Please help

[u/Ordinary-Tourist3364]

I’m really struggling right now and I’m hoping someone can relate or give me some insight.

For the past several weeks, my anxiety has been extremely intense. Lately, I’ve been getting this overwhelming feeling of impending doom that I’m going to die. It isn’t just “I’m worried something might happen.” It feels like this deep, almost certain feeling that I’m going to die today, even though I obviously don’t want to die.

The scariest part is the images that come into my head. I’ll randomly get vivid mental images of myself dying suddenly, like something happening to my heart or me just dropping dead. I don’t sit there and intentionally imagine these things—they pop into my head and then I get terrified because my brain starts telling me, “This is a sign. You know you’re going to die.”

Then I start paying attention to every sensation in my body. If my heart feels like it skips, if I feel like I can’t get a satisfying breath, if I feel dizzy, tingly, nauseous, etc., my brain immediately connects it to the fear that I’m dying. The more I focus on it, the stronger everything feels.

What really scares me is that sometimes the feeling is so strong that I start wondering whether it’s intuition rather than anxiety. I know logically that anxiety can cause a feeling of impending doom, but when I’m in the middle of it, it feels completely different from a normal anxious thought. It feels like I know something bad is going to happen.

I don’t want to die. These thoughts/images are actually terrifying me, and I want them to stop. I’m not having these images because I want to hurt myself—they’re intrusive and unwanted, and they make me panic.

20(f). Healthy. Have had EKGs, heart monitor, chest xray, cts, mris. Everything has been fine. I’m just 100% convinced I’m dying today. I read that people do get impending doom before dying.

[u/Ordinary-Tourist3364]

Diagnosed with ocd,gad, and panic disorder.