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At some point in life we have all misdiagnosed ourselves with some type of sickness or illness that we never actually ended up having. Maybe your body ached and it was accompanied by a sore throat, so you thought you were coming down with the flu, but it passed and the next day you felt fine. Or a mole on your body appeared dark and abnormal, so you assumed it was cancerous, but when you got it checked the doctor said it was nothing to worry about. These things happen, especially in this day and age of instant information, Google search, and WebMD. However, if you constantly find yourself in situations like this, you may be a hypochondriac.
There are many misconceptions about hypochondria and it’s more than just thinking you’re always sick, it’s like that times a thousand. To be clear, the term Hypochondria is defined by the online Oxford English Dictionary as “abnormal anxiety about one’s health, especially with an unwarranted fear that one has a serious disease.” An individual who suffers from hypochondria is constantly preoccupied with thoughts and fears about whether or not they are ill, to the point that these worries negatively impact and interfere with their life. They often become obsessive over it and cannot clear their minds of irrational health fears. This manifests into repeated trips to doctors and other specialists in an attempt to get a diagnosis, but even with reassurance that there is no problem, they continue to worry and seek medical attention.
Hypochondria is often debilitating and exhausting, and it’s more common than you think. Psychologists, doctors, and other medical experts estimate that between 0.8% and 8.5% of the general U.S. Population suffer from hypochondria. It affects men and women equally and even though it appears most frequently in early adulthood, it can also appear at any age in life. So if you think that you might worry a little too much about your health, or others think that you do, you may want to take this quiz. It will help you get a better idea of whether or not you are showing signs of hypochondria, give it a try and pass it on.
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