Why You Can’t Stop Googling Your Symptoms — And What to Do Instead

Googling your symptoms - it won't help your health anxiety

If you live with health anxiety, chances are you’ve found yourself caught in the endless scroll of symptom checkers, online forums, and worst-case medical articles. Maybe it starts with a harmless twinge — a headache, a flutter in your chest, a rash that wasn’t there yesterday. Before you know it, you’re deep in a Google spiral, convinced you're facing a serious illness.

You might even know it’s unhelpful. But in the moment, it feels impossible to resist. Googling seems to offer clarity, control, or reassurance — and for a few seconds, it does. But the relief never lasts. In fact, if you live with health anxiety (sometimes called illness anxiety disorder or cyberchondria), this pattern likely leaves you more anxious, not less.

So why does Googling feel so necessary when you’re anxious about your health? And what can you do instead?

The Health Anxiety and Google Loop

Health anxiety is more than just concern about your wellbeing. It’s a pattern of excessive worry about being seriously ill — even when there's little or no medical evidence to support that fear. It often involves intense body scanning, checking behaviours, and, of course, reassurance-seeking — including online.

Googling becomes part of what CBT therapists call a safety behaviour — something you do to reduce fear or uncertainty. It might look like:

• Searching for "chest pain after exercise" 20 times in a day

• Reading every forum thread on a tingling arm

• Comparing symptom lists to try to rule out cancer or a stroke
  

But here’s the twist: while Googling is meant to ease anxiety, it almost always increases it.

Why? Because when you search symptoms online, you’re often met with vague or extreme possibilities. A headache could be dehydration… or a brain tumour. That tight chest might be anxiety… or a heart condition. The information is rarely definitive, and it’s rarely personal. You're trying to find certainty in a space that thrives on fear-based clicks.

The result? You might feel calmer for a few minutes — but your brain learns that Googling = short-term relief, reinforcing the habit. Long term, your health anxiety grows stronger.

So, What Can You Do Instead?

The first step is to recognise that Googling is part of the problem, not the solution. It’s not that you’re being irrational or dramatic — it’s that your brain is trying to protect you by avoiding uncertainty. And uncertainty is one of the hardest things to sit with when you have health anxiety.

Here are some therapist-approved ways to begin breaking the cycle:

1. Postpone the Search

Start by saying, “I’ll wait 10 minutes before I Google.” You’re not banning it entirely — you’re creating space to check in with yourself. Ask: What do I hope to find? What am I afraid of? What have I found in the past? Often, you’ll notice that the urge fades or softens during this pause.

2. Track Your Triggers

Keep a simple log of what sensations or situations trigger your Googling. Do you tend to search late at night? After a stressful conversation? When you’re alone? Awareness helps break the automatic loop.

3. Practice Uncertainty Tolerance

This is the long game. Health anxiety thrives on the belief that you must be 100% sure you’re healthy — and that if you aren’t, something terrible will happen. In reality, none of us can be entirely certain. Learning to live with some doubt is hard — but incredibly freeing.

Therapists often use something called imaginal exposure or uncertainty training to help with this. It might involve practicing thoughts like: "Maybe this is nothing — and I can live with not knowing for now."

Be Kind to Yourself

If you’ve spent hours — or years — Googling symptoms, that doesn’t mean you’re broken. It means you’re anxious and looking for answers in the most available place. That’s understandable. But over time, this habit wires your brain to associate symptoms with danger, and danger with the need to act immediately.

Breaking that cycle takes patience, self-compassion, and often, support. A therapist trained in CBT for health anxiety can help you map out your own anxiety loops, work with the thoughts that drive them, and create a plan for moving forward.

When to Get Help

Sometimes health anxiety masks other struggles — grief, trauma, or a deep fear of losing control. And sometimes, it becomes so overwhelming that it affects sleep, work, and relationships. If you're spending hours a day worrying, checking, or searching for reassurance, you're not alone — and help is available.

Working with a therapist can help you build tools to respond to uncertainty, discomfort, and fear without spiralling. It doesn't mean ignoring real health concerns — it means learning to assess them in a balanced, grounded way.

Final Thought

If Googling your symptoms has become your default coping strategy, you're in good company. But you deserve better tools — tools that calm your nervous system, build your confidence, and help you feel safe in your own body again.

You don’t need to live at the mercy of the search bar. You can learn to trust your body — and your mind — again.

Want to learn more? Download our free PDF: "5 Ways to Break the Health Anxiety & Google Cycle", or get in touch for a free consultation.