How to Stop Making a Mountain Out of a Molehill with Chronic Illness

Worrying about daily tasks and the future can be a difficult cycle to break when you live with a chronic illness. These tips can help you calm your mind and manage your emotions.

For those of us with a chronic illness, you know that depression and anxiety often come with it. I have a chronic illness that affects me every day. Sometimes, I find myself cycling through depression and anxiety when it comes to the big impact my condition has on my day-to-day life.

I grieve for the person I was before I was diagnosed, and I also have great worries about my future. This cycle can be vicious and often seems impossible to break.

If you’re at the beginning of your journey with your diagnosis, this can seem especially hard. I want to tell you that it gets easier with time, but I can attest that these emotions just seem to get more complicated as time passes.

The longer I live with a chronic illness, the more important it has been to learn to manage my emotions to improve my quality of life.

Here are some things to consider to avoid making a mountain out of a molehill and ease your worries related to chronic illness.

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Ask yourself these questions

When I find myself experiencing depression or anxiety related to my chronic illness, I ask myself the following three questions:

Does the thought I’m having reflect reality?

Often, the hardest part of managing anxiety and depression related to your chronic illness is identifying the emotion and the reality.

As a person with a chronic illness, you’ve likely experienced racing thoughts that are nonspecific and centered on the worst possible outcome. For example, “This is going to ruin my life,” “My spouse will leave me because of this,” or “My children’s lives will suffer forever due to this.”

Most of the time, these are overdramatized, apocalyptic, and untrue statements. They’re often rooted in anxiety and depression, not reality.

After you’ve identified the emotions versus reality, take one more step and analyze the facts in this reality. Having a chronic illness is a fact. Diabetes, hypothyroidism, or rheumatoid arthritis are facts. The actions of your employer, spouse, and children are also factual circumstances.

Once you separate emotions from factual reality, the anxious thoughts that come with your chronic illness can become much easier to manage.

Pro tip: Nothing is as good or as bad as it may seem at the time.

What can I control?

To manage depression and anxiety in chronic illness, first identify what you can control.

Start with eating a nutritious, balanced diet full of fresh fruits and vegetables and lean proteins. The Mediterranean diet has truly stood the test of time. This continues to be what I follow and recommend for my clients.

A well-balanced diet that provides all the nutrients your body needs can dramatically improve your overall health and state of mind. One 2019 study followed 38 participants who ate more whole foods and less processed foods for 3 weeks. Researchers found the participants had reduced symptoms of depression.

You can also control how often you move. Stay active and move whenever possible. Movement is so important for emotional well-being, and exercise can even alleviate long-term depression.

Get outdoors. Sunshine and vitamin D are beneficial for managing emotions. In one 2021 study, researchers found that 30 consecutive days of sunshine improved symptoms of depression.

Seek out talk therapy, a support group, or volunteer with your local health organizations that support your chronic illness. Simply knowing you’re not in this alone may help you manage your emotions.

Lastly, take your medications as directed, prioritize your healthcare appointments, and practice regular self-care.

After you identify what you can control, identify what you can’t control. You can’t control other people and how they respond to your chronic illness. You can’t control the medical advances that are available. You can’t control how well these work for you, either.

But you do have control over choosing to be your best self every single day.

Pro tip: Focus on identifying what you can control to manage anxious thoughts related to living with a chronic illness.

Why is this important to me?

While you’re experiencing these emotions, they can seem like the most important things in the world. They can completely dominate your thoughts and demand 100% of your attention.

When this happens, I stop and ask myself, Why is this important to me? Will it still be important tomorrow? In 5 years? In 10 years?

Sometimes, the answer is yes! Sometimes the depression and anxiety that I’m feeling are caused by something very important to me. Maybe the event is critical for my health. Maybe my spouse asked me to take care of something and it’s important to them. Maybe it impacts my ability to make a living and provide for my family.

But I have to admit that more often than not when I ask myself this question, the answer is no. Most of the time, it’s not only unimportant to me, but it won’t matter tomorrow or years down the road. Once you prioritize how you’re feeling, and give the emotions this type of meaning, they are a lot more manageable.

Pro tip: How your world looks today might be very different tomorrow, regardless of your chronic illness.

The bottom line

Daily life with a chronic illness can be tough to manage, and anxious thoughts and negative emotions may come and go. But it’s important to learn ways to manage them so that your molehills don’t turn into huge mountains.

Remember to slow down when you’re facing these cycles of worry and ask yourself: Does the thought I’m having reflect reality? What can I control? Why is this important to me?

Doing so can not only help you calm your mind but improve your quality of life with chronic illness.