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JaneLeslie
USA
88 Posts |
 Posted - 11/25/2006 : 15:30:59
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Hi! As some of you folks know I have had no appetite for a while and am losing a lot of weight. I needed to lose the weight and I now at a good weight. The TMS sx. are hanging around annoying my muscles and bladder. I have been doing the "work" (a la Sarno) and been very hard on myself--and everyone else---because I don't feel better physically and emotionally yet.
Today I gave myself a pep talk about the weight loss and said to myself: "Isn't it great! There is nothing to worry about. You are supposed to look like this. You are NOT sick! You look great." I felt my appetite come back!!!! I remembered that in the past every time I tried to lose weight---more numerous than I can count---I felt depressed (equivalent!)and would gain the weight back.
I think that I am such a TMS weirdo that I was beating myself up for not getting to the "bottom" of my rage (or whatever) when, regardless of that, my mind is threatened by my body CHANGING. Sarno says that the ucs. mind panics at any change. So a now 30 lb. weight loss might threaten it alright. This is like the people who claim their necks hurt when they drive over potholes. Conditioning.
I am trying to talk myself out of having sx. from the weight loss process. Not sure how. I think my ucs. mind is very threatened by it. Any thoughts welcome. I will continue my "work" but I feel better about the whole thing because it may not be that I need to feel more rage, etc., but that a conditioning process is occurring as well, or besides.
Thanks!
Jane
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Dave
USA
1864 Posts |
Posted - 11/25/2006 : 17:17:18
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quote:
Originally posted by JaneLeslie
I have ... been very hard on myself--and everyone else---because I don't feel better physically and emotionally yet.
Being hard on yourself is a symptom. Ignore it like any other symptom. Don't allow it to set in. Recognize and put an end to it. |
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Littlebird
USA
391 Posts |
Posted - 11/25/2006 : 23:10:08
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Hi Jane,
I'm kind of struck by the way you used the word "panic" in this thread, because when I was following your previous thread about the weight loss I was kind of getting a sense of panic from some of your comments. I think maybe it's not just your unconscious mind that may be feeling panic, but maybe the conscious part as well. I was having that feeling recently, but I finally am getting past it.
What I think was causing it for me was that I was pushing myself to acknowledge anger that I was very uncomfortable thinking about and wanted to deny having. Sort of like a tug of war was going on between my conscious and unconscious mind, because I believe I need to get to the point of acknowledging that anger to get free from the pain and fatigue that have destroyed my life, but it's been hard to get to the real rage, even though I've been feeling a lot of conscious anger for the past 4 years. It's been hard because even though my conscious mind feels what seems like a lot of anger, even my conscious mind has resisted going all the way into the depths of that emotion. It's been fighting itself as well as the unconscious, if that makes any sense.
So--I'm going to toss out a couple of thoughts based on the little bit I know about you from previous threads. I know your childhood had some similarities to mine, so I'll tell you a few things I feel have contributed to my TMS. Maybe something will be of some use to you in dealing with this TMS beast. But if it doesn't fit, ignore it.
Even though I knew my parents weren't meeting some of my important emotional and other needs, particularly my (probably borderline) mother, I didn't feel like I could blame them for that because I knew how they developed their mental imbalances, through childhoods that made mine look like Disneyland. When I went to therapy and the counselor made some negative remarks about my parents, I felt defensive. Even though I could admit that I felt pain and loneliness due to my upbringing, I couldn't feel real anger. I felt annoyed, disappointed, upset--not angry. Certainly not outraged.
Just before discovering Sarno's book, I realized that I could be angry that my needs weren't met without viewing my parents as villians. Since learning about TMS I'm finding that I can be more than just angry, I can be outraged that they were caught up in their own problems and that they either didn't see or didn't know how to give me the kind of support and acceptance that are necessary for children. I can be outraged that their parents did such awful, awful stuff to my parents and that those bad things led to them not being able to provide what I needed. I can be outraged about the effects of my parents behavior without hating them, without putting all the blame on them. And, most important of all, I've learned that I am not a bad person for being outraged.
This failure to provide for my emotional and other needs continued to affect me well into my adult life. It drove many of my bad decisions, which led to more pain and more repressed anger as I got involved with people and situations that I'd never have gotten involved with if my parents had treated me differently. I'm finally getting to the point where I can let myself recognize that quite often when I feel really sad and hurt, there's a good chance that I could have avoided whatever caused the sorrow and pain if my parents had been able to raise me in a different way, without the twisted influence of their own mixed-up emotions and fears.
Most of the stuff that really hurts us and makes us the saddest has to do with our relationships with other people--our families, friends and workmates. And much of what goes on in our relationships is related to what went on in our earlier relationships with our family of origin.
Being raised my mothers with mental health issues, we not only didn't get our emotional needs met by them, but we learned to deny our own needs and feelings. We learned to conform to their image of us in order to survive. We hid our real selves away, we got numb in order to protect ourselves. Now that our real selves see the chance of being let out again and are pushing to be allowed to become visible again, to be seen, acknowledged and accepted, our unconscious is panicking because it has been conditioned for so long to protect us from this dangerous action. It's spent so many years, from the time we were really little, believing that our mothers would reject us or punish us or maybe even worse, if we didn't repress our real selves and be the child that our mothers expected us to be, needed us to be in order to fulfill their own emotional needs. It's terrified that our world is going to crash and burn if it doesn't maintain the old status quo, doesn't continue forcing us to stifle the real selves and real feelings.
I know you previously mentioned that you were wondering if your goodness has been an act to make people like you. The answer is that even if it was partly that, you are still a good person. Your goodness is not simply fear of being slammed, hurt or rejected. Your real self contains a great deal of goodness or you wouldn't be able to draw on that in the situations where you want to please others. As a child there was a "reward" for ignoring your own needs and being what someone else wanted, so it's only natural that some of your desire to please others may be motivated by the conditioning to be good in order to protect yourself. But that does not mean the desire to please doesn't also come from your own goodness. As time goes by and we get to know our real selves better, we'll be able to separate out the different motivating factors. Our unconscious minds will come to see that we can be good and still set healthy boundaries, so then we'll know for sure that the things we do for others are coming directly from our goodness, without any fear.
Do you think that your unconscious mind could be threatened by your efforts to change the way it forces you to repress your inner self, and that the focus on this change in your weight is just a diversion to keep you from focusing your efforts on making this other change?
And congratulations on your weight loss! Corey |
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JaneLeslie
USA
88 Posts |
Posted - 11/26/2006 : 18:54:55
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Corey,
Thanks for that. Thanks Dave too! I have to read and re-read your post Corey. There is a lot in there and I want to get every word. How to get at the rage while still preserving your love for your parents is key, I know. Not sure how. Tonight I am letting myself look at old pictures. My parents divorced when I was 19 and that is when the TMS really started dominating my life.
Thanks for all that. You took a lot of time. I am going to read it again tomorrow.
The focus on weight loss most certainly could be a distraction from bad feelings. I am also finding that I am now conditioned to get pain from all sorts of stress/emotions/activities---now that I am "aware." I have to "yell" at my brain to cut it out while I do this deeper work because this work takes time.
Blessings,
Jane |
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Littlebird
USA
391 Posts |
Posted - 11/26/2006 : 21:04:09
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Hi again,
So many of your posts really hit me, like you have been in my mind and know a lot of what I feel. Things that you've written that I've never responded to, because the feelings that were triggered were kind of overwhelming to me and took a while to process, have really helped me figure out what I need to focus on and how to do it. That and Dave's responses to your threads. I sometimes think he could write a book about TMS work.
One thing you said a while back that just made me cry was something about what does everybody want from you. I ask myself that so often, because I feel like everyone in my life needs and expects so much from me that there's nothing left for myself. Like my brain shut my body down because I was running myself into the ground to take care of everyone else.
I've learned a lot from your threads. And I believe that one day you're going to be pain free. Take care--Corey |
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Singer_Artist
USA
1516 Posts |
Posted - 11/26/2006 : 22:19:13
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Hiya Jane,
That is great that you lost 30 pounds! I cannot wait (no pun intended..lol) to say the same..Yes I believe the uns. mind can be threatened by such a change..I have been up and down the scale myself for yrs and have all sorts of reactions, good and bad to these changes..The eating issue is just another TMS equivalent, just another attempt to find a suitable distraction in my view..
Hugs,
Karen |
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JaneLeslie
USA
88 Posts |
Posted - 11/27/2006 : 09:25:05
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I have two questions for you smart ladies (and Dave, a very smart guy ):
1) How can we get at the rage (ucs) when we are "conditioned" to feel pain with cs. anger? That scares me. If I get to the rage am I going to hurt even more for a while???? Maybe that is what is going on now and I don't even know it.
2) I now have muscle stiffness that is unpleasant. My TMS doc is rather hard-core about no drugs. I am considering going to my GP for something. I will still do "the work" of course, I am just tired of non-stop sx. In the past muscle relaxants have really helped but didn't know if that was a Sarno "no-no." If it is, why is it? What other things are usually prescribed (specifically.)
Thanks Littlebird for your emotional input. (You too Karen.) I think a great deal about it. We just KEEP GOING!!
Thanks,
Jane |
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armchairlinguist
USA
1397 Posts |
Posted - 11/27/2006 : 10:55:20
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I think Sarno generally recommends OTC pain meds, primarily, to take the edge off symptoms so you can better function and do the work.
It seems possible that your pain will get worse at some points -- I've seen a lot of people report that, although it didn't happen to me. But I still have stuff (stiffness and mild pain) that goes up and down with time, and it sometimes gets worse if I am trying to think about TMS things. :/
I see a lot of strength in you and great dedication to your healing, so I have confidence that you'll figure out what works for you! :-)
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Wherever you go, there you are. |
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Littlebird
USA
391 Posts |
Posted - 11/27/2006 : 16:33:33
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I think ACL is right about your strength and your dedication to healing. I want to share what has helped me, but I realize there's no guarantee that it will help someone else. If it doesn't fit for you, I know that your determination to overcome TMS will lead you to whatever does work.
I have also been afraid of getting to rage, because of what I expected it to do to me. I have been barely functional; it takes me a week to do what I used to accomplish in a day's time. I've been afraid that this emotional process will debilitate me further, but once I decided to push ahead I found the opposite. I am getting more energy and functioning better. I've been surprised to find that I'm actually less overwhelmed by emotion now that I'm willing to feel real anger. Before I could face my anger I was so very sad all the time, but that is lifting, and I believe it's because my unconscious was using those "surface" emotions as a distraction from the anger that needs to be acknowledged.
I had to go back and review Dr. Sarno's words that we just need to acknowledge the anger, which is not the same as trying to analyze it or justify it or try to do some sort of intense processing. I had trouble believing that I could benefit from acknowledgement without doing some sort of intense analysis process. I realize now that I expected it to be like processing grief, because that is what I was constantly doing, grieving, but allowing/accepting the anger is not like going through the stages of grief; at least it hasn't been for me.
I think I was stuck with grief and emotional pain because I was afraid of allowing major anger. I did allow some mild anger in some situations, but nothing like the real anger that was being suppressed by my conscious mind and repressed by my unconscious mind. What kind of person would I be if I allowed that sort of rage? My mother had regular rages, and I wanted to be nothing like her, so I stifled anger. Plus I was afraid that showing anger of any sort would drive people away from me the way my mother's rages drove everyone away from her. I have to say that I never stopped loving my mother, despite all of the pain she caused, but anger/rage and love don't have to be mutually exclusive.
I'm finding that acknowledging rage to myself, and accepting it as a natural response to certain demands from people and life in general, is very different than the type of rages my mother acted out, even though the source of her rage and mine is probably quite similar in many cases. Both mom and I tried to suppress and deny the angry feelings; for her they leaked out as outbursts that hurt others and for me they became physical pain.
My impression of treating sx with meds is that whether it impedes your TMS work depends on your perspective of why you're using the med. If it's viewed as a temporary assistance until your emotional work gets you to a point where you can function better without the help of the med, I think it doesn't necessarily limit your progress. I'm still taking some pain medication, and expect to wean off it as I progress. I've weaned off of one already.
Corey |
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JaneLeslie
USA
88 Posts |
Posted - 11/28/2006 : 08:30:26
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ACL---I have noticed too that focusing on TMS stuff can make sx. worse. What does that mean??? Do you back off or work harder?? It's so confusing.
Littlebird, thank you. Fear of the rage has created the pain and I need to learn the art of acknowledging the rage and ACCEPTING that it is normal and doesn't make me "bad." We are only human.
As I was saying on another thread I think that along with the ucs. rage I have been hamstrung by how my mind has conditioned me to feel pain---worse at some times and not others. Certain types of pain come and go. It can even be in response to weather!!! How silly. I am trying to think of techniques to stop some of this because it is so insidious.
What I find hard is knowing what part of my TMS is "deep" (Freudian ucs. rage) and what part is a conditioned response (my brain "thinks" I will have more pain in bad weather so I do.) I may never know. I don't know how deeply I am repressed and conditioned both!
I do think that at the heart of it, as Sarno says (Brady too) is my personality. But that ain't easy to change, or really possible.
Thanks all as usual. You are great!
Jane |
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armchairlinguist
USA
1397 Posts |
Posted - 11/28/2006 : 11:01:16
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You do what feels right to you! I hope you'll come to adopt that philosophy more and more as you heal. I don't see you trusting yourself as much as you could. You know the symptoms are harmless, so disregard them, and do what feels right -- do some TMS work, or do normal daily stuff.
You might think about devoting a certain span of time, at a certain time of day, each day, to TMS stuff. You work then, and you don't at other times, unless it comes on spontaneously. That way you know you are working, and you know you are living.
Sarno says we don't have to change our personalities, but I kinda think we just get sick of being the way we've been. I've been really astounded at how helpful the book The Drama of the Gifted Child (recommended by many on this forum) has been to me. I also love the essay at (http://www.creativegrowth.com/teresa.htm). I feel like if I'm able to work through some of this stuff, some personality evolution may happen naturally.
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Wherever you go, there you are. |
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Dave
USA
1864 Posts |
Posted - 11/28/2006 : 11:09:42
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The conditioning aspect of TMS is perhaps the most important to understand and accept.
You feel symptoms in a certain location, at a certain time, or in response to certain external events. It is all part of the brain's strategy to convince you the problem is physical.
Surely if you feel pain every morning when you wake up, then you must have "slept wrong", right? Or if you feel pain when you sit for too long, it must be that our bodies are not "designed for sitting", right? Or if you get a headache every time it rains, it must be the weather, right?
WRONG. It is a conditioned response. Recognize that, laugh it off, and ignore it.
There are no magic techniques that will rid you of TMS in a hurry. As I said before, a habit developed over a lifetime cannot disappear overnight. This is one area where I feel Dr. Sarno does his readers a disservice: he claims in his book that most people are cured in a few weeks. If this is true, then I bet the majority is 50.0001%. The rest of us have to keep at it and may not experience significant relief for months.
Don't have high expectations, and don't get frustrated with a lack of results. Just do the work faithfully and trust that the symptoms will fade over time, be it days, weeks, months, or a year. |
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JaneLeslie
USA
88 Posts |
Posted - 11/28/2006 : 17:57:38
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Thanks Dave. I find that I am getting depressed sometimes because I cannot quickly resolve this thing, even though I think I have a good intellectual understanding. I feel in "limbo." I am trying not to let it get to me, but you know how that is. I know I always have use of pharmacology if I need it temporarily.
Good response. I will re-read.
Jane |
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Singer_Artist
USA
1516 Posts |
Posted - 11/28/2006 : 20:42:50
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Good to see all the great replies you got, Jane..:) I feel for you and for all of us..My TMS is doing some very weird things I mentioned in a previous post..Like, I am sitting watching TV and my whole head moves very slightly..Seems this happens more after driving over those darn intense potholes, while being tail gated by a crazy NYC driver! Or..after a fight w/ my boyfriend..(stress related)..Dave is right, conditioning is Big in TMS and ACL is right..you are on the right track and determined to heal..I have faith in you!
Hugs,
Karen |
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JaneLeslie
USA
88 Posts |
Posted - 11/29/2006 : 05:39:47
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Thanks Karen! You are a good pal!
What I am noticing today is a LOT of emotion, mostly anger coming out. IT is very frightening to me. It almost feels a little like PTSD. Waves of emotion.
I think it is progress, but I have never just let it roll over me before and it is like a tidal wave.
Hold me in your prayers.
Jane
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JaneLeslie
USA
88 Posts |
Posted - 11/29/2006 : 05:54:16
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It also seems like the only way to keep the pain away is to live through these horrible emotions.  I hope this goes away soon so I can have freedom from emotional and physical pain at the same time.
Any input welcome.
Jane |
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Dave
USA
1864 Posts |
Posted - 11/29/2006 : 08:19:22
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quote:
Originally posted by JaneLeslie
Thanks Dave. I find that I am getting depressed sometimes because I cannot quickly resolve this thing, even though I think I have a good intellectual understanding.
TMS-prone people are thinkers and not feelers. That is part of the problem.
Intellectualizing does not help. TMS is an unconscious process dealing with the most primitive emotions that we cannot even feel.
You simply cannot place any expectations or schedule on relief. If you do then you will surely fail. |
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HilaryN
United Kingdom
879 Posts |
Posted - 11/29/2006 : 10:06:15
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quote:
It also seems like the only way to keep the pain away is to live through these horrible emotions. I hope this goes away soon so I can have freedom from emotional and physical pain at the same time.
Hang in there, Jane! It sounds like you’re on the right track. It may take a while, but you’ll get there in the end.
Hilary N |
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armchairlinguist
USA
1397 Posts |
Posted - 11/29/2006 : 11:13:33
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We are big and strong enough to be with our pain...It's tough but hang in there. It will start to come out, and then you won't have to feel it in your physical body as aching, and you will feel a renewed vitality for all of experience, even pain.
The pain I've been experiencing lately is still quite horrible, but I also feel that I'm healing as I experience it. This is described in the Growing Towards Wholeness essay as your inner child experiencing the pain, while your adult self experiences the healing it brings. She adds that your "higher self" also experiences the beauty of you being able to help yourself heal, though I seem not to have connected that up yet.
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Wherever you go, there you are. |
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JaneLeslie
USA
88 Posts |
Posted - 11/30/2006 : 09:54:01
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Well I find it interesting that sometimes when I am really feeling my emotional pain I cannot tell the difference BETWEEN that and the physical pain! I know that something "hurts" but is it my body or my mind!!! I can' tell for those few minutes. How can that be?
Really strange, but I hope this is the right direction.
Thanks,
Jane |
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JaneLeslie
USA
88 Posts |
Posted - 11/30/2006 : 09:55:08
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| I may post about this! |
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Conditioning? Ucs. mind panicking?
