askchapo

I'm absolutely certain my mother has this, although she's doing much better with it compared to when I was a child. She would get these ailments that she felt were 100% some physical symptoms for which no doctor could ever find a cause of or treatment for. She saw every kind of specialist and quack in existence. The issue she was fixated on would change over time as well.

Bad news is that no direct action ever worked to convince her to get mental health help. If anything trying to convince her that her issues were factitious made her condition worse. To her it felt like people gaslighting her. She felt that her issues were real and physical in nature and telling her otherwise was tantamount to calling her a liar.

At various times she saw therapists and psychiatrists(sometimes at the insistence of medical doctors), but that never helped, for whatever reason.

IMO, the only thing you can do is try to be supportive while trying to redirect him to focus on other things. Nothing else ever seemed to help in my situation.

It’s difficult to weigh in with just an assumption of such a diagnosis. I have a friend with health anxiety who talks about their health issues and the illnesses they think they might have. I’ve learned that it helps them to have someone to talk about their health journey and who doesn’t judge them for always assuming the worst and exaggerating their symptoms. I can’t ‘fix’ their anxiety, all I can do is be there and listen to them and acknowledge their fears and frustrations.

Munchausen can be a very serious disorder that involves lying to doctors and/or inflicting harm on oneself. In that case it might be necessary to have some kind of intervention, but I don’t have experience with such things.

Know that you are not responsible for your friend’s health. People who live in their own version of reality often do so out of necessity and self preservation, and it can cause them great distress if an outsider tries to force them to break from this. In mild cases it’s better to just let them vent and let them know that you will be there for them. If it becomes overbearing you can try to limit your attention towards a subject and/or take some distance from the person. You can always suggest someone to seek help for underlying problems like trauma, anxiety or emotional/mood issues.