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Struggling with constant symptom checking, Googling, or fear of serious illness? This book is for you. Written by two anxiety therapists that have been through it themselves, The Disordered Guide to Health Anxiety offers a clear, practical way out of the health anxiety cycle. No fluff. No false promises. Just insights and straight-talking support from two people that have been there.
The Disordered Guide to Health Anxiety is an easy to read, friendly guide through the different variations of health anxiety commonly seen, the mechanics that drive health anxiety, and the basic effective principles for understanding and overcoming health anxiety that have been proven over decades of clinical work worldwide.
We follow five health anxiety archetypes, using fictional characters to illustrate how health anxiety shows up in daily life for different people with different backgrounds and primary concerns. You'll meet:
- Sanjay: The Resource Gatherer. Sanjay spends a huge amount of time and energy compulsively gathering health related information. He's always looking for information and needs the right information at just the right time from just the right sources to feel OK about his health.
- Maisie: The Avoider. Maisie is obsessed with health concerns and fears, but won't go near a doctor's office and avoids anything even remotely related to health, disease, or dying. Maisie doesn't talk about her health or ask for constant reassurance. That's too scary for her. She tries to ignore her health anxiety but suffers in silence.
- Rachel: The Protector. Rachel isn't worried about her own health. Her health anxiety is focused on the health of others. Rachel is driven by health fears for her loved ones. She sees herself as doing the right thing - protecting them through her health related compulsions.
- Adam: The Optimizer. Adam's health anxiety looks like wellness, but his obsession with avoiding illness drives compulsive attempts to optimize, hack, and micromanage every aspect of his physiology. At face value Adam seems to be making good choices, but he is living in fear all the time, terrified of what might happen if he doesn't find the best and latest bio-hacks for preventing cancer or other illnesses.
- Buck: The Threat Monitor. Buck's health anxiety is focused on his mental health, not his physical health. Poor Buck is trapped in a virtually endless cycle of mental health focused fear, followed by a storm of mental compulsions that involve checking his thoughts, his emotions, and his cognitive functions for signs of insanity, dementia, or other catastrophe.
We're also looking at the difference between assurance and reassurance, how feedback from loved ones that "don't understand" can actually be helpful, and the role of attention, fear, and courage in the process of overcoming health anxiety. If you're familiar with the Disordered podcast, you won't be surprised to find a bit of humor and a healthy helping of compassionate encouragement woven throughout.
The Disordered Guide to Health Anxiety is the first book in the Disordered Library (our next book will focus on depersonalization and derealization). We're really happy with the way this one turned out. If you do decide to get the book feel free to tag us on social media with any pictures or posts you might make about it. As always, we're eager to hear and feedback you may have. Feel free to drop us an email or a voicemail here on the website and we'll be sure to check them all.
Thanks as always for your support. We appreciate it.
Josh & Drew