Catastrophizing is the anticipatory experience of disaster. Before the test results, before the difficult conversation, before the reply — the mind has already run the worst version all the way to its conclusion. You've survived the catastrophe several times before it happens. When it doesn't happen, you feel nothing but the residue of having survived it anyway.

Anonymous thoughts about catastrophizing posted here are from people who live in the worst version of things that haven't happened — and what it's like to be exhausted by events that were never real.