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sborthwick
87 Posts |
 Posted - 04/08/2008 : 07:16:56
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Hi Hillbilly,
Hope you don't mind if I address this directly to you as I have found your input so helpful. I have started reading and listening to Claire Weeke's tapes and books and for the first time in a long time, my anxiety is actually going away. It is extraordinary. I know this will take some time but it is very effective. She just encourages one to float through it and not get scared....then the symptoms simply stop coming. My issue is that this morning I woke up with sciatic back pain for the first time in a while. I ignored it, laughed at it however could not help but think this is the symptom imperative at work. Why if the anxiety is going away, has teh back pain reared its ugly head. Wouldn't this underscore Sarno's theory of the distraction method of the brain?? I am a little confused how I tie this into Week's method.
Weeks definitely helps one get over the fear of difficult emotions - thereby taking the power out of them until they eventually calm down. I understand that I ahve a very oversensitized nervous system. This concept completely makes sense. But how do you fit the back pain into this?
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Hillbilly
USA
385 Posts |
Posted - 04/08/2008 : 08:11:22
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Suz,
You need to reread the book. In Hope and Help (which is the one I hope you have) she states that the person with anxiety will often have body symptoms that will show up one day, another the next. "He slays one dragon only to have another appear," as she says on the audio tape of Pass Through Panic. Your system is still highly sensitized, a word that even Sarno uses. You are still bothered by the tricks your nerves are playing on you and then thinking and thinking and looping the stress and wondering if you need to do some emotional release and go back to Sarno-therapy. I did the exact same thing for months and months. My mind would switch back and forth and never relax and focus on what was happening in my life, only my body and how to fix it.
I have known people to have written lists of many symptoms that bothered them prioritized from worst to least, then to have that list scrambled in a matter of days. Staying in this analysis loop of which theory is right is not helping and was one of the things I was concerned about when you said you were using Weekes, Bassett, and Sarno-therapy to attack your issues. Getting out of your head is the way out of the problem in the long term. You are in no danger from nerves ever, and they are not permanently damaged. You will be fine so long as you commit to this approach and let go of timetables and realize that you can do what you want to do today and tomorrow even while you wait for your nerves to calm themselves down. |
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sborthwick
87 Posts |
Posted - 04/08/2008 : 08:22:40
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Thanks so much Hillbilly. I was hoping that was what you would say. I will reread the book - have not read all of it. I completely agree that it is way too confusing to mix all three of the approaches. I am simply staying in the self obssession loop. I noticed how much Weeks stressed to take a timetable out of it. It is going to take time for me not to focus on myself, my body and thoughts so much. I have been doing it for at least 15 years or so. I can tell you that the reduction in anxiety is absolutely fantastic. Of course, as you can tell, I immediately panicked about the back pain. I will reread and keep listening to Week's CDS and get on with thinking of other things!
Your support is invaluable. I cannot tell you how helpful it is to hear of someone who has come out the other side! It gives me a tremendous amount of hope. I feel more positive than I have felt for a long time. I know that Sarno has been very helpful to me but his approach has also made me feel like a victim of myself. As if - whatever I do, my unconscious is playing against me. Weeks makes me feel like I can have control again of my life. |
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pan
United Kingdom
173 Posts |
Posted - 04/08/2008 : 09:10:38
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quote:
Originally posted by Hillbilly
Suz,
You need to reread the book. In Hope and Help (which is the one I hope you have) she states that the person with anxiety will often have body symptoms that will show up one day, another the next. "He slays one dragon only to have another appear," as she says on the audio tape of Pass Through Panic. Your system is still highly sensitized, a word that even Sarno uses. You are still bothered by the tricks your nerves are playing on you and then thinking and thinking and looping the stress and wondering if you need to do some emotional release and go back to Sarno-therapy. I did the exact same thing for months and months. My mind would switch back and forth and never relax and focus on what was happening in my life, only my body and how to fix it.
I have known people to have written lists of many symptoms that bothered them prioritized from worst to least, then to have that list scrambled in a matter of days. Staying in this analysis loop of which theory is right is not helping and was one of the things I was concerned about when you said you were using Weekes, Bassett, and Sarno-therapy to attack your issues. Getting out of your head is the way out of the problem in the long term. You are in no danger from nerves ever, and they are not permanently damaged. You will be fine so long as you commit to this approach and let go of timetables and realize that you can do what you want to do today and tomorrow even while you wait for your nerves to calm themselves down.
Hi Hillbilly
Just to clarify, are you saying that we fall into the trap of thinking that by fixing our bodies and hopefully therefore eradicating the worrying symptoms that this will solve the problem?? Should we really be removing the focus from our bodies and the sensations and restoring the focus on our normal day to day issues and activities? |
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sborthwick
87 Posts |
Posted - 04/08/2008 : 09:36:46
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Hillbilly,
Quick minor question. Do you drink cofee/caffeine? I noticed that it is recommended to give it up to help desensitize the already oversensitized nervous system. It is my one pleasure in the morning but I definitely don't want to hinder my progress.
Thanks |
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Hillbilly
USA
385 Posts |
Posted - 04/08/2008 : 09:52:49
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Pan,
Yes. That isn't just my advice. It is also Dr. Sarno's advice, Claire Weekes' advice, and everyone else's. You can't fix a tension problem any other way except to remove the tension. No matter the source of tension, giving up resistance to it is essential. Dr. Weekes calls this practicing masterly inactivity.
Suz,
I gave up caffeine and refined sugar entirely (though weaning over a period of a couple of weeks) to help with the physiological effects. That won't cure you in and of itself, but it helped me to focus better. To each his own in this area. If you feel bad or get headaches, forget it. You have to address the thoughts that are continuing to cause you stress no matter what you are doing. People with these problems will keep getting the stress responses over and over until they learn to control their inner environment, which involves identifying and conquering irrational, nervous fears. I can't emphasize that enough.
Second fear, as Dr. Weekes describes is reacting to body noise. Back pain this morning was first fear, an abnormal stress response, but normal in the circumstance of your mental state. If you reacted at all to it negatively, you added stress hormones to your bloodstream and perpetuated the cycle. This is very straightforward. Watch for second fear and send it packing and regain your health. There is no magic in the process. Simple common sense will do the trick. |
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sborthwick
87 Posts |
Posted - 04/08/2008 : 10:32:46
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thanks Hillbilly. I think I might be better without sugar and caffeine too.
I get the second fear aspect when it comes my reaction to the back pain....but I am a little confused as to how to identify the second fear when it comes to my thoughts.
For example, a reoccurring fear that keeps hitting me today is "what if the relationship I am in is really not working out - I have to break up with my boyfriend." What happens is that I think that thought and then I ruminate on it and think further. I think things like - Oh no, I am going to be alone. What if it is just my overworrying is making me dysfunctional in a relationship. Are the second thoughts - the second fears? This is the crux of my anxiety. I cannot let issues go. I dwell on them. I think Weeks may call this "what ifs". I think I am supposed to just let the thought come and then accept and float through it? Will this stop the second thoughts coming?
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Hillbilly
USA
385 Posts |
Posted - 04/08/2008 : 12:22:38
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Try to lose the outcome fears and focus on relating, and if it doesn't work out (and it sure sounds as if you have doubts), then let that be as well. Being alone is not dangerous. Your thoughts about it are dangerous as perceived by your body, so it still produces stress responses when you think about it.
The thing that really unmasked this to me was when I was watching a television show about a doctor and saw him making rounds and standing for a long time and bending over patients and I got this idea that I couldn't do that (my back hurt too badly and I couldn't stand for very long at the time) and it scared me. Well, I was lying in my bed at the time and the thought sent shockwaves of poison through my body and I had trouble sleeping that night. If you are lying in bed and just thinking, you can have the same effect as a lion chasing you through the woods. You have to reprogram the mind to see danger only in the case of real physical danger. Otherwise, you are reacting to social fears and other nonsense as though you are in imminent danger of death. It won't happen overnight, but stopping the fear reaction to conditioned stress responses is the key (ACCEPT everything your body throws at you) and get on with things. |
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sborthwick
87 Posts |
Posted - 04/08/2008 : 12:34:44
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OH I SEE! Huh - that makes sense. Hillbilly - you explain it better than Claire Weeks!!
So - my body is overreacting to all my fears as if it is being attacked - in a constant state of Fight/Flight? So when I think of being alone, my body panics and produces more feelings of Fear?? Therefore - giving me second Fears. So I guess the answer is as simple as letting the Fears come and just not paying much attention and floating through them? Phew - that isn't easy!! Surely, then you would just not figure anything out in life?? |
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Hillbilly
USA
385 Posts |
Posted - 04/08/2008 : 12:49:16
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The first part you have right. The second part is not there yet.
Fearful thinking is a learned behavior. As such, it can be unlearned. Ruminating about things you can't control is the problem. You tense up as a result and don't let things unfold naturally because you are so emotionally invested in outcomes. You can't force your relationship to work out with nervous strain and brooding, but that is exactly what you are doing. You are actually lessening the likelihood of it working by behaving in this way. This is also what makes it so difficult to get past anxiety/TMS symptoms because people hold onto them and can't take their focus off them for a second. They want to force them to go away, when the only way to make it happen is to let your body do what it does best, heal itself.
I mentioned Annie Payson Call before. She talks about running to catch a train. What makes us hurry is fear of NOT catching the train. This mental attitude contracts the muscles and makes it harder to run, which is counterproductive. |
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sborthwick
87 Posts |
Posted - 04/08/2008 : 13:00:03
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Hmmm.....I am rereading and rereading what you have written. Hillbilly - thanks a million for all the time you are spending on explaining this to me. I really appreciate it.
Ok....so if I am obsessign over and over on these fears - especially right now about the relationship. I don't get what I am supposed to do? Just accept a fear thought, float through it and go about my day?? For some reason, this seems really difficult! |
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armchairlinguist
USA
1397 Posts |
Posted - 04/08/2008 : 13:29:57
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Suz, I think it also might help you to try the perspective shift I got on anxiety recently -- Hillbilly's remark about outcomes vs. relating reminded me. Worrying is partly about control for me, like if only I worry enough, the outcome I fear either won't come to pass, or I'll be forewarned and forearmed if it does. If only I can figure out what I will do, what the other person will do, what the weather will be that day, what will happen if I say this thing, what I'll do if this other thing goes wrong...
...then I will know the answer and I will be safe and everything will be fine.
But it doesn't work like that. We can't control things by worrying, and past planning stages, it doesn't help us prepare either. We can't know what other people may do, nor are we responsible for knowing that.
This is why going into the fear (probably similar to or the same as floating, masterly inactivity, etc) is such a powerful response to anxiety. It says, well, I have got the fear. So what?!?! Now I feel fear. I am still alive now and the fear will pass.
It relinquishes the attempt to control. It stops making resistance to the fear. So there is nothing for anxiety to work on, in a sense. No resistance that says Can't feel this must control it by thinking about it.
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It's not 100% belief that's required, but 100% commitment. |
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sborthwick
87 Posts |
Posted - 04/08/2008 : 14:09:13
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| Thanks so much Armchair - that makes alot of sense. I cannot tell you how helpful all this is for me. I have never realized that I do this at all - it is very eye opening. It has become such a way of life and thinking for me. |
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Hillbilly
USA
385 Posts |
Posted - 04/08/2008 : 16:29:59
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Suz,
It is about not avoiding things any more. Worry is, as ACL stated, misguided control behavior. You have to find out what you are worrying about and let go of it and accept whatever the world brings you. You've always handled it (for better or worse) but anxiety is all about hiding and running and staying afraid. Two powerful words to guide you: SO WHAT? I'm scared, so what. I have a backache, so what. It isn't a problem to be fearful or angry. It is a problem to avoid these feelings and situations that arouse them. |
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sborthwick
87 Posts |
Posted - 04/09/2008 : 08:52:41
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I am going to read this thread frequently because everyone has been so helpful. I had no idea that I had become so afraid of having a fear. I also had no idea I was such a control Freak with everythign around me!! I actually have a bit of a sense of humor now and am finding a relaxation I have not experienced before.
It is simply marvellous. I will continue to read Weeks every day, listen to her tapes until my nervous system relaxes and desensitizes. I don't care how long it takes...doesn't matter. I finally realize that I don't have anything wrong with me!!
Thank you to all of you. I am off to get on with my day - think of other things besides me! |
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Hillbilly.......what about symptom imperative?
