How do you navigate triggers on the internet?
How do you deal with using the internet as someone with severe health anxiety? It has come to a point where I am scared to google ANYTHING regardless of what it is about. For context, my biggest fear is me or someone I love getting cancer. My dad died from stomach cancer, my grandma got diagnosed about a year ago and has been very sick. Since then, I see it everywhere. I am NOT seeking it out. It will be ridiculous things like looking for a recipe on reddit and someone will be in the comments "I like this channel on yt with awesome recipes, unfortunately they got cancer now and are in hospital" Or I will watch videos on Youtube about mysteries and the top comment will be "I'm dying of cancer and your videos make my day". This happens to me MULTIPLE times a day everywhere I browse, even when none of it has anything to do with illnesses. Nevermind it extending to my offline life where people in public transport next to me will have no other topics than cancer. X just got diagnosed, X just died of etc, it's everywhere on the internet?
Does anyone else struggle with this and most importantly, have you found a way to deal with it? I already keep scrolling past as soon as i see the c word but it hits me in the face out of nowhere all the time and then it's already too late, damage done.
Is the only way to just stop using the internet alltogether??
Posted Aug 11, 2025, 1:23 PM UTC