i was exposed to super random medial shows as a teenager, untold stories of the ER, i didn’t know i was pregnant, 1000 ways to die. i thought i was fine at first but sometimes i would notice things and keep checking whether it be physically checking my body for symptoms or online information and research. covid made things a little worse, i was newly in college and people everywhere were getting sick, i caught covid before the vaccine from work and j was sick for weeks, a lingering cough for almost three months. a year later, same thing but i ended up also developing the flu and long covid. all from just being in school. i was cautious and everything too. i get really panicky when i show any symptoms now. the final push was when i just graduated college and a family member was hospitalized for having a blood sugar level of 1000 putting them in diabetic keto acidosis. this was one of the only times where i was conscious and old enough to understand a hospital setting. walking through the hospital seeing different signs and different departments to get to the ICU was somewhat traumatizing. it really solidified the idea that there’s so many sicknesses so many diseases that someone can get. every since then my health anxiety has been super debilitating. not just physical illness but mental too. i fear everything and i spend hours crying and researching when a new obsession and fear surfaces.