Health anxiety, can be overwhelming and exhausting. For many, it can feel like a never ending spiral of worry about having, or developing a serious illness and can lead to a constant cycle of checking for symptoms, or seeking reassurance. For some, it can involve avoidance of visiting the GP or health professionals altogether. Despite medical reassurance and absence of significant health issues, the anxiety persists, and can have a significant impact on your overall life, wellbeing and happiness. If this resonates with you, know that you’re not alone – and there is hope.
Evidence-based therapies like Cognitive Behaviour Therapy (CBT), Compassion Focused Therapy (CFT), and Acceptance and Commitment Therapy (ACT) offer practical tools to break free from the cycle of health anxiety. Let's explore how these approaches can help you regain control and cultivate peace of mind.
Understanding Health Anxiety
Before diving into strategies, it's important to understand the nature of health anxiety. Often, it arises from an understandable desire to protect ourselves from harm. However, this protective instinct can become excessive, leading to:
Frequent body scanning for symptoms
Repeatedly seeking reassurance from doctors, family, or the internet
Avoiding medical appointments for fear of bad news
Difficulty concentrating on daily tasks due to preoccupation with health
Often our catastrophising worries, checking behaviours and bodily symptoms can keep us stuck in a vicious cycle that maintains the anxiety. For example, if you notice a new breathing pattern you may feel anxious, and search on google for reassurance. When we do search the internet, we feel reassured and our anxiety comes down. But our behaviour (google search) reinforces the anxiety over time, as our brain learns that we MUST check every bodily symptom. With the right support, these patterns can be changed.
Cognitive Behaviour Therapy (CBT): Challenging Thoughts
CBT is one of the most researched and effective treatments for health anxiety. It focuses on identifying and modifying unhelpful thoughts and behaviours that maintain anxiety. The below skills are developed alongside a therapist:
Cognitive Restructuring: Learn to recognise and challenge catastrophic thoughts (e.g., "This headache must mean I have a brain tumour"). Replace them with more balanced perspectives (e.g., "Headaches are common and usually harmless"). There are strategies that can help you develop skills in challenging your thoughts, such as asking yourself 'what would I say to a friend with this thought?'; or using the Judge Metaphor: Imagine your mind as a courtroom where negative thoughts are "on trial."
Each lawyer has to present evidence for and against the thought.
A neutral "Judge" evaluates the fairness and accuracy of the thought.
If the thought lacks solid evidence, the Judge dismisses it or reshapes it into a more balanced, rational belief.
This technique helps distance you from negative thinking, promoting objective reflection and reducing emotional distress.
Exposure Exercises: Gradually expose yourself to feared situations (like reading about illnesses or attending doctor’s appointments) without engaging in safety-seeking behaviours (such as Googling symptoms immediately after).
Behavioural Experiments: Test out your fears by conducting small experiments. For example, delay checking your symptoms and observe that the discomfort lessens over time.
Compassion Focused Therapy (CFT): Soothing the Inner Critic
CFT emphasises cultivating self-compassion and reducing shame, which often underlies health anxiety. This approach helps soften the self-critical voice that fuels worry and avoidance.
Compassionate Imagery: Visualise a compassionate figure (real or imagined) offering you comfort and reassurance during moments of anxiety. Take this image, or person, with you and imagine their response, and the calmness they bring..
Self-Compassion Breaks: Practice speaking to yourself with kindness, as you would to a close friend experiencing similar fears.
Emotional Regulation: Develop tools to calm your nervous system, such as deep breathing and grounding exercises, reducing the intensity of anxious states.
Acceptance and Commitment Therapy (ACT): Embrace Uncertainty
ACT teaches us to accept the presence of uncomfortable thoughts and feelings rather than struggling against them. The goal isn’t to eliminate anxiety but to create a meaningful life alongside it.
Defusion: Learn to "unhook" from anxious thoughts by observing them as passing mental events, rather than absolute truths. A common metaphor is The Passengers on a Bus: Imagine yourself driving a bus. Treat difficult thoughts as rowdy / annoying passengers. See if you can keep driving, rather than stopping when they want or trying to kick them off. Can you stay focused on driving
your bus safely to your destination?
Acceptance Practices: Allow anxiety to be present without resistance, noticing that it often fades when we stop fighting it. This involves developing a mindfulness practice with strategies such as focusing on the breath, using imagery such as leaves on the stream.
Values-Based Action: Identify your core values (such as health, connection, or curiosity) and take small, meaningful steps in alignment with these values, even in the presence of anxiety.
A Journey Toward Peace of Mind
Overcoming health anxiety is a journey, not a quick fix. It requires patience, persistence, and a willingness to face discomfort. Hopefully this article can provide you with some ideas or strategies to begin to face the Health Anxiety straight on. If you feel as though you would benefit from professional help, you can get in touch with us a The Lotus Psychology Practice, a team of qualified Clinical and Counselling Psychologists with expertise in supporting people in overcoming health anxiety.
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