HIS ILLNESS FEARS HAVE US ON EDGE

Dear Coleen

I’m a woman in my mid-40s and have two children aged seven and 10. I have a happy marriage – we’ve been together for 12 years. There’s only one problem – my husband is a hypochondriac and it’s getting to the point where it’s stressing out the whole family.

He’s at the doctor every five minutes with a new ailment and I’m losing sympathy with him, as he always comes back with a clean bill of health. He has taken a lot of time off work and our kids have started coming up with fake illnesses so as not to go to school.

To be fair to him, he does have an extremely stressful job with a lot of responsibility, but I think that’s what he needs to tackle.

He won’t accept it, though. How can I make him see sense?

Coleen says

Stress and anxiety could be manifesting themselves in these physical symptoms. It sounds as if he’s perhaps in denial that there’s potentially a psychological cause and he’s desperate to find a more explainable reason.

Suggest he goes back to his GP and talks about his lifestyle and how much pressure he’s under at work. You could even go with him.

If it does turn out to be anxiety then, until he deals with that, those feelings aren’t going to go away.

His doctor might suggest group or one-to-one cognitive behavioural therapy sessions – this is a very effective technique for overcoming anxiety.

Try to encourage him to be honest with you by letting him know that you’re not judging him and that you’re 100% behind him if he needs to make changes in his life. Perhaps he feels stuck in a rut, but feels under pressure to remain in his job because he has a family and needs to pay the bills.

Try to help him unravel how he feels to get to the real problem.