| T O P I C R E V I E W |
| vikki |
Posted - 07/01/2005 : 12:22:55
Hi all,
After reading two of Sarno's books and listening to Schechter's DVDs, I am still a bit confused about what exactly it takes to recover. In some cases it seems that all it takes is knowing that the pain is caused by TMS. In other cases, this isn't enough and one has to actually IDENTIFY the repressed emotion that's causing the pain. In yet other cases, it seems that one has to not only identify but also remove the source of emotional stress -- Sarno gives several case studies in which the patient couldn't recover from the pain because they didn't remove themselves from the stressful situation (even though they'd identified it).
In your experience, what does it take?
Thanks!
Vikki |
| 20 L A T E S T R E P L I E S (Newest First) |
| Kimakim |
Posted - 08/21/2006 : 09:40:32
[quote]Originally posted by alinnyc
What I believe now is that the way I react to my TMS is a mirror of the way I have learned to react to many things in my life. I am a perfectionist (trying to portray myself as strong and control my enviornment--denying the vulnerable part of myself that makes mistakes and can be hurt). All this does is make me perpetually anxious and worried. I can't control the world, **** happens, I can't be perfect and control the way people react to me. The burden that comes with trying to control my environnment is unbearably heavy. [quote]
Awesome revelation! I've printed it off to read again...makes a lot of sense. Thank you so much for sharing it.
Kim |
| Singer_Artist |
Posted - 07/05/2006 : 14:30:18
After reading this whole thread I must say I feel less alone w/ my frustration..I am not one of the book cures either...And my MRI's showed herniated discs years ago...I guess that would be called a positive MRI..However...Sarno's books and videolecture both say that herniated discs are NOT the cause of the symptoms..They are merely grey hairs of the spine..To quote Dr. Sarno himself...I got a little scared just reading someone on here saying their MRI was normal, etc..and they have TMS..Well one can also have abnormal tests and have TMS as well...Because the body does heal and heal well...So as you can see i am still struggling w/ completely accepting the TMS DX...and that it isn't structural...That really is step one..I am journaling, reading, seeing a TMS therapist as well...Just covering all bases because I cannot take being like this anymore...I would love to see what the 12 steps of Dr. Schechter are as well...Can whoever has them please write them out for the several of us who have asked...Thanx... |
| chicago |
Posted - 07/05/2006 : 13:35:54
I know that the question has been asked previously, but I would also like to know the 12 steps that Dr. Schechter mentions in the treatemnt of TMS. If someone knows a response would be appreciated.
Thanks! |
| Darko |
Posted - 07/04/2006 : 23:34:12
Hi Crk,
I found your post excellent and and I've taken heaps away from it. However I'd like to ask you. I KNOW I have tms and I've had treatment to help me with my past issues, but i still have pain, not so bad I must admit, but it's still there, it moves around and keeps me awake at times. The perfectionism and focusing on the psychological is where I need to really focus. How do I go about this? Do I think about how someone pissed me off today, if I do that then I could get more pissed off about it. Can you please provide me with more guidance here? Also, the over achievement stuff¡K¡K.let me tell you about me. I¡¦m studying hard at the moment to pass some hard technical exams. I don¡¦t feel I want to stay in my career for much longer as I hate the fact I have to study for it ( IT industry) I'm starting up as a property developer, I feel fear about this as it¡¦s risky, and I¡¦m still learning. I really really really want to be successful, I want to prove to my mother in particular and everyone else that I not a deadbeat (far from it, don¡¦t want to sound up myself- narcissistic part of me coming out there  ) Seriously, I want to take care of my mother, my woman, and help or change the world in some way. These things are all normal right??? I inherited some money and now I'm pushing to grow that money and become a self made man. I get frustrated and always need to be moving forward. Wow, this is therapy on it's own. So, what are your thoughts? Does this mean I have to change who I am, to free myself of the pain. Or do I just need to focus on these thoughts, and if so how? How do I focus on them exactly. I'm closer now to beating this than I ever have, but I really need a hand from someone who is experienced and understands where I¡¦m at. Please feel free to say whatever you need to, I really want to beat this and will do anything. Please help?
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| alinnyc |
Posted - 08/26/2005 : 10:49:51
Vikki
Read this post and your original question and it struck a cord with me. I am still working on my tms. I have seen significant improvement and I am learn to lose the fear and obsession about my tms pain. I am learning to become physically active again. It is hard. I identify with your anger and the cycle of frustration with the process. That said I am a believer and fully believe that letting going of the obsession about the pain (because it does us no good, it just makes us miserable) is a key to recovery. I am a perfectionist type. I am impatient and a worrier. I read about these miracle cures and felt angry and frustrated that it wasn't happening for me. What was I doing wrong. Then the fear kicked in. Maybe it wasn't TMS maybe it was a real problem. Then the anger. God damned it here I am tearing myself apart emotionally and why. What if the TMS diagnosis is wrong. I am just making myself miserable and not getting better. I got mad at Dr. Sarno for not helping me understand how to get better. What if he was wrong.
What I believe now is that the way I react to my TMS is a mirror of the way I have learned to react to many things in my life. I am a perfectionist (trying to portray myself as strong and control my enviornment--denying the vulnerable part of myself that makes mistakes and can be hurt). All this does is make me perpetually anxious and worried. I can't control the world, **** happens, I can't be perfect and control the way people react to me. The burden that comes with trying to control my environnment is unbearably heavy.
It sucks. It makes me miserable and unhappy. I realize that when I am caught up in this frentic cycle of extreme effort, worry, anxiousness (trying my hardest, worried whether it will be recognized and appreciated, reading faces for reactions, imagining reactions that may or may not exist, fearing things I can't control)that all I am doing is abusing myself. I am not making anything better. I am not taking responsibility for my happiness. I am just living in a state of worry and anxiety. I can't be myself in that state. All I am doing is making myself angry. In a weird way I am creating the environment of chaos I experienced as a kid.
I know this is rambling, but the realization that the way I was reacting to TMS seemed to fit the pattern of the way I was living my life came to me as an epiphany. I realize that to obsess about it is impeding my recovery. My unconscious brain is doing its thing. It is terrified by the rage. I can't control how quickly it chooses to let go of this. All I can do is remind myself that I can't control it. That there is nothing physically wrong with me. That I can't hurt myself. That that is great news and I have my life back.
Focus on what I need to focus on. Why am I so hard on myself. What part of myself am I trying to deny. I find that it helps me to try to do this in a persistent yet gentle way. I have faith that if I give up what I can't control and focus on what I can and take responsiblity for my happiness that I will win this race. It is an important race. It has to do with more than just physical pain. By the way, I have gone to a forum that Sarno organized with patients who have recovered. Everyone's experience is different. Most did not have "miracle cures". Some of the folks on the panel talked about surrendering to the tms and reminding yourself that it cannot hurt you--is not dangerous. Learning to forgive yourself and understanding that we are all complex with many different sides to ourselves and our personalities.
Best of luck in your recovery
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| Bazz |
Posted - 08/26/2005 : 05:43:17
Dear Vikki,
In one of your replies you talked about "a list of 12 steps for treatment" that you've got from dr. Schechter. I saw that it has been asked before, but can you write this list in a reply. (or can you possibly send this list by email)
Thank you in advance.
Best regards,
Barry |
| Carol |
Posted - 07/09/2005 : 09:50:47
At this point I think you must start treating the pain as TMS and see what happens. If you haven't already read Amir's book I would highly recommend it. I am seeing some real results after less than a week, and I have had back pain for more than 5 yrs now.
Because I am a real believer that there is nothing wrong physically, except for maybe those pesky bone spurs, I have never stopped my physical activity. Sonetimes I have an increase in pain that scares me, and I have some heavy duty conditioning issues, but I do keep doing all my physical things. I climb, hike, kayak, mountain bike, and cross country ski. The only one of those things that I have any problem with is mountain biking. I have developed a fear of falling, which makes me somewhat timid, not a good thing when riding a trail.
I am getting off track here. My point is that you need to begin to treat the pain as TMS and reclaim your life! When you find yourself fearful just grab your brain and tell it to "knock it off"! You have ruled out all the physical stuff, and now should be able to convince yourself that the pain has taken over and whatever diagnosis you were given is no longer relevant, if it every was! Best of luck to you.
Carol |
| hsb |
Posted - 07/08/2005 : 13:03:33
Carol
Very very quick synoposis. I am a marathon runner. Had groin pain in October. Went through PT, meds, stopped running. had mri and xray which were negative. Went to the surgeon who developed a procedure for sports hernia, athletic pubalgia. He has done this procedure on tons of professional athletes. The sports hernia and AP don’t show on xrays and mris. Surgeon said I had AP and he performed his pelvic reconstruction surgery 3/9. supposed to be out running in 8 weeks as have all his athletes have done. Well it is now 4 months and I have worse pain. I went back to the surgeon twice – first time he put me on indocin saying I had osteitis pubis (inflammation of pubic bone) caused by the surgery. He said it would knock out the inflammation in 2 weeks. 7 weeks later still in pain. Went back to him and got a cortisone shot in the pubic bone – supposed to work miracles. Well my friend, I am still in tons and tons of pain. I tried to go back to walking and swimming.
I wonder if it could be adhesions or as you say, the tms has found a very convenient place. It was there before the surgery and I still have the pain and worse.
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| Carol |
Posted - 07/08/2005 : 10:34:36
I believe that you said they did not find anything "wrong", or did I misread your posts? Did they just assume from the symptoms that you had a hernia, or did they find an actual hernia that they could repair?
If you are still in pain, and worse than before, I would assume that the diagnosis was wrong, and not the cause of the pain in the first place. Unless there are adhesions, surgery should not make the pain worse. If that were so all the terribly invasive procedures that people with extensive surgery have should result in lots of prolonged post-op pain, but they usually don't. My husband had part of his liver and a big chunk of his small intestine removed. He has a huge scar, but no pain. He recovered in about six weeks. In fact he climbed a mountain after 8 weeks, and he is 67 yrs. old. That is the way recovery from major surgery should be.
Have you gone back to the doctor(s) who performed the surgery? Have the possibilities of something being left behind, or adhesions, been ruled out? What do they say to the fact that you now have worse pain?
If they have no explanation, I would assume that the diagnosis was wrong, and TMS has found a very convenient place to take root and keep you focused.
I feel for your fear and confusion. I have succeeded in getting rid of many TMS manifestations, but the one for which I was given a "physical" diagnosis, my back pain, persists despite all my best efforts. I read Back Sense, which was highly recommended, and somewhere in the book he mentions that people with stenosis or bone spurs might have "real" back pain. I wish I had never read that book, because that one line reinforced my pain and I just can't get rid of it. I have just started Fred Amir's Rapid Recovery from Back and Neck Pain, and I have hope again. He has helped people in very much worse shape than I am, so maybe there is hope.
Carol |
| hsb |
Posted - 07/08/2005 : 09:01:15
carol-
i had sports hernia - athletic pubalgia surgery. i think the surgeon calls it pelvic reconstructive surgery. the doc says he fixed evyerhting that needed to be fixed, but i certainly am in pain 24/7 now. you can read my previous posts - much fear and anxiety about where to proceed. |
| Carol |
Posted - 07/07/2005 : 19:22:35
hsb, what kind of surgery did you have? What did they fix, remove, etc. to try to fix the groin/abdominal pain?
I ask because I have groin and abdominal pain along with my back pain. There was no structural abnormality that the doctors could pin it on, so they said it was "referred pain" from the back pain, which is supposedly from bone spurs at L4.
It amazes me how similar or identical symptoms as blamed on so many different things.
Carol |
| n/a |
Posted - 07/06/2005 : 16:28:13
HSB,
Your state: "going to a tms doc with negative xrays i feel won't really help. most of you guys go with positive xrays and positive mris."
Not true, many people with TMS show nothing on a CT scan, MRI, blood test etc. I am an example of that. I had all these tests and absoutley zero shows up, except for minor arthritis on the spine and slight but nornmal degeneration which is so small that even the doctor dismissed it as the normal aging process. My doctor says I am competely healthy. But guess what? I have TMS and, I highly suspect, so do you.
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| hsb |
Posted - 07/06/2005 : 14:15:42
crk-
thanks. i had negative mris and xrays before the surgery. i had the surgery in hopes to be able to run again. thinking it was the last resort with the surgeon who invented the procedure. well i had the procedure and guess what - the pain is still there. the doc didn't order an mri or ct scan post surgery. he gave me a cortisone shot and anti-inflammatories and guess what - they haven't worked either!!!!
so as i have reitered a million gazillion times - it is the fear i am dealing with - what did the surgeon do to me; whatever he did-- will it debilitate me forever, will i be stuck in a chronic pain clinic, will i ever run again. that is where i'm at.
going to a tms doc with negative xrays i feel won't really help. most of you guys go with positive xrays and positive mris.
but it could be the same thing...
tbanks ck - i would sell my soul to be running again!!!!
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| crk |
Posted - 07/05/2005 : 20:37:14
HSB, you will run again! Back in 2003 I was actually kicking myself for signing up for a running camp when I had so many "injuries" that I couldn't go longer than 1 minute before I needed to walk a bit, the pain was that bad. What had I been thinking? But it was at that camp, run by Jeff Galloway, that I found Sarno. Galloway even sells Sarno's book on his website, probably because he has seen so many runners benefit from it. I was running pain free in well under a month and soon completed my first half marathon. (Am now up to 6 marathons, going strong, loving it, number 7 is this Sunday.)
I completely agree with the advice to gather medical evidence (MRI or other). The hardest part of losing the pain is coming to doubt the physical "I'm hurt" diagnosis. Look at Joan (Benoit) Samuelson, trotting off to run in the 1984 Olympic Trials just a few weeks after knee surgery, and subsequently winning the gold in the marathon. We heal. That's what our bodies do best. Good luck in your quest to uncover the TMS and give it the boot!! |
| Fredarm57 |
Posted - 07/05/2005 : 10:22:50
I ended up having to do all three steps, kowing AND ACCEPTING that the pain is caused by TMS, identifying the repressed emotions that were causing the pain (through psychotherapy), and finally being removed from the stressful situation. I say "being removed from" because the stressful situation was a job that I hated, but was afraid to leave. I was finally laid off, and it was the best thing that ever happened to me! Not everyone has to go through all three steps and it makes sense to work on them one step at a time. Some difficult situtations may be impossible to remove yourself from (impossible in-laws, surly teenagers, and the like) but you can minimize your contact with them (the in-laws) or try to change the way you deal with them (the teenagers).
Fred |
| n/a |
Posted - 07/04/2005 : 20:43:08
hsb,
Your last posting indicates that you are on your road to recovery. Congratulations!!!! You are going to be even a better person WHEN this is all over. |
| hsb |
Posted - 07/04/2005 : 11:59:03
Michele-
That is very interesting. I am going to ask the surgeon if there is an MRI or CT scan that i can get to see if he did anything internally. When i started with these pains back in October, I went the usual route - orthopaedist, PT, meds, etc. I had an MRI, x-rays, etc. They showed nothing. A dx. of sports hernia or athletic pubalgia will NOT show up on any of those tests. so the only thing a diagnostic mri or ct scan would show now would be if the doctor did anything internally.
funny, - peter said that perhaps i didn't have an injury in the first place - since nothing showed up on any test and no treatment worked. believe me i understand that alot. but i think it is the fear and accpetance like vicki is having trouble with as well. but then my tms mind will say, that is the way this "injury" presents itself - as th esurgeon said - no conservative treatment will work, surgery is the answer. well i did all the conservative stuff and had the surgery. look where it's gotten me!!! |
| molomaf |
Posted - 07/04/2005 : 08:28:23
hsb,
Is there a way for example, an MRI, that could show that you look fine internally? If there is, than you can feel confident that the surgery didn't "mess you up". How about finding a TMS doctor and asking what kind of test to do and then bringing the findings to this TMS doctor. I think that would put your mind to rest. It seems that you are having trouble believing that you can go back to running safely even though you can accept that it was and is TMS. Maybe "physical" proof here would be helpful.
Michele |
| hsb |
Posted - 07/04/2005 : 07:53:46
crk-thanks for your post. i am interested in hearing from runnes about their "injuries". if you've read my posts, you'll see that i was an avid runner; haven't run since NOVEMBER because of groin/abdomen pain. had surgery in to fix the groin/abdomen. i am far worse than i was before the surgery. this has set off a whole new set of fears - did the surgery cause something internal to go wrong that can't be fixed; resting, surgery hasn't worked, what now; did the surgeon mess up some organs, etc. etc.
someone posted that perhaps this was tms in the first place. i am not disputing htat at all. what scares me is that sometimes you read about doctors messing up your body with surgery and the body not ever being the same. those fears of debilitation are omnipresent. i have tried to do some light exercise post-surgery, PT, etc. and i am still in so much pain. i should have been up and running in 8 weeks and it is now 4 months.
i am so incredibly depressed about this whole thing and was not prepared for this outcome. |
| crk |
Posted - 07/03/2005 : 23:04:36
I did have an almost instant cure to my seven year history of severe low back pain. It was unbelievable. At the time I discovered Sarno, I had also developed two other chronic pains (hip pain and neuroma (foot)) which also went away quite quickly, about 2 weeks. But I have to say that months later, one of these 3 would occasionally "trigger" a little, and then I'd beat it back down like a small brush fire. As a runner, I have plenty of subsconscious suggestions about possible injuries, plenty for the TMS in me to try out. The only one that was really hard to get rid of was the one I thought might not be TMS. I was so scared I had a stress fracture. But training in horrible pain and then running my marathon totally pain free made me see my brain was up to something, and then I was able to beat it.
For me, the key to recovery is
-think psychologically and do not let your brain fool you into the physical diagnosis. It is b.s. Always look for evidence of the b.s. to help you shift your thinking Eg- increased pain with stressful situations, pain moving around (first one side, then the other), pain "going away" briefly when you're having fun, etc. Just the fact that something is chronic is a huge red flag, and no, you didn't "reinjure" it by being careless. Our bodies heal well and they heal fast, otherwise our species never would have made it this far. Chant this mantra: chronic equals b.s.
-when you talk to your brain and get mad, try to get mad at the psychological cause (childhood trauma, etc.) more than at the pain. Getting mad at the pain seemed to increase my attention to pain, increasing the effectiveness of the TMS and empowering it.
-get some psychological help for issues that are triggering your pain. If you like self help books, try The Three Minute Therapy.
-try to kill off your inner perfectionist, because that is the part of you generating the rage. It's ok for your world to be imperfect; life is basically good despite those imperfections. In the words of fictional character Olivia Joules (a Helen Fielding novel) "Nothing is ever as bad or as good as it seems."
Good luck! |
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