I know, how dare she! If you can’t tell, I say that tongue in cheek. I came up with the concept during a session with her a couple weeks back. I often have pains in my body or uneasy feelings. And typically, this triggers anxiety for me. Not knowing what it is, I usually assume it’s the worst.

I hear people that have had cancer or survived a heart attack talk about the symptoms they first felt or ignored. So now I am always wondering “Is this the first sign of [fill in the blank]”. Without knowledge, I start to build up anxiety because of the unknown.

So, I came up with the concept, sort of jokingly, of having a doctor follow me around and at any moment I could ask the doctor to evaluate me to make sure I am ok. Besides the feasibility of this, my therapist told me I should not do this (which I did not take kindly to). However, I heard her out.

She told me that this could actually lead to more anxiety in the future. It would end up just being a crutch to help me avoid the anxiety in the short term. I needed to let myself process the anxiety and learn from the situation that I am ok. I do not love this concept because if you are like me and have felt the panic from anxiety, there is nothing more in the world that you want than to get rid of that feeling and just feel normal again.

That being said I am going to try to comprehend the concept that she was trying to teach me. Avoidance will not solve my problem; it will only make it worse in the long run. So for now, I will not hire a doctor to follow me around 24/7 (never mind the fact that I cannot afford it)!