This is the illusionist, in which I, Helen Zaltzman, tenderly mop languages brow.
This episode is about health anxiety, so content note there's a lot of discussion about health anxiety and there are mentions of cancer doctors and hospitals, but not detailed accounts of medical conditions or treatments.
Remember, on the 18 April 2024, there is a space themed illusionist live show in the planetarium at the HR Macmillan Space Centre in Vancouver, Canada.
It'll be really fun, possibly a one off, unless you have a planetarium you want some language related entertainment to happen in.
I'm open.
I've linked to tickets@theillusionist.org events and they include a whole evening of space related amusement and edutainment.
On with the show.
What does hypochondria mean?
Like, what does it mean?
I suppose.
What does it mean to you now?
I think to me now it's come to mean a particular state of anxiety I experience that is related to health generally.
Specifically, though, bodily sensation I associate it very strongly with.
I feel something.
It doesn't feel right.
It must be.
It must be x, it must be y.
That escalating train of anxiety, what it means in a more neutral, dictionary definition way, I think the oad calls it the persistent and unwarranted fear that one has a serious illness, very much though a mental condition that you experience around feelings to do with your health.
My name is Caroline Crampton and I'm the author of a body made of a history of hypochondria.
The word hypochondria has had a pretty big shift in meaning over its lifespan, since it originated as a word for a physical problem in the region of the body then known as the hypochondrium.