Today Inside prominent Raymond Mens lives in constant fear due to a severe form of hypochondria. He thinks he regularly suffers from diseases such as prostate cancer. “And that I’m going to die.”
Raymond Mens suffers incredibly much from hypochondria. It hinders him in his daily life and he regularly worries in bed at night, which means he does not get enough sleep. “If I feel something that is not right, I immediately think: now I’m going,” explains the American expert as a bar guest in Today Inside.
To pee
Does Raymond have an example? “It’s when you have something that you normally don’t have. This week I had to go to appointments a few times and I had to pee every time, even though I hadn’t had anything to drink. Then I think: there I go, prostate cancer. That’s what I immediately think.”
It gives him anxious moments. “I usually just pee at home and when I come home in the evening, I pee again, but now I had to pee every time. I thought: now I’m going. But I don’t dare to call the doctor, because I think: then I will end up in that mill.”
Prostate
The excessive urination lasted for two days, Raymond said. “If I notice: it is different from normal, then I immediately think what it could be. Okay, I have to pee a lot, then it’s prostate cancer.”
“At a certain point it fades away, but then you feel something else again, a kind of tingling sensation and then you think: yes, maybe there is something wrong with my heart, there you go. Then you lie in bed at night and think: yes…”
To a lesser extent
Colleague René van der Gijp also appears to suffer from it. “I have this, yes, but to a lesser extent.”
Raymond: “Even when other people have it, like when Nouri collapsed. Then I really thought for two or three weeks: that will happen to me too, then I will be walking in the city and suddenly I will fall down and there will be no doctor there.”
VI guest Rutger Castricum? He already has it. “Yes, I often have cancer too. Up to three times a week.”
His wife is a doctor, right? “That’s the big problem of course, because then she says: ‘Yes, that could be possible, yes.’”
Diabetes
The stars of VI are sitting comfortably on the couch. Then it is Wouter de Winther’s turn: “I was so thirsty on holiday this winter. I think I drank two liters of water in a row. I thought: what is that? I googled and: diabetes. I thought: the time has come. 45 years.”
Wilfred Genee is quite shocked: “What a life you all have!”