In psychology, it is believed that hypochondria is not just a depressed state (not to be confused with depression!), But an obsessive search in the body for severe, even fatal ailments, the desire to get rid of them.
Any symptoms are considered by the hypochondriac as a manifestation of a terrible, incurable disease. The reasons lie in the personality traits when the psyche is disturbed.
Hypochondria Symptoms and Treatment
In order for the treatment to be successful, the doctor carries out an examination, identifies the causes of neurosis (somatic, mental). Excessive suspiciousness of the patient psychologically exhausts him and deprives of strength.
Causes of Hypochondria
It is impossible to clearly determine the causes of the disorder, when increased fear for health manifests itself in too bright a form.
The psychotherapist treats hypochondria as a panic condition resulting from:
- synchronous disturbances in the cerebral cortex;
- initial manifestations of symptoms of neurosis, psychosis;
- malfunctioning of organs that send distorted impulses to the brain;
- excessive suspiciousness of a patient who can no longer control himself and deal with the manifestation of symptoms;
- when people suffer from old age;
- The reason may be defects in education, physical abuse, or serious illness.
How does hypochondria manifest symptoms and signs
Hypochondria is emotional. He accurately names and colorfully presents the symptoms and causes of a supposedly serious illness that must be dealt with, seeks to get rid of it.
He is sure that urgent diagnosis and treatment is necessary. The situation is aggravated by the availability of medical information, an abundance of drug advertising, and spectacular television programs about unexplored diseases that cannot be cured, since their symptoms are difficult to recognize.
Sometimes a healthy person, under the influence of stress, begins to search for unreasonable symptoms of an imaginary illness, which may not exist at all, but which must be treated. However, this hypochondria is a disorder akin to painful mania.
There are several types disease:
1. Obsessive. The presence of constant concern about their own body, which a person cannot cope with on his own. In an obsessive form, the patient does not seek to cure a possible ailment, many of his experiences are characterized as hypothetical.
2. Overvalued. Exaggerated health care, the desire to get rid of contrived diseases by any method: folk, unconventional, self-treatment. The slightest indisposition is perceived as a dangerous disorder requiring immediate treatment.
3. Crazy. Symptoms: pathological ideas, hallucinations, depression. The attack of anxiety for health can lead (rarely) to suicide as an occasion to get rid of suffering.
How to treat hypochondria
Treatment takes place in stages. Psychotherapy is prescribed to help get rid of anxious thoughts and stress. Then medications are applied to fight the neurotic causes of neurosis. Drug treatment means eliminating the causes of the disorder.
For example, anti-neurosis drugs, anti-depressants are prescribed to relieve stress. With severe manifestations, a real threat to health, treatment takes place in the hospital. Specific means that will help get rid of the disease, no.
Hypochondria how to get rid yourself
Treatment at home is reduced to the provision of comprehensive support, attention, help of loved ones. Disbelief in the existence of symptoms of the disease exacerbates the problem, the patient “winds up” himself, falls ill for real, or tries to get rid of a fictional disease in various, not always safe, ways.
It is recommended to avoid watching medical TV programs, relevant literature, talking about the course of the disease among friends.
Excellent distracts from the search for a new disease in his exciting hobby so that there is no time left for complaints. Needlework, cooking, creativity, home pet, sports - choose any activity that truly interest the hypochondria, diversify his life.
It will take time and patience for the hypochondria syndrome to go away, and the person will constantly stop being afraid of getting sick.
Treatment of hypochondria with folk remedies
The question is often asked: how to defeat a hypochondria without medication? Cooked self-soothing infusions with mint, motherwort, aniseed seeds, Eleutherococcus roots, hop cones will help. It is advised to make a tonic decoction of Echinacea.
The recipe for preparing the infusion, decoction is described on the package or in the enclosed instructions for herbs. Helps to fight ice douche in the morning, which is well treated stress. The benefit for the whole organism is obvious here, plus the procedure has an impressive psychotherapeutic effect.
Hypochondria diagnostics
Complaints of the patient are compared with the real state of his health, for which a medical examination is carried out. The main focus is on the organ that the patient considers problematic (for example, the heart).
In the absence of pathologies, the psychotherapist makes a diagnosis, offers treatment, designed to get rid of the root causes of the conviction that there is a serious threat to life.
