health anxiety/hypochondria, when to seek help

[rabbitrun]

I am having trouble regarding whether I should seek help. They say to just fight it. I did it before. But they somehow came back. The worries and fears.
Okay so here is what keeping me up:

1. I have an impacted wisdom tooth. They say to take it out. But I worry about surgery complications: nerve damage etc. I am worried that it might leave me in pain, if something bad happens. This has been going on for months. Having panic attacks when I think about it.

2. Going through the surgery in my state: a bundle of nerves, might do me harm. It might make recovery hard because I might be obsessing and anticipating that I will surely have complications after he wound heals. Me thinking it might make it happen. I tend to symptom check.

3. Should I go to surgery? Or not?

4. Should I seek mental health assistance or not?

5. Should I do item four first then three?

6. Should I do item three first then item four?

7. Or none of the above?

I feel like all my days are consumed with thinking about a darned tooth. sorry about this guys. But my brain just always thinks of the worst scenarios.

I hope someone could offer me some advice. PLease.

[Radical Goats]

Actually, freaking out about getting your wisdom teeth removed is not all that unusual, if you know what some of the risks are. Nerve damage is not what you have to worry about though - the big risk is that you'll have a bad reaction to the sedatives/anesthesia. My mother - who is an anesthesiologist - made sure that I had my wisdom tooth extraction done in a hospital, so that I could get help quickly if I stopped breathing or something. Everything went smoothly but I'm glad we played it safe. I was sore for about a week but I bounced back quickly. In the long term it was a good thing I got my impacted wisdom teeth removed because they were actually giving me headaches.

So here's my advice:

1. Get your wisdom teeth extracted, in a hospital, with an anesthesioloigist (or at least a nurse anesthetist) on hand.

2. Take some down time (about a week) to recover. Eat lots of sorbet, it helps.

3. If everything goes okay but you're still anxious - especially about stuff that didn't used to bother you - seek professional help. Don't be deterred by those people who say you should "just tough it out."

I hope that helps. Please let me know how it goes.

[fennec]

Rabbitrun, how has your anxiety been since you posted this?

I do think you should get mental health assistance. I find it useful to have that objective person to tell my worries to. And then maybe that person can walk you through the surgery decision?

I definitely identify with worrying about health related stuff. I'm dealing with a health related issue that has caused me a ton of anxiety. I ruminate about it constantly, even though it is a treatable thing and I'm treating it. But of course in my mind it will never get better and I beat myself up all the time for not getting help for it sooner, but anxiety was the reason I didn't do anything for so long. I could go on and on, and in my brain I do! It sucks.