Why can't i just believe Dr's etc? I have had a left sided back ache for about 6 weeks and i keep prodding and twisting my torso and convincing myself it's my lung because it hurts sometimes at the end of my breath. I saw an osteopath yesterday who said she could feel all my left side wasn't right and my rib was locked. I kept saying to her so it isn't my lung and she said no i can feel it's skeletal. I believed it coming home but this morning it's worse and i am worrying it's my lung again. Why do i always think the worst, it's awful.
At least you
know you're thinking the worst, aware that it's not the pain per se but what you're
thinking about it that is the biggest problem right now, because our thoughts are the one thing (almost the only thing!) we can have any sort of control over. I read once that we can only have one thought at a time (despite all the noise about multi-tasking). So if you distract yourself (in various ways), then the negative thinking will stop, because you can't think 2 things at the same time.
Invisible Woman has some good suggestions for doing this. Meditating helps me calm my mind. And reading fun trashy books or a good murder mystery. And watching Jane the Virgin on Netflix - one of the funniest series out there.
When you're thinking the worst about something, you're invariably thinking about the future. If you train yourself to stay in the moment, now (and meditation is very good for this), then the worry basically stops. It's non-productive anyways. I'm not religious but like this saying anyways: if you worry, why pray? and if you pray, worry? Actually worry is about the most useless thing to do - it accomplishes nothing and just paralyzes us and makes us feel awful.
And yes, I'm sure addressing the issue may help - let the osteopath know it's worse and see what she says. I would assume she has some sort of treatment plan in mind. When I cracked a rib, it definitely hurt when I breathed and it lasted for several weeks so it makes perfect sense to me that your problem could be a rib.