Get Premium
Dark mode theme is available exclusively for premium users. Learn more about the benefits of subscribing.
No fees, cancel anytime.
Dark Mode 
No fees, cancel anytime 
Have you ever gotten a diagnosis from a doctor, but felt that something was not quite right? Like, it didn't make sense that it's the thing that's burdening you, and that it could be something more serious than that.
Well, if you didn't -- consider yourself lucky. At least luckier than the netizens from today's list -- they were once told that their symptoms were "just" anxiety, and it took them a long time to find the real truth.
More info: Reddit
This post may include affiliate links.
#1
Coeliac disease. A decade of trying all kinds of meds and having counsellors telling me I must be anxious *about* something, panic attacks don’t just come out of nowhere.
Turns out untreated autoimmune disorders wreck your nervous system 👍.
RELATED:
#2
Well, a woman I knew kept having pain around her jaws for weeks and later on a crushing feeling on her chest. Everyone said she probably had anxiety or maybe tooth pain. Turns out she was having a heart attack. Heart attack can apparently show up as jaw pain or toothache too!!
When you go to a doctor with a complaint, you expect them to provide you with a fitting diagnosis. Then, once you get it, a plan for healing/help can begin. Yet, such a plan of action works properly only in cases when the diagnosis is right.
Studies show that there is around a 10-15% medical diagnostic error rate. If you take this percentage to the United States, it translates into 100-200 million errors per year. Sounds pretty horrific, doesn’t it?
#4
Infertility caused by endometriosis. I’ve since lost organs due to the disease. I was told I wasn’t trying hard enough to get pregnant and should relax. I only got diagnosed when I had an ovarian cyst rupture.
#5
Complex trauma due to neglect beginning in infancy and throughout my childhood. I also learned how common it is for neglected children to not recognise that the way they were treated was negligent. .
#6
Cancer.
Neuroendocrine Tumor, specifically.
Luckily slow growing and removed with one surgery.
Took ten years to get a proper diagnosis. Shocking the Lexapro didn't fix it.
Don’t fret – not all of these errors are serious. Only about 10 million of them result in death or disability. Okay, the word “only” might not be the best fit here, as even one serious harm is too much, but you get what we wanted to express with it, don’t you?
Someone getting misdiagnosed with anxiety happens more often than you might think. In fact, there’s a whole list of conditions that get mistaken for it. It includes rather common things such as endometriosis, inflammatory bowel disease, fibromyalgia, and less heard of conditions such as inappropriate sinus tachycardia or Postural orthostatic tachycardia syndrome.
#7
Anemia due to internally hemorrhaging stomach ulcers and Endometriosis. I kept telling my Dr that I had an impending sense of doom I was going to die but he just sent me to a therapist instead. One day I fainted on the street and nearly bled out and needed 2 blood transfusions to stabilize. The ulcers were caused by taking NSAIDs for my Endo pain. It's actually really common for women to have hidden iron deficiency (you can have normal HGB but low ferritin) and a lot of the symptoms mimic anxiety (panic attacks, heart palpations, shortness of breath, insomnia, stomach pain, headaches, vertigo & dizziness, blurred vision, random muscle spasms etc.).
#8
Multiple sclerosis , my doctor made me feel like i was losing my mind before i got diagnosed at ER.
#9
My wife was misdiagnosed with Panic Disorder for a long time. Turns out it was Epilepsy and she was having seizures, not panic attacks.
For more examples, you can check out the list we created today – it’s full of stories from the internet.
But why does anxiety disorder get mixed up with all these various diseases so often? Well, you see, anxiety symptoms overlap with many of those of other medical issues, driving doctors to make wrong assumptions when they’re presented. The assumption is made even quicker if the patient already has a history of mental illnesses, mostly anxiety itself.
#10
I knew a guy who kept saying that he was having heart attacks. The doctors kept saying anxiety.
He found out years later, he had had about 10 small heart attacks.
#12
Diagnosed with brain tumor twice. Both times I did not feel normal. Consistent headaches, forgetfulness, loss of time, balance issues, ears ringing, mood swings (one minute happy as a clam, the next I am crying) and extreme fatigue but not normal fatigue. Simply cutting the grass would put me down for two days.
The first time my doctor blamed it on anxiety, then depression, then "you are just getting older, try exercising more". This went on for two years until I had a spell while grocery shopping where I don't recall walking through an entire department and finally come to and hear my daughter yelling "dad are you ok". I went to the doctor the next day and said I was not leaving until we find out what is wrong. One MRI later we find a tumor at the base of my brain wrapped around the nerves and spinal cord. Had surgery a month later and they removed it all.
Two years later all of the symptoms came back and I asked for another MRI and we found I had a clival chordoma which is a super rare bone cancer of the skull/brain. It's so rare they call us the 1 in a million g**g because that is the ratio of being diagnosed with a chordoma. I had surgery to remove the tumor but unfortunately it entered my dura and spine so it will more than likely spread.
Long story short, you know your body and you know when something is off. Don't brush it off and don't let others dismiss it either. Be your own advocate for your health and tell your doctors what you feel you need. If they disagree or gaslight you find a new doctor. They call it practicing medicine for a reason and most of the time they are basing your diagnosis on the first search of WebMD or clinical reference that matches most of your symptoms.
Of course, not only are symptom lists to blame here. The lack of knowledge by clinicians and limited time with patients can play a part in it, too. Essentially, some doctors might lean towards diagnosing anxiety because it seems like the simplest explanation for vague symptoms.
Then, there’s a whole other problem of women specifically getting misdiagnoses because doctors don’t take them seriously – something people dub as medical gaslighting. Basically, when women come with complaints, they get written off for weight gain, imagination, and mental health.
#13
HAHA I am female and have multiple autoimmune conditions so you're describing the last 2 decades of my life with 50% of my new doctors. 20 years ago "anxiety" turned out to be what I told them I had - but it took 6 specialists and a smart one to finally agree.
Funny how my dad and grandma have the same condition (psoriatic arthritis) and I had most of the textbook symptoms, but hey, here's a Lexapro.
And so, both medical gaslighting and anxiety misdiagnosis cases eventually lead to patients suffering longer than they have to without proper treatment. This can result not only in harmed health but in people forming distrust in clinicians, discouraging them from seeking further care.
Have you ever been misdiagnosed with anxiety or anything else? Share your story in the comments!
#16
Perimenopause. My first symptoms were heart palpitations. I thought I was having heart attacks. My doctor brushed it off as anxiety.
#17
Chronic migraine with aura, pelvic floor dysfunction, chronic intermittant acid reflux, and sleep apnea.
I kept being told that my aura symptoms were something that I was imagining due to anxiety for years until I finally saw a neurologist. It turned out that I wasn't imagining the vertigo, visual changes, sensory sensitivities, motor difficulties, tinnitus, or numbness, tingling, and weakness. This is all my migraine aura.
'Anxiety' is a common assumption for any symptom for women.
#19
A heart condition called premature ventricular contractions that causes a fluttering feeling in the heart.
The tricky thing was that the heart condition triggered medical anxiety for me, so I *was* experiencing anxiety...but there was a root cause.
#20
Optic neuritis. Doctor told me to go have a beer. In his defense I wasn't presenting with pain, just blindness(which should have sent me immediately to the hospital but wherever) I kinda enjoyed the beer, as much as you can when you are terrified you can't see anymore lol.
#22
First time- some flavor of tachycardia. Something’s wrong, they’re not sure exactly what, but they’ve confirmed it’s not only anxiety.
Second time- kidney stone.
#25
A bad gallbladder. It was also anxiety but anxiety wasn't making me puke everyday, my gallbladder was. My anxiety does give me a tummy ache sometimes but not debilitating like my gallbladder was.
Explore more of these tags
What do you think ?
Michael Largey 5 months ago
My dad's doctor told him those massive headaches he was suffering from were "just stress". We found out it was a brain aneurism - after the autopsy.
Lee Gilliland 5 months ago (edited)
Any bets 3/4 of these are female? Mine was, for the few that don't know, I was six months pregnant with 1/4 of a single ovary and the doctors, plural, diagnosed me as having an ulcer!
Michael Largey 5 months ago
My dad's doctor told him those massive headaches he was suffering from were "just stress". We found out it was a brain aneurism - after the autopsy.
Lee Gilliland 5 months ago (edited)
Any bets 3/4 of these are female? Mine was, for the few that don't know, I was six months pregnant with 1/4 of a single ovary and the doctors, plural, diagnosed me as having an ulcer!
Related on Bored Panda
