| T O P I C R E V I E W |
| Dave |
Posted - 11/04/2006 : 08:56:22
They just don't GET it .. and the epidemic continues.
More than a million suffer chronic fatigue
By Maggie Fox, Health and Science Editor
WASHINGTON (Reuters) - Chronic fatigue syndrome, once thought by some doctors to be a psychological problem or even a excuse for malingerers, is a real disease that affects more than a million Americans, the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention said on Friday.
Early diagnosis and treatment of the disease are important for recovery -- even though it is not clear what the best treatments are, CDC officials told a news conference.
"CFS (chronic fatigue syndrome) is a terrible illness that prevents many people from taking part in everyday activities and participating in the things they enjoy," CDC Director Dr. Julie Gerberding said.
"Fortunately, there are therapies for CFS that can reduce much of the pain and suffering," she said.
The CDC launched an awareness campaign about chronic fatigue on Friday and published a dedicated Internet site at http://www.cdc.gov/cfs/.
Up to 80 percent of people with chronic fatigue do not know they have it, the CDC said. Its causes are unknown but it can cause profound exhaustion, sleep difficulties, and problems concentrating and remembering.
Flu-like symptoms, including pain in the joints and muscles, tender lymph nodes, sore throat and headaches are also common. "A distinctive characteristic of the illness is a worsening of symptoms following physical or mental exertion," the CDC said in a statement.
"Diagnosis is primarily made by taking a patient's medical history, completing a physical exam and lab tests to rule out other conditions," it added.
"The CDC considers chronic fatigue syndrome to be a significant public health concern, and we are committed to research that will lead to earlier diagnosis and better treatment of the illness," Gerberding said.
Several other illnesses have symptoms that mimic chronic fatigue, including fibromyalgia syndrome, myalgic encephalomyelitis, neurasthenia, multiple chemical sensitivities, and chronic mononucleosis, the CDC noted.
"There are tens of millions of people with similar fatiguing illnesses who do not fully meet the strict research definition of CFS," the CDC added.
No one therapy works but reducing stress, dietary restrictions, gentle stretching and nutritional supplementation have all been shown to help. Drugs are sometimes prescribed.
"For instance, tricyclic antidepressants may not only improve mood, but may help with sleep and pain," the CDC said.
"Patients should be advised to avoid herbal remedies like comfrey, ephedra, kava, germander, chaparral, bitter orange, licorice root, yohimbe and any other supplements that are potentially dangerous," it added.
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| 20 L A T E S T R E P L I E S (Newest First) |
| MikeJ |
Posted - 11/15/2006 : 15:35:09
quote:
"I've also found that being too invested in spreading the Sarno word is bad for me in the long run. And collectively it could be bad for all of us not just for that reason, but because persistent attempts to "Proselytize Sarno" can really turn people off. Hopefully if we live our healthy lives, people will be convinced by example. (I came to this idea recently, thinking about how I react to other forms of prosyletizing, vs. to people living their lives well by example.)"
I definitely got a sort of new-treatment fatigue after a while. It took more and more to convince me that a road was worth going down -- basically, only glowing testimony from someone who had been there and clearly knew what they were talking about would convince me to try something. I think that's why the SuccessStory concept is so helpful. People tell their story, which amounts to sharing their "credentials" -- why they are worth listening to -- and then say "I was cured by this."
Armchairlinguist, that's a very good point and I fully agree. I thought about it, and I don't like being proselytized either. When someone first suggested a psychological cause, I simply ignored it and harbored resentment. I really believe the best way, as you suggested, is through success stories. The soft approach is probably the most effecient; examples of people living their lives well, and the steps they took to get there. I can't think of a better way to make people more apt to listen, as opposed to a patronizing "I know what's wrong with you" tone. |
| PeterW |
Posted - 11/15/2006 : 13:33:56
quote:
Someone here, (thank you), said that 95% of our brain's operate on the unconscious level, so it seems that we have little conrol over what's going on in the long run and are doomed to be mostly reacitve to life's slings and arrows. When we try to break out of the norm, we feel the societal coercion to conform and the need to repress our urges. Being a non-conformist in our society will generally not get you very far unless you are outrageously good at it.
A lot of good points Tom, that one in particular really rings true to me. I know I was a non-conformist deep down but grew up repressing my true needs and wants, trying my best to conform and fit in for peer approval and all that. I wonder how many other TMSers this applies to. In my case I think society expectations and peer groups in those awful Jr high and high school years left quite a mark.
I also grew up being afraid of public speaking, of ruffling feathers, and in public took the most popular concensus of opinion, for safety's sake. I know I wasn't alone, even back in Grade 9 I distinctly remember our English teacher constantly challenging us to think for ourselves and to express different views, she was always frustrated that everyone in the class just chimed along with what everyone else thought. "You just think as one group, you're afraid to think as individuals" she always told us. That age group can be brutal for demanding conformity.
quote:
PeterW, thanks for those good points you made about how some forms of TMS are not really "harmless" in an immediate or long-term sense (as for CFS and depression). It's a good tip for talking to people, and very true.
Thanks ACL, that's exactly the point I was trying to make with all my ramblings.
quote:
It's just they've already spent too much energy looking for help (probably in all the wrong places), and have unfortunately given up. Or in Zen terms, learned to accept their lot in life that they believe they cant change.
To add to my own thoughts there, they may have the whole acceptance forgiveness 'this is my life and I'm at peace with it all' thing down pat, and really believe that on the surface, but who knows what is really lurking down there in that unconscious 95% of the brain they cant access. |
| armchairlinguist |
Posted - 11/15/2006 : 11:26:03
PeterW, thanks for those good points you made about how some forms of TMS are not really "harmless" in an immediate or long-term sense (as for CFS and depression). It's a good tip for talking to people, and very true.
I've also found that being too invested in spreading the Sarno word is bad for me in the long run. And collectively it could be bad for all of us not just for that reason, but because persistent attempts to "prosyletize Sarno" can really turn people off. Hopefully if we live our healthy lives, people will be convinced by example. (I came to this idea recently, thinking about how I react to other forms of prosyletizing, vs. to people living their lives well by example.)
I definitely got a sort of new-treatment fatigue after a while. It took more and more to convince me that a road was worth going down -- basically, only glowing testimony from someone who had been there and clearly knew what they were talking about would convince me to try something. I think that's why the SuccessStory concept is so helpful. People tell their story, which amounts to sharing their "credentials" -- why they are worth listening to -- and then say "I was cured by this."
It used to really annoy me when clueless or less-experienced people would tell me to try wrist splints (BTDT), or ask if there wasn't a pain medicine I could be taking (no -- bleeding stomach anyone?), or just read this book, don't you know anything about arm anatomy and RSI theory? (Um, yes, I know pretty much every bone, muscle, and nerve between my neck and my wrist, and all the things that are supposedly wrong with them.) So I generally don't expect much when I recommend Sarno or anything else (even though it doesn't stop me from hoping that these nice people will finally be able to stop suffering).
--
Wherever you go, there you are. |
| tennis tom |
Posted - 11/15/2006 : 10:34:40
Dr. Sarno in his latest book expands on his view that psychosomatic pain symptoms are a "protective" device. That our unconscious perceives the pain as preferable to the expression of the underlying anger/rage emotion from being consciouly expressed. This does NOT mean that our unconscious is RIGHT by doing this--it's just the way it is.
TMS "knowledge" as theroized by the Good Doctor makes us "conscious" of this unconscious process so that we may learn to have some say or control over it. We can then change our behavior or accept what is going on around us that we may not have control over.
Someone here, (thank you), said that 95% of our brain's operate on the unconscious level, so it seems that we have little conrol over what's going on in the long run and are doomed to be mostly reacitve to life's slings and arrows. When we try to break out of the norm, we feel the societal coercion to conform and the need to repress our urges. Being a non-conformist in our society will generally not get you very far unless you are outrageously good at it.
It's kind of like eating from the apple in the Garden of Eden. It can be a two-edged sword. But it puts the ball in our hand and we can play the ball rather than the ball playing us.
I think much of this repressive behavior is a due to our society. We are subject to many written laws as well as the un-wriiten laws of PC that are constantly changing. We have come to a point where it is safer to repress than express.
Whatever we say or do today, there will probably be some group that will take offence and jump down our throats. Perhaps this is why public speaking is the number one fear of most people. It's safer to take no position or wait until there is a consensus of opinion and hop on board then.
About the only group that has total license to act-out are the "artists". Due to their "special" place in society they can act-out under the guise of artistic expression. I've noticed a trend of post-menopausal women taking art classes and becoming "wanna-be" artists. They are no longer Realtors-they are now "artists". Perhaps this is in reaction to all the years of repression they have endured. Women settle their differences in a more passive-aggressive way than men. They smile at each other while really masking their disdain--it's a little dance. Men just shut up or shoot.
Well I've digressed a bit on this sociological tangent but I think my point was that TMS is a protective device from perceived (anti-social) emotional confrontations/explosions. It doesn't mean it's right, or good for us, it's just the way it is.
We are a product of our society and can't help being influenced by it consciously and unconsciously. |
| PeterW |
Posted - 11/15/2006 : 09:12:38
quote:
You hit the nail on the head, Peter. I found it irritating when people who knew nothing about RSI felt they had to make suggestions to me (“Have you tried putting a bandage on it?” kind of thing.)
I’m also a former CFS sufferer. (I definitely wasn’t depressed and I recovered before I’d heard of TMS, but would have treated it as that if I had it now.)
Yep it got to the point when it got pretty annoying, everybody coming with their 2c worth of advice. Much of it well intentioned on some level, but often with a patronizing flavour, and sometimes just plain foolish or naive.
Thankfully I didn't tune out completely though. It's sad that so many do that, and miss out on something like Sarno that has helped so many others.
But I personally dont buy into this theory of people clinging to their illness or pain because they decide they need it or want it, at least for most. Sarno never suggests anything like that in all his books, and forcefully shoots down the 'secondary gain' motivations for being ill or in pain that have become so in vogue. These folks may feel defeated, hopeless even, but most would pursue getting better a second if they really thought there was a way. It's just they've already spent too much energy looking for help (probably in all the wrong places), and have unfortunately given up. Or in Zen terms, learned to accept their lot in life that they believe they cant change.
We can only hope that they'll sometime give consideration to this approach, but they've got to arrive there on their own time and terms. That I totally agree with.
BTW Hilary, I'm curious, did you recover from CFS . . . and then develop RSI?? Was the 'symptom imperative' working with you? |
| HilaryN |
Posted - 11/14/2006 : 15:29:59
Nice one, Beth.
quote:
(PeterW)
Of course we'll never really know, but my guess based on my experience would be she was just burned out on trying new things, as nothing she'd tried in the past had ever helped her. There was a time when I just rolled my eyes at anyone who said they had the latest book or theory or concoction that would relieve my suffering.
You hit the nail on the head, Peter. I found it irritating when people who knew nothing about RSI felt they had to make suggestions to me (“Have you tried putting a bandage on it?” kind of thing.)
I’m also a former CFS sufferer. (I definitely wasn’t depressed and I recovered before I’d heard of TMS, but would have treated it as that if I had it now.)
TT et al, I love the posts about eating dirt!
Hilary N |
| h2oskier25 |
Posted - 11/14/2006 : 14:03:00
quote:
Originally posted by TT
She said she could not hold a book to read it...I suggested her husband hold the book for her...she rolled her eyes...I suggested she hire a high-school kid to hold the book for her...she declined that idea also. I surmised that she needed her TMS/Fibro pain and no suggestion I would make to her would prevnet her from trying her best to hang on to it. That she had great strength and energy for.
Boy, TT, this paragraph really hit home with me. I see this in so many people, some of whom are on this board.
I believe part of it is the "How dare you flippantly suggest a cure for me when you don't know the depths of my pain, and you haven't spent years trying to find a cure? How dare you feel like you have anything to teach me." You're right, they have great strength and energy for stamping out your suggestions.
I was a little bit this way about my condition when people would suggest basic therapies and surgeries. I HAD tried most everything else, and the first person to suggest Sarno to me was all I needed.
I have to warn the CFS/Fibro people on the board who say, "But wait, we're different." I would hate to condemn yourself to TMS not working for you, or only working part way for you. What about the plucky Fibro sufferer who has decided it's TMS, and by God he won't be dissuaded, and then he comes on this board looking for support, and finds fellow CFS/Fibro sufferers saying "Nope, we're different!"
I couldn't do that to somebody.
Ok, let her rip.
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| armchairlinguist |
Posted - 11/14/2006 : 11:07:33
An osteopath I saw said he was seeing teenagers with thumb pain from sending 50-60 text messages a day. TMS finding a new home in today's stressed-out teens... :(
--
Wherever you go, there you are. |
| tennis tom |
Posted - 11/14/2006 : 09:31:43
Right on Logan. This morning CNBC did a story on a new disease, "Blackbery Thumb". A hotel chain is even offering hand massages for stricken business travelers. |
| Logan |
Posted - 11/14/2006 : 08:55:06
Neurasthenia??!!
I thought that went out with the 19th century!
Anyone here remember reading "The Yellow Wallpaper" in high school or college?
It's a story about a woman whose physician husband treats her for neurasthenia (the old fashioned version of CFS) and essentially turns her into a bedridden prisoner. She goes crazy from the intense claustrophobia - she's essentially his prisoner in a dormer room with this terrible yellow wallpaper.
TMS has its detractors for sure; but every time I've read that story in a Lit class, most everyone agreed that this chick's problem was her controlling husband, the patriarchy, and her repressed anger and lack of self-agency.
Ah well, I guess like our own mindbody, the culture at large has to keep reinventing the symptoms to keep us from seeing "the man behind the curtain" or "the monster at the end of the book" or however you want to title the subconscious boogies that dog us all.
My local paper has published three recent articles about how PDA-Thumb is now a "real disease." I predict PDAT will be the new carpal tunnel. Just wait for it. The power of suggestion will intersect with all those stressed out, pissed off business people who can't put their PDAs down. And the lawyers and the chiropractors will rejoice! :)
I feel so lucky that I read and understood Sarno's books and that I cured myself from my own TMS pain.
All around me, in addition to PDAT and CFS, I see my undergrad students, fellow grad students and family all starting to succumb to the final exam/holiday pressure. I've had several students give me medical excuses for mono, back pain, sinusitis.
A cold rippled through the faculty twice already this year. I have been lucky and I have been trying to stay in touch with how I feel - angry, sad, fearful etc. I think this is why I have not been sick.
And my thumbs, wrists etc. feel fine despite all the typing I do! Probably because of all the typing I do...
Thanks Dr. Sarno! |
| PeterW |
Posted - 11/13/2006 : 22:12:57
Ha! I thought that N/A post was yours Tom! Something in the board must still have been messed after the weekend hacker got at it (unless you were being shy at that moment). 
So you're a survivor of significant depression . . . that's serious stuff too, though I haven't had significant clinical depression myself I know several folks who have, and at least three who never made it out of that dark-well to tell the tale. Two of them actually pegged themselves soon after being put on new antidepressants. The partner of one of them started a cross Canada awareness campaign about depression and the dangers in the medications that are supposed to help them. Cant help but get really really cynical about the pharmaceutical industry and the tragically inept abilities of mainstream medicine with this stuff.
On paper I can see how the symptoms of CFS can sound like those of depression, and any inexperienced or incompetent doctor could throw on whatever label fit their biases. Like you say, probably depended on what waiting room they're in. Though they are really quite distinct, and treated very differently at least in the mainstream medical way. I remember seeing a study back in the 90's comparing them. Among other things, they compared SPECT scans of brains of people with the two conditions, and showed how very different areas of the brain were affected. The scans were quite striking, different areas of the brain, different syndromes, yet as I recall they both involved loss of blood flow to the brain but to different areas. At least I think it was loss of blood flow, or hypofusion was the term, and that would make sense in light of Sarno's theories. I'll dig around and see if I still have that paper buried in some pile somewhere.
I suppose different theories could be put forth to explain the close mindedness of your aquaintance in the hot tub. Of course we'll never really know, but my guess based on my experience would be she was just burned out on trying new things, as nothing she'd tried in the past had ever helped her. There was a time when I just rolled my eyes at anyone who said they had the latest book or theory or concoction that would relieve my suffering. I'd seen too many doctors, had too many tests run, read too many get-well books, taken too many supplements, been sold too much snake oil, and tried too many treatments both mainstream and alternative to believe anyone who promised miracles if you only just try this . . . . . There had been too many disappointments, with the lesson being to just accept your illness, and dont waste any more time, energy and money hoping in vain to get well. In the end I did find approaches that really helped me, but a lot of folks just give up trying, or even hoping. It's sad, but it's partly out of cynicism, and partly as a defense against another promised 'cure' that in their eyes inevitably wont work, and will just cause more disappointment and probably empty an already vanishing bank account. |
| tennis tom |
Posted - 11/12/2006 : 18:31:33
quote:
Originally posted by PeterW
"OK this post started as a couple lines but my inner goodist and inner legalist got the best of me and I just got carried away again, so here goes another thesis . . . to do with the challenge of trying to get CFS and Fibro people to consider the TMS approach."
---------------------------------------------------------------------
Good post/thesis PeterW, you made many good points. It's diificult to empathize without having been in someone's shoes. It's like the saying goes, "Walk a mile in someone's shoes, then run like hell and you have a pair of new shoes."
But seriously, I don't feel it's my job to spread the word on TMS. And from my experiences it only leads to frustration, anger, repression and deepening the TMS reservoir.
Dr. Sarno, in THE DIVIDED MIND, builds on Freud's mapping of the mind's functioning with his theory that psychosomatic pain is a "protective device" rather than a "punisher". Maybe we TMS devotees are the "mutant genes" not going along with the majority of our specie's program and embracing our physical/affective TMS equivalents?
Maybe we are contrarian in-grates for not going along with the unconscious's program to stop us from throwing things at our "loved ones" and instead internalizing our angst.
I can empathize with CFS/Fibro/TMS. I experienced "significant depression" recently and while helplessly floating down the dark-well
could recognize the overlapping symptoms and figured that I could just as easily be diagnosed with CFS or Fibro if I sat in the "right/wrong" waiting room.
The job of proselytizing TMS is the medical community's. They are the ones getting paid for healing people. The medico/psycho professionals are not being held to task for their monumental failure at there job. I would especially pick out all the dime-store "shrinks" being pumped out of match-book cover Psycho-Colleges.
You would think psycho-therapists would be the first to embrace psychosomatic-TMS conditions. But my experiences in the hot-tubs of Southern Marin proselytizing the Good Doctor's theory has found psycho-therapists to be the most resistant to it and the first to line up for hip-replacements.
Psycho-therapists are so needy to qualify themselves as "technicians" that they align themselves with surgeons at the drop of a scalpal. Therapists must have an inferiority complex not being psychiatrists and not being able to prescibe RX meds. They are in effect "empathizers" or "paid friends" who listen without much meaningful, useful comment.
I recall a few years back after reading Dr. Sarno's first book MIND OVER BACK, encountering a lady in a hot-tub in Norhtern Mairn who said she had Fibro. She moved very slowly and I could immediately sense she had some condition. I proselytized Sarno to her to no avail. She said she could not hold a book to read it...I suggested her husband hold the book for her...she rolled her eyes...I suggested she hire a high-school kid to hold the book for her...she declined that idea also. I surmised that she needed her TMS/Fibro pain and no suggestion I would make to her would prevent her from trying her best to hang on to it. That she had great strength and energy for.
|
| n/a |
Posted - 11/11/2006 : 10:03:19
"OK this post started as a couple lines but my inner goodist and inner legalist got the best of me and I just got carried away again, so here goes another thesis . . . to do with the challenge of trying to get CFS and Fibro people to consider the TMS approach."
---------------------------------------------------------------------
Good post and thesis PeterW, you made many good points. It's diificult for people to empathize without having been in someone's shoes. It's like the saying goes, "Walk a mile in someone's shoes, then run like hell and you have a pair of new shoes."
But seriously now, I don't feel it's my job to spread the word on TMS. And from my experiences it would only lead to frustration, anger, repression and deepen my TMS reservoir.
Dr. Sarno, in [u]THE DIVIDED MIND[/u], builds on Freud's mapping of the mind's functioning with the idea of psychosomatic pain being a "protective device" rather than a "punisher". Maybe we here are the "mutant genes" that aren't going along with our specie's program and accepting our physical/affective TMS equivalents?
Maybe we are contrarian in-grates for not going along with the unconscious's porgram to stop us from throwing things at our "loved ones" and instead internalizing our angst.
I can empathize with CFS/Fibro/TMS. I experienced "significant depression" recently and while helplessly floating down the dark-well
could recognize the overlapping symptoms and figured that I could just as easily be diagnosed with those two disorders if I sat in the "right/wrong" waiting room.
The job of proselytizing TMS is the medical community's. They are the ones who get paid for healing people and are not being held to task for their monumental failure at that job. I would especially pick out all the dime-store "shrinks" being pumped out of match-book cover Psycho-Colleges. You would think psycho-therapists would be the first to embrace psychosomatic-TMS conditions. But my experiences in the hot-tubs of Southern Marin proselytizing the Good Doctor had found psychotherapists to be the most resistant to it and the first to line [i]themselves[/i] up for hip-replacements.
Psychotherapists are in such need to qualify themselves as true medical "technicians" that they align themselves with surgeons at the drop of a scalpal. Therapists must have an inferiority complex for not being a psychiatrist they cannot even RX meds. They are in effect empathizers or "paid friends" who listen without much meaningful, useful comment.
I recall a few years back after reading Dr. Sarno's first book [u]MIND OVER BACK[/u], encountering a lady in a hot-tub in Norhtern Mairn who said she had Fibro. She moved very slowly and I could immediately sense she had some condition. I proselytized Sarno to her to no avail. She said she could not hold a book to read it...I suggested her husband hold the book for her...she rolled her eyes...I suggested she hire a high-school kid to hold the book for her...she declined that idea also. I surmised that she needed her TMS/Fibro pain and no suggestion I would make to her would prevnet her from trying her best to hang on to it. That she had great strength and energy for. |
| tennis tom |
Posted - 11/11/2006 : 08:59:55
quote:
Originally posted by floorten
quote:
A few years ago I remember coming across a nutritional supplement of 'homeostatic soil organisms' - a probiotic that was supposed to give you back the natural beneficial bacteria from soil and dirt that we dont get anymore with our superhygenic lifestyles. But I figured why not save the 50 bucks or whatever and go play in the dirt for an afternoon.
LOL. You have to laugh at our modern lifestyle when you can now buy pills containing "essence of dirt", so you yourself don't ever need to get your hands dirty!
--
"What the Thinker thinks, the Prover proves."
Robert Anton Wilson
I knew I should have put a patent on it, I could have called it something like "DIRT-A-CEUTICALS". None the less, I would like to sign up and be a distributor so I could pyramid market it to my "friends". What's the calorie count? |
| floorten |
Posted - 11/11/2006 : 03:15:57
quote:
A few years ago I remember coming across a nutritional supplement of 'homeostatic soil organisms' - a probiotic that was supposed to give you back the natural beneficial bacteria from soil and dirt that we dont get anymore with our superhygenic lifestyles. But I figured why not save the 50 bucks or whatever and go play in the dirt for an afternoon.
LOL. You have to laugh at our modern lifestyle when you can now buy pills containing "essence of dirt", so you yourself don't ever need to get your hands dirty!
--
"What the Thinker thinks, the Prover proves."
Robert Anton Wilson |
| PeterW |
Posted - 11/10/2006 : 22:51:57
quote:
Originally posted by tennis tom
That's why whenever I have an opportunity I eat things that have fallen on the floor. It gives me an opportuity to build-up my immune system. I feel people who are neuroticly obsessively cleanly and concerned with germs and disease everywhere are in reality doing themselves a disservice by not naturally building up their immune systems to things they may encounter someday in the real world.
Had to laugh. But methinks there's some truth to this as well.
A few years ago I remember coming across a nutritional supplement of 'homeostatic soil organisms' - a probiotic that was supposed to give you back the natural beneficial bacteria from soil and dirt that we dont get anymore with our superhygenic lifestyles. But I figured why not save the 50 bucks or whatever and go play in the dirt for an afternoon.
OK this post started as a couple lines but my inner goodist and inner legalist got the best of me and I just got carried away again, so here goes another thesis . . . to do with the challenge of trying to get CFS and Fibro people to consider the TMS approach.
Speaking as someone who was living the CFS real life nightmare during the early 90's, I can truthfully say that there's no possible way to explain how bad it is to someone who has never experienced it. There are different severities of CFS, just like everything, but for the more severe cases the term 'chronic fatigue' is really a joke. The symptoms and physiological changes go way beyond fatigue, including for me blood pressure that dipped below 80/50 at one point and made it impossible to even stand up. For a year I was so weak that I often couldn't even chew my own food.
At this extent of 'super TMS' I really dont think it's fair or accurate to claim that the symptoms are harmless, and that's something that folks keen on spreading the TMS /Sarno word need to understand before approaching hardcore CFS/Fibro sufferers, especially if what you've recovered from is more the garden variety TMS stuff. I would suggest that if your inner goodist wants to help these folks make the leap into Sarno's world, then you'd greatly help your chances if you made some effort to truly understand their world.
Heck there probably isn't a medical condition that's been so maligned and misunderstood in the last century. They as a group have had it up to here with doctors and family members telling them 'it's all in your head' blablabla ad nauseum, and immediately put up the defenses at the mere whiff of that suggestion. And no wonder. And I know that's not what we're saying, but they'll probably still hear it that way initially.
I can also readily see how CFS/Fibro folks could not possibly comprehend the possibility that the unconscious mind could be responsible for generating all those physiological changes - the endocrine and nervous system and immune and digestive disruptions, and all that intense pain. It's been a slow process for me, and there's still a part of me that shakes my head and thinks that it's utterly ludicrous to believe that the mindbody could seemingly sabotage itself that badly. But, as we know . . . yup, it can. And if something like this is a severe TMS equivalent, well pretty well anything could be mindbody generated in my opinion.
Brings to mind a book I heard about on this forum last year - 'When the Body Says No', by Dr Gabor Mate, a Vancouver M.D. He talks about the stresses, resentments and hidden angers in people's lives and documents how it can contribute to all sorts of havoc in the body - cancers, MS, ALS. There's a fascinating chapter about Stephen Hawking, the reknowned physicist with ALS. It's frightening stuff too, but as Tom said on another thread, those of us already familiar with TMS who have developed reasonable emotional awareness shouldn't worry ourselves, these types of severe illnesses usually strike people who have been professional repressors all their lives.
BTW I'd say the same about the typical CFS and Fibro patients, at least the ones I've known - probably spent a lifetime repressing, with goodist, perfectionist, super driven, super consciencious personalities, and highly sensitive to boot.
The good news is that CFS is not progressive like those other diseases and is reversable. I know a lot of people who have recovered from it to varying degrees, some mainly by various physical/nutritional means and the standard stress reduction stuff. I focussed on that for a decade and did quite well. But I can also say that the people I've known who have completely recovered all went well beyond that and did serious internal and emotional work.
In the end, I've come to believe that even though Sarno may not have every detail right, he (as well as Reverse Therapy in the UK) is zeroing on the underlying mindbody mechanisms that trigger CFS and Fibro far more than anything else I've come across. If you have these conditions and are looking at this TMS stuff and wondering how it possibly applies, I urge you to read Sarno's TMS personality type, as well as the profile descibed in Elaine Aron's book 'The Highly Sensitive Person', and you'll probably see yourself stamped all over those pages. Check it out with honesty and an open mind, and you may be surprised at what you uncover. |
| armchairlinguist |
Posted - 11/09/2006 : 13:26:35
Ooh, that makes me want to take a hot bath right now.
I never liked baths for cleaning up, but I like to get in the bath, and just kind of relax and float away.
Afterwards I kind of feel like every bad thing is coming out through my pores. Sounds like that might be true!
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Wherever you go, there you are. |
| MikeJ |
Posted - 11/09/2006 : 10:37:23
If I want to boost my immune system, I'd rather take a hot bath!
quote:
Research shows that baths are not only great for unwinding and soaking away the stresses of the day, they can also play an important role in boosting your immune system, help skin conditions like eczema and even alleviate serious medical disorders.
One study, published in the New England Journal of Medicine, showed that diabetics who spent just half an hour in a hot tub could reduce their blood sugar levels by around 13 per cent - as the heat dilated their blood vessels, blood-flow improved and the body made better use of its insulin, the hormone that converts blood sugar into energy.
A separate Japanese study showed that 10 minutes in a warm bath improved cardiovascular health in elderly men and women, helping them to cope better in exercise tests and reducing pain.
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| tennis tom |
Posted - 11/09/2006 : 08:03:25
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| h2oskier25 |
Posted - 11/09/2006 : 07:18:35
quote:
Originally posted by tennis tom
That's why whenever I have an opportunity I eat things that have fallen on the floor. It gives me an opportuity to build-up my immune system. I feel people who are neuroticly obsessively cleanly and concerned with germs and disease everywhere are in reality doing themselves a disservice by not naturally building up their immune systems to things they may encounter someday in the real world.
Tom, I thought I was the only one who did this !! I'm with you and the Labrador Retriever, a little dirt and grime now and again can only make me stronger. Bring on the germs.
Beth |
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