She would go to hospital "four to five times a week" complaining of excruciating chest pain. "I think the longest I spent in A&E was 13 hours," says the 25-year-old. But despite numerous tests, doctors could never find anything wrong.
Sharman says she had "always worried" about her health as a child and remembers "making up any excuse" to get sent home from school and get into bed. Her 22nd birthday meal was spent in the restaurant toilets "having the worst panic attack I've ever had". That triggered years of health anxiety, with hours spent searching symptoms, feeling panicked and isolated.
"I was constantly Googling and using ChatGPT, every source I could get that could tell me what was wrong," she says. "I spent so long in the hospital. They'd tell me it's nothing, they'd check everything.
"I'd go home, but then my legs would feel weak, so I'd Google that and then it would say it's a sign of heart failure. So I'd go back, it was literally a constant cycle." At its worst, she "completely disconnected from everyone" and wouldn't reply to messages from family to avoid repetitive conversations. Sharman says her health anxiety also had an extreme affect on her relationship.
"It got to the point that nothing he said would be the right thing. "I would get upset because he didn't understand what was going on inside my own head. How can you tell someone everything's fine when I think I'm actually dying?" Clinical psychologist Dr Kirren Schnack says health anxiety is "a constant worry about being seriously ill or becoming seriously ill when you are not".
Key signs can be "checking" behaviours, such as frequently examining your body, taking your temperature, blood pressure or researching symptoms online. Another is constantly asking the internet, friends or family for reassurance that you are safe and healthy, she tells Complex with Kimberley Wilson. Others may experience "avoidance" - not looking at their body or going to doctors appointments because they fear "the worst".
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