| T O P I C R E V I E W |
| Penny |
Posted - 11/30/2007 : 23:11:53
Hi Guys,
In talking with Marcos in the hemo/iron thread, I started thinking about the long-time contributors here. Especially those of you who hardly ever mention your own physical pain, but you stick around here and continue to share AND learn. I have great admiration for you guys!
Do you still actually get physical pain? Do you think that TMS is something you conquer, or is it something you have to live with... well... for all your days?
I've been doing the TMS stuff for over 18 months now and I see pain very differently than before. Thankfully I'm out of the excrutiating, panic attack, hypochondriacal state I began in, but I do still get physical manifestations. I talk to them, analyze things that may be contributing, indulge myself in some ME things. I don't limit my physical activity, ever! Lots of helpful counter things. I even accept the pain if it stays around, and say to it--"Oh hello, there you are again! Haven't seen you om a while. What's going on that you've got to get my attention again by giving me (insert symptom)? Hmmm? Don't want to tell me, well let's go have a cup of tea and a think and maybe a good cry too." yaddayadda 
I feel confident (hopefully not arrogant) in my pain management. (I'm seeing my psychoT again on Monday.)
So what do YOU sages think: Are we to have TMS pain/reminders for all our days? Have you accepted a lifelong approach to dealing with your TMS?
As always, thanks for sharing your insights.
>|< Penny
"Feeling will get you closer to the truth of who you are than thinking."
~ Eckhart Tolle
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| 10 L A T E S T R E P L I E S (Newest First) |
| Stryder |
Posted - 12/04/2007 : 20:56:55
Hi Penny,
Sounds like you are doing well yourself and you have gotten some good responses to your post here.
Like yourself, I still get pain, but I do also see it in a different light than before I knew about TMS. One major point is that if I do get pain I no longer have any fear. I have 100% been able to control the fear, and that has made a huge difference in how I deal with things going forward.
Also, I can recognize when the pain is starting and small in magnitude, what is going on (TMS), and can manage to ignore it right from the start. So the pain never progresses to the extreme stages like it used to where I'm basically disabled. Its been over 10 years since I had pain like that.
I think this condition is indeed a lifelong condition, but knowledge is everything.
Take care, -Stryder |
| armchairlinguist |
Posted - 12/03/2007 : 23:30:17
quote:
It's been my pattern to feel guilty instead of resenting people for putting me in the bad position in the first place.
Oh yeah. Sometimes we are mirrors of each other! I'm just starting to realize this.
--
It's not 100% belief that's required, but 100% commitment. |
| Penny |
Posted - 12/03/2007 : 20:39:43
Had a great therapy session today. Hadn't seen my doc in 2 months, so decided to see him again. I'll be going back next week. It was good to take a break from all the self analysis, but it will be good to get some feedback OUTSIDE my brain again. Today, he flipped the guilt I've been feeling over my parents not coming for Christmas and exposed yet another emotion I have never allowed myself to experience: RESENT! It's been my pattern to feel guilty instead of resenting people for putting me in the bad position in the first place.
I--like you--prefer alive to dead. I'd rather be crying than missing, like I was.
I love your points, particularly about the fact that it is perfectly healthy to have mixed feelings about people and circumstances. This has been a huge revelation for me. I used to believe that ambivalence was a sign of weakness, and again, never allowed mixed feelings to surface in me. Now though, I feel almost flaky. It feels good not to know, very non-commital.
That last point you made is my challenge too. Most of the time I am better at accessing my true feelings, but standing up for myself (without guilt, or feelings of unworthiness) is not easy. Now, I've got another feeling to tap into, and that is resent. Think I'll go look that one up in the dictionary!
nightynight 
Penny |
| armchairlinguist |
Posted - 12/03/2007 : 20:30:11
Penny,
I completely relate to that feeling of wishing that the bad parts would go away, but I have finally come to dislike the 'dead' feeling even more. I am much more glad to be alive now than I used to be, most of the time.
It is hard to know what is healthy, but I have learned a few things:
It is healthy and common to have a complicated mix of feelings about things or people, in which one feeling is uppermost, then another.
It is healthy and common for feelings to change quickly at times (moods).
It is healthy to express feelings in a non-threatening, non-defensive way, and ask for what you need.
I still have a hard time with the last one. Sometimes my feelings seem so trivial. Does it really matter than my boyfriend was wrapped up with his own lack of success in an endeavor and did not express happiness at my success? Or do I let it go? But at least now I am aware that I feel that, and asking myself if I want to mention it, even if I am still unsure about expressing it. Being so much more aware of my feelings is such a rich and deeply satisfying thing.
--
It's not 100% belief that's required, but 100% commitment. |
| Penny |
Posted - 12/02/2007 : 21:16:43
God ... I LOVE you guys. Thanks for sharing.
Altherunner ... I'm jealous. (That's not easy for me to admit. Therapy has done me good!  )First, that you experienced Ecky (I call him Yoda) in person. Second that you continue to run! I stopped but not due to pain: I've managed to not prioritize my running and I only go about once a month. I need to do this for myself again. Running expelled a lot of my anger. I'd run and swear my head off.
Art, You are such a great person! Thanks for chiming in here. I love hearing from you.
Hilary, Congrats on getting thru your RSI. Thanks for reminding me about that little perfectionist in us that always wants to divde and conquer.
Skizz,
You ABSOLUTELY cracked me up! That is probably more than half my bloody battle: I'm too f*&%^ing nice!!!!!!! I;ve had a few glasses of wine tonight, so I'm quite a bit looser than I usually am when I post here.) Very good points. Maybe I'll go have a Bailey's when I'm done with my reply!
ACL,
So many times you are a mirror for me and my experience. Thanks for being here. I have learned so much from your revelations. Holy schmoly!!! Yes, emotional malaise. I resent these negative feelings. Sometimes my brain likes to believe that I was happier before I experienced all of these "bad" emotions, but then I remind myself that at the height of my TMS pain I was depressed. Depression didn't allow me much deviation from apathy: neither joy or sadness. Now, I feel a lot of sadness, but I have a lot more joy beam thru too, so I have to remember that. Gosh, what the hell is an emotionally healthy person?! I don't think I've ever met anyone who is emotionally healthy! At least who is a grown up. (I think my children are emotionally healthy, but how the hell would I know?!)
Thanks to you ALL. |
| altherunner |
Posted - 12/02/2007 : 11:27:55
Your quote from Eckhart Tolle says it all. Went with a couple of friends to see him in Vancouver on Friday - it was great! He is going
to Seattle, Feb.23, San Fransisco Mar.7 and 8. The San Fran lectures
can be bought live online at www.soundstrue.com/et2 800-333-9185.
His teachings have reduced the anger and fear generated by the ego, and have not caused me any pain for a long time. The "thinking mind"
generated stress, living in the head all the time caused my pain. Dr. Sarno eliminated the symptoms, not constantly thinking allowed the pain generating mechanism to stop. Runners are bombarded with reasons "not to run", and why running causes so many aches and pains.
90% are BS, once in a while I'll post my experience to someone in a similar situation, particularly if they are considering surgery. |
| art |
Posted - 12/02/2007 : 08:01:24
In many ways I'm as clueless as I ever was. An aging athlete workout hound, my main challenge continues to be separating genuine over-use problems from TMS....As long as I'm working out 6 and 7 days a week, I'll continue to have real injuries...
I'd tell you I was better at it than I used to be, but the truth is my real growth is in a reduction of fear, and a better acceptance of problems when they do arise. That said, I've a long way to go.
To be honest, I find the endless discussion of the finer points of TMS boring, so I skip a good 95 percent of what's posted here. But the forum attracts intelligent and interesting people, and that can be fun..PLus, every once in a while I feel that I might have something to offer to the newcomer.... |
| HilaryN |
Posted - 12/02/2007 : 05:12:42
Penny, I love reading your posts. ACL, don't be so modest!
For me, my RSI is completely gone.
I still get other manifestations of TMS in other forms, relatively minor, but irritating enough to bug me. If I tackle them early on (usually in the form of talking to them firmly) I can usually get rid of them quickly. It shows I still have work to do.
Being a perfectionist, of course, I want to get to the stage where I never suffer any illness! 
Hilary N |
| skizzik |
Posted - 12/01/2007 : 06:00:35
quote:
Originally posted by Penny
-"Oh hello, there you are again! Haven't seen you om a while. What's going on that you've got to get my attention again by giving me (insert symptom)? Hmmm? Don't want to tell me, well let's go have a cup of tea and a think and maybe a good cry too." yaddayadda
>|< Penny
Penny, sounds like your'e doing great. Lots of members here would love to be where you are.
Try throwing some Bailey's irish in that Tea and getting pissed off at who's making you angry in your life!!!  |
| armchairlinguist |
Posted - 12/01/2007 : 00:59:48
Hardly a sage here...
I would say that what you do is much like what I do, except that I don't get pain very often anymore. More usually I get 'emotional malaise' where I know I feel bad but not why or specifically what emotion. I do have ongoing bits of tightness and soreness in my neck and right shoulder. It is conditioning and habit and I know it.
Mostly I am just working on taking better care of myself, acknowledging and expressing my feelings more. To some extent I do expect this to be a lifelong effort, but not so much in terms of treating TMS as in terms of being an emotionally healthy person. Most of us didn't get good training in this to start out with, so we will be playing a bit of catch up, possibly for a long while. It is a lot of work to be emotionally healthy, just as it is to be physically or mentally healthy.
I think the way you put it in the other thread is good. Sometimes our bodies reach for physical pain before emotional pain. All we can do is keep circumventing that as appropriate. In time, the pain should become an occasional mild irritant at most.
'A good cup of tea and a think' sounds like an excellent TMS remedy to me. :-)
--
It's not 100% belief that's required, but 100% commitment. |
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