How do you know whether or not the illness is in your head?

Pretty much the thread says it all. I'm preparing for a visit with my family doctor (that takes a month for me as I like to get a feel for exactly what I'm going to say...as well as do a food diary) and it made me wonder.... all of these joint pains, exhaustion, among other things. Is it in my head?

I mean I try my best to act as normal and healthy as possible, but sometimes its hard. I mean.... I dont particularrly enjoy falling asleep or just being a lump because im tired when im out with friends. I don't enjoy going to bed at 10 pm because my head is pounding when all my friends are online talking to me. But just becuase i dont enjoy it... it can still be made up right?

I have no seriious illnesses because all the tests came back normal...thank god. My mri is normal and my iron is low...as always. This defenetlly rassures me, but also leads me to think...am I making this up? How do you heal an imagined disease? How do you know if its imagined?

How do you cope with people not taking you seriously?

Even if this sickness isn't real...its causing me real pain and I want it taken care of.
You know?

Well psychosomatic illnesses (illnesses caused for trauma or things of that nature) are very real. They is a very big thing about mind-body connection. The thing is, that i don't think it is in your head. Your test can come back normal and something can still be wrong but some things have to be specifically tested for. Unfortunately, sometimes its just waiting until it gets worse (such as my case).

For your case, I would suggest (as we spoke about) looking at a sleep study. It is so difficult to get help when people will not take you seriously. I have nearly given up on docs several times, but I know that its about quality of life for me. I have none with my illnesses unless I'm receiving treatment. I even did psychiatrists and therapy to see if that would help my illnesses, and it did not change my medical symptoms.

It is hard, but keep going. It is your own personal decision to decide what to do with whether to keep trying a doc to find out the answers you seek. I have had a doctor tell me that "A doctor may never possibly figure out what's wrong. Until that happens, you deserve to have a quality of life". This is what I believe in. Quality of life is very important.

I wish you well hun and well done on posting I can relate. It sucks, its painful and I wish it would be easier, but its not. And accepting and acknowleding that is important.

There is no way to know. There are plenty of illnesses that are a pain in the ass to diagnose but the physical manifestations are causing physical problems.

I believe there is a great overlap. Your mind controls your body. If it thinks you're sick, quite often it makes you sick, not always to a minor degree either. The fact is that it's there, whether it's in your head or not, it's happening, thus, it's real.

But as Kuno said, whether or not it's in your head shouldn't matter if you have obvious problems. Everybody deserves a quality of life.