already or they are really scared. And this made me feel good but then i read about it and i found out that its pretty common that people faint, or vomit or fo both after blooddrawn... and now im just thinking about not going... i cant deal with it cause idk what to do. Breathing techniques didnt worked for me, if im panicking and i try to relax by breathing, i get more stressed cause my brain knows i do it to calm down and the panic is a danger so i get more panic... idk what to do.