Health anxiety can hit hard, especially when a body sensation feels unfamiliar or a medical article sends your mind racing. For many men, the fear isn’t just “What if I’m sick?” It’s also “What if I die?” or “What if I miss something serious?”
At Guy Counseling in Chicago, health anxiety therapy for men focuses on helping you respond to illness fears, body scanning, reassurance seeking, and death anxiety in a more grounded way.
Sessions are available in person at the Chicago office and by secure video when appropriate.
What Is Health Anxiety?
Health anxiety involves persistent worry about having or developing a serious illness — and that worry can continue even after a doctor has offered reassurance. Some estimates suggest roughly 12% of the population deals with health anxiety in some form.
People may scan their body, research symptoms online, seek repeated reassurance, or avoid medical care altogether. The older term “hypochondriasis” is sometimes still used, but it carries stigma — most clinicians today use “health anxiety” or “illness anxiety” instead.
Health anxiety is not “being dramatic.” It’s an anxiety loop that can make normal body sensations feel threatening.
How Health Anxiety Shows Up in Men
• Privately Googling symptoms late at night
• Checking pulse, skin, breathing, lymph nodes, digestion, or pain
• Fearing cancer, heart problems, neurological disease, or sudden death
• Feeling embarrassed to talk about the worry out loud
• Avoiding doctors out of fear of what they might find
• Repeatedly seeking medical reassurance, without it fully sticking
• Worrying more after a family member’s illness or death
• Misreading panic sensations as medical danger
• Using alcohol, work, exercise, or distraction to avoid the fear
Health Anxiety and Fear of Death
Death anxiety, sometimes called thanatophobia, can sit underneath health anxiety. Some men fear not just illness itself, but loss of control, leaving loved ones behind, unfinished business, or uncertainty about what happens after death.
Counseling can help you talk about these fears directly — without being dismissed or treated like the worry itself is the problem.
What Can Trigger Health Anxiety?
• A past illness or medical scare
• Illness or death of a loved one
• Family history of disease
• Chronic stress
• Panic attacks or intense body sensations
• Frequent online symptom searching
• Aging and midlife transitions
• Unresolved grief
• Perfectionism or a strong need for control
How Counseling Can Help
My approach draws on several evidence-based tools, including CBT strategies for catastrophic thinking, ACT for tolerating uncertainty and living according to your values, mindfulness and body awareness without slipping into compulsive checking, and practical work on reducing reassurance-seeking loops and building stress regulation skills. Exposure-based techniques may be used when appropriate.
Some clients also find guided relaxation or hypnosis-informed techniques helpful for calming the body’s physical anxiety response — these are used as optional supporting tools, not the core of treatment. Some research suggests relaxation training combined with CBT can help lessen the impact of health anxiety.
With your written permission, I’m glad to coordinate with your physician when that’s helpful. The goal isn’t to ignore real medical concerns — the goal is to help you build healthier ways of responding to fear and uncertainty.
The goal is not to stop caring about your health. The goal is to stop letting fear run the entire system.
Medical Care Still Matters
Health anxiety therapy is not a substitute for medical care. New, severe, or concerning symptoms should always be discussed with a physician. Counseling can help with the anxiety cycle that may continue after medical evaluation or reassurance — doctors address the body, therapy helps with the fear cycle.
In-Person and Video Sessions
Guy Counseling offers counseling for men in Chicago, with sessions available in person at the Lakeview office (Park Place Tower, at Irving Park Road and Pine Grove Avenue) and by secure video when appropriate.
My Background
I’m a licensed psychotherapist in Illinois with a PhD in Psychology, board-certified as a clinical hypnotherapist, and experienced in working with anxiety, fear, stress, and men’s counseling more broadly. You can read more on my bio page.
If health anxiety, illness fears, or worries about death have been taking up too much mental space, counseling may help. Guy Counseling offers counseling services for men in Chicago, with sessions available in person and by secure video when appropriate.
My ability to book new clients is limited. If I’m unable to work with you because of scheduling, I’m happy to refer you to a professional experienced with health anxiety and death fear counseling.
Frequently Asked Questions
Is health anxiety the same as hypochondria?
Health anxiety is the more current and less stigmatizing term. Older terms like hypochondria or hypochondriasis have been used in the past, but many clinicians now use “health anxiety” or “illness anxiety.”
Can therapy help with fear of dying?
Therapy may help men talk more directly about death fears, uncertainty, control, grief, and the anxiety patterns that can attach to health concerns.
Should I still see a doctor?
Yes. Health anxiety therapy is not a substitute for medical care. New, severe, or concerning symptoms should be discussed with a qualified medical professional.
Why do I keep Googling symptoms?
Symptom searching can temporarily reduce anxiety, but it often strengthens the worry cycle over time. Counseling can help you reduce reassurance-seeking patterns like this one.
Do you offer in-person and video sessions?
Yes. Sessions may be available in person at the Chicago office and by secure video when appropriate.
If you think you are having a medical or psychiatric emergency, call 911 immediately or go to the nearest emergency room. I am not a medical doctor and do not diagnose medical conditions. Health anxiety counseling is not a substitute for medical care — all medical concerns should be reported to your physician.
