2 min read

On hypochondria

I recently discovered that there’s another medical term for hypochondria. I don’t even remember what it is, but it’s what they wrote in my digital patient portal that’s specific to the for-profit healthcare network in my area. It might be that hypochondria is a colloquialism or maybe whatever version of medical fear I have fits another more specific definition.

Recently, at 3 a.m. in New Orleans, a friend of mine (who I never really imagined being scared of anything, much less death) asked me if I was afraid of dying. I answered honestly that, no, I’m not and never really have been. For some reason, though, I’ve always been constantly steeped in deep fear that every twinge, blemish or irregularity with my body is a terminal illness. It makes zero sense. Even knowing it’s irrational doesn’t make it less pervasive.

When I was younger I didn’t understand why Barack Obama made healthcare his main priority. I felt then like there were more pressing issues, like climate and war. A symptom of being a naive and healthy young person. I didn’t start to get wise to the idea that a society not prioritizing providing healthcare is a sign of gnarly moral rot until I saw Rob Delaney posting about it on old Twitter. For some reason that’s what made something so obvious come into focus for me. Rob’s relentlessly clever passion for matter of factly advocating for the idea that everyone deserves health has stuck with me.

I’ve been thinking a lot lately about survival in a society that treats healthcare as a commodity. I'm fortunate in that I come from a long tradition of working people using silliness and compassion as an antidote. My aunt taught me to love myself in spite of the despair that comes from having even a smidge of empathy in an unfathomably cruel society. My uncle taught me that laughing and goofing off is the best medicine.

Image of a bluesky post from poster Cohen is a Ghost @skullmandible.bsky.social that reads, "people will scold you for joking around when things seem really scary and fucked up. brother, those are the time what we invented joking around for

We have these crude but innately human tools for trying to care for each other in absence of harnessing medical science outside of a profit structure. There’s no valor in that struggle, just incredible grief for what could be. I don’t know why I’m always afraid a mole I just noticed (that I’ve probably had since birth) is going to kill me. What I do know is that this particular dread is probably just the weather patterns of knowing that we could take care of everyone, but don’t.

I saw AOC on TV the other day say, when asked about running for president, “My ambition is way bigger than that. My ambition is to change this country. Presidents come and go, elected officials come and go, single payer healthcare is forever.” The phrase “single payer healthcare” is a media-trained way of saying that everyone deserves the basics.

I hope her vision for the future comes to pass. Until then, I’ll be doing the best I can to use inelegant humor to cauterize the wounds of an America that could be better.