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jerica
USA
94 Posts |
 Posted - 02/28/2010 : 09:27:52
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Hi Winnieboo,
I don't do risky sports and I'm not a typical thrill seeker but when you said this:
quote:
Originally posted by winnieboo
Hi Jerica,
Why do I not feel alive unless my life is at risk?
I felt really overwhelmed all at once and tears came into my eyes. Something about it really socked me. I am addicted to the "thrill" of thinking I'm sick. That's part of it and I hate to admit it, but something about it excites me and I think life is BORING without it.
I remember being a kid and a house on our street caught on fire and I watched the roof burn from my window since I was in a 5 story building on the 4th floor and the house was just a 2 story down the street a ways. (If anyone has seen the movie Doubt with Meryl Streep, it was filmed in my childhood neighborhood and the street in the opening shot where the man and woman are walking together and they cross the street, that's my street). I remember thinking how EXCITING it was to watch this house burn and I sort of subconsciously since then have "wished" for bad things to happen because bad things broke the boredom of my life.
Now I didn't have a normal childhood, either. My dad was schizo and didn't work, mom worked nights and slept during the day. My sister and I spent most of our time in our bedroom with our TV. I read a lot. I was Isolated (with a capital I). I had no friends and was socially so anxious I didn't even want to go out. There were times where I literally wouldn't leave the apartment for months at a time. I didn't take baths, I didn't take care of myself. My dad ignored us, my mom worked but tried her best.
I was BORED out of my MIND. BORED! Isolated, alone. My sister started becoming a party girl/wild child and would run away (I don't blame her haha), or go out a lot so I really WAS alone.
this started a NEED in me for interesting things to happen. For excitement. The only thing that ever got exciting was when someone was sick or someone died. We didn't do anything FUN. We never once in my life that I can remember ever took a family vacation because we were dirt poor. I mean looking in your sofa for change kind of poor. Government cheese poor. Glad bags on the windows to keep out the cold poor.
I was sick even at 11, 12 years old. I had intestinal problems. I had asthma. I think through those illnesses I was screaming to be heard, to have a life. I was wasting away and not even a teenager yet. I needed attention, and parents who loved me. But then the focus went onto my sister since she was causing "trouble." I remember going to family therapy with sis and mom (dad wouldn't go of course)and the lady telling us to tell my sis that we loved her. I had brought a book to read and the therapist said something about that. I wasn't interested in telling my sister I loved her, I wanted people to love ME.
quote:
When you experience a symptom that is not TMS, I'm convinced: you know. I've had "real ones" along the way; I know. Physical issues don't move around, don't turn themselves off when you're asleep or when you're having fun. They don't fade after a beer or a glass of wine. If you're like me, there will be plenty of times when you experience a symptom and you won't be sure. Then you HAVE to check, but do your checking with a live M.D.
I don't know the difference. I don't. Not at all. Not one bit. I go to the doc over EVERYTHING. I am broke because of it. You realistically can't see a doc for everything because they cost too much. I have had so much shortness of breath or chest pain or whatever that I've run to the ER sooo many times I can't count anymore and I'm still here worrying. I can't tell what's what. That's why I'm off to the cardio guy yet again and all he can do is more tests. And all of the docs have said I don't need any more tests but then I think well then why is he saying I can get a heart cath? Why is he saying is the symptoms keep up we will "get more aggressive" which can only mean a nuclear stress test or heart cath? I don't want to put myself in these invasive things especially when I don't have clear evidence of a problem. I might do the nuclear stress test but I don't think I could do the cath unless something was found wrong and I was told by a doc that it was necessary. No doc, not even the cardiologist has said to me that it is necessary. He just listens to me complain and says that all my tests are normal, I'm tormenting myself, and I can get more tests just to make myself feel better if I want them. That's not a clear answer. My gastroenterologist told me that I didn't NEED a colonoscopy and he WASN'T going to do one, period. That is what I need. I need someone who is sure enough to say you know what, I'm not doing it, you don't need it. My cardio guy right now is waffling and kinda letting ME be the doc. He's just as confused as I am. We both don't have a clue why I feel so bad despite good test results.
quote:
On another thread, you sent us to a website that I watched and it's very Sarno-ish, all about the inner child and repression. So, that's the right road. Improvement begins when TMS is accepted and one does the work in a disciplined way, like sticking to a diet or exercise commitment.
yep that's the method that my new therapist employs but we have only had 2 sessions and I have been filling her in on my background. It sure takes a long time to get through that and into the "work." I'm trying, though. I see her again tomorrow.
I am going to think a lot more about what you said. The addiction I have to fear or at least the "excitement of possible danger ahead." It's seriously something I truly feel I am doing to myself. I am making my life dramatic because I'm desperately afraid of it being boring for some reason.
If just reading what you said actually can make me cry without even really thinking about it, you definitely hit a nerve so it deserves some investigating. (Am I a bad person to have wished for bad things to happen just for my own entertainment? *guilt*) |
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jerica
USA
94 Posts |
Posted - 02/28/2010 : 09:45:50
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I just wanted to talk to my husband about this post and I could not get him to sit his butt DOWN and listen. Now we just had an argument about it, about how he "doesn't like to sit" (yeah but will sit in a chair at the computer for hours playing games or whatever) and how I shouldn't be thinking about this stuff or talking about it because he says it makes me feel worse. So now I am being told not to think/talk about it which just leads to
- repressing it all again
- feeling unwelcome and unloved
- stifled
- unimportant
- like what I try to do to help myself is wrong
- may as well get a heart cath since no one cares, anyway
I want to cry but again I can't. I get the tingle in my eyes but I can't get it out. I feel worse now that he was yelling at me about it.
I didn't even get to speak to him about what winnieboo said that I found so compelling. I feel pretty alone over here again. That's why I have no friends -- no one wants to listen to this stuff. |
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jerica
USA
94 Posts |
Posted - 02/28/2010 : 09:54:27
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I just felt a pain in my arm again like a muscle was cramping then I felt restricted when I inhaled, like smothering or something in my lungs. I'm so convinced it's my heart and I think at the same time that I'm insane and will never get well.
I keep wanting to know if you can have all these symptoms and still have it be TMS and not the heart? Is that really possible that it is TMS? It feels so real. It is real, I mean. But I don't know the real cause. How can i feel like I can't breathe or like someone sucked the air out of my lungs and have all these pings and pangs and stuff?
*tears hair out* |
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Hilary
United Kingdom
191 Posts |
Posted - 02/28/2010 : 12:17:08
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Jerica
Have you read the Claire Weekes books?
I ask because the endless changeable symptoms you describe, the thoughts that torment you, the continual "checking in" about how you feel from second to second, all sounds like the kind of patients she describes treating for "nervous illness" in her work.
Weekes would say that you're perpetuating your symptoms by thinking about them, trying to figure out what's normal, what's not, what's your heart, what's that pain, what's this pain, why do I feel like this, my heart doesn't work, etc etc. You get tenser and tenser by trying to fight the thoughts and the feelings and it just doesn't work - you get yourself into a spiral of emotions, thoughts and bodily responses and it's impossible to think your way out.
Weekes says that the only way to handle all that is to "float" through the symptoms AND through the thoughts by accepting each and every symptom and thought that comes up. When you accept, it's just - okay, so I'm having a weird thought that my heart doesn't work. It's just my overtired mind playing tricks on me. My jaw's hurting, okay, my jaw's hurting. I can let my jaw hurt if it wants to. You don't fight the thoughts or the bodily symptoms - you just accept. Okay, I'm having a panicky feeling that this TMS stuff doesn't work. It's just my mind again and my frazzled nerves trying to trick me.
Then you go and do something else. So it fits nicely in with the "think about something else" TMS work.
She directly addresses issues such as worrying endlessly about your health, lightheadedness, breathlessness, heart palpitations, generalised anxiety, intrusive thoughts, random pains, etc along with the panicky thoughts that accompany these symptoms. It is a horrible cycle to be in, but not an impossible one to get out of. I've found her method to be an absolute life-saver.
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jerica
USA
94 Posts |
Posted - 02/28/2010 : 18:54:13
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Hilary, I have one of her books but I misplaced it. I'm just going to buy another copy and some of her other ones because I really do like what she says and you're right and she's right. I'm spiraling around.
I just went to the clinic and got another EKG and it was fine. So here I am with my clenchy constricted throat and upper chest sensations and my little tightness in my lungs sensation and my little wheeze tickle thing and scared that I'll stop breathing but it comes and goes and it only lasts a second or two. The doc listened to my heart and lungs and didn't hear any wheezing but I do have a cough and tickle so he prescribed me an inhaler and Zyrtec in case it's allergies (did I mention I live in an area which has the highest cedar pollen count on the planet?) and a muscle relaxant for my shoulder. He felt my shoulder and all and it hurt.
He says I'm too tense and I don't need a heart cath or other heart tests and he was talking to me about believing that there's nothing seriously wrong and until I BELIEVE it this will just keep spiraling. Sound familiar?
*sigh*
It's always something, some symptom to scare me. If the regular ones don't work there's a new one or a new version of an old one. Last year I had this weird thing where I felt like an oppressive kinda tightness/chokiness in my throat and chest that would just come and go all day for like 2 weeks then it went away. Then at one point it came back again and went away. Maybe this is part of that back again but I'm just freaking out that I'll stop breathing or smother. But yeah, the way I described the symptom last year was "smothering" sensation that would come and go.
I have to give up and trust one or the other. Either I trust that I am having TMS, anxiety, and it's NOT dangerous or I go the other side and get more tests. And I can't afford tests right now, plus I'm too scared to get them.
I was sitting here asking myself again, doesn't it mean anything to you that you have been having some kind of chest pain for over 15 years and you have been maybe CAUSING your own symptoms by being obsessed with it? Maybe that is the answer. Maybe I am making these things happen like Dr Weeke's said -- because I Can. Not. Stop. Obsessing. About. Every. Single. One! I am like tracking minute by minute and with the new wheezing/cough/tightness stuff when it happens I'm sent off on the roller coaster again.
I should feel better. I just got a fine EKG! I just got reassured! Why don't I feel any better? I'm literally laying here thinking, "It will happen again, what will I do? I won't be able to breathe, I'll smother, maybe it's my heart, could it be, what about this what about that what if it gets worse and I can't breathe...." and so on.
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jerica
USA
94 Posts |
Posted - 02/28/2010 : 19:10:15
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This blasted cough is getting to me too. It feels like when I was a kid and I had asthma. The more I cough the tighter and more tickling my lungs feel. I am sucking on Halls Breezers to get rid of the tickle in my lungs. I have tons of sinus problems and post nasal so I wonder if that's the problem but the more I cough the more I feel like I'm wheezing and can't inhale easily. It is just like a mild asthma or something. I haven't had this in ages. But then I did have a cold about 2 weeks ago that started with a cough and lasted about 12 days straight. I probably destroyed all my lung's little hairs during the cold so I am coughing more now.
My husband just found Hope and Help for your Nerves on the bookshelf so I didn't misplace it after all! I thought I looked through all the books a few times but I must have missed it. I'm gonna read it now. I'm not sure she addresses the wheezing cough thing though or if that could be TMS at all... |
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Hilary
United Kingdom
191 Posts |
Posted - 03/01/2010 : 08:52:47
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I remember what that health obsession is like - I haven't had it badly for years but once in a while it pops its head up again and I become fixated on something. And then, guess what? The pain/discomfort/itch/tightness whatever gets worse and worse. I treat it now with the Weekes acceptance method, and then when it's under control I think about what's really going on with me. And it goes away. (The acceptance bit has to be there for me, which is the part of the process implied but not particularly emphasised by Sarno).
The thing is that there is always something wrong with our bodies. If I think about my body right now, I find that I have an ache in my neck. Being of a pretty stable mindset right now, I don't even think about it and it doesn't bother me, and in another minute I won't even notice it. I certainly don't imagine that it's anything serious.
Your mind on the other hand (and I know what this is like) is like a needle stuck in a groove on an old-fashioned record player. You replay the same "what if" track over and over again - locating the discomfort, trying to figure out what it is, wondering if it's deadly. It's like OCD (another TMS equivalent). From the sound of things you've had a million tests so the chances are very very good that your body is very healthy indeed. Your mind however gives you no peace at all because you are constantly fighting it.
Look at it like this: many many people with genuine heart problems don't obsess like this. I mean, my dear old dad, who's 80, had a massive heart operation (his second) last November. He has recovered extremely well, and he spends not a minute thinking about his heart. I asked him if he ever thinks about how close he came to death (cheerful person that I am) or if he worries about things going wrong and he looked at me as if I was insane and said, "why on earth would I want to do that?" He's a very non-TMS type, feels no guilt about anything and doesn't give a damn what people think of him.
Read the Claire Weekes book. I really hope it helps you - it did me.
ETA - I think my point in relating that story about my dad is that in a way, whether or not your heart is "ill" (which from all accounts it isn't anyway), doesn't matter. If someone who has major heart problems doesn't obsess about his heart, that seems to me to suggest that the problem (i.e. the problem that is making your so unhappy and desperate) is not your heart/lungs/throat/symptom du jour - it's what is going on in your mind. And the way out is not by endlessly thinking about analyzing: it's by letting yourself feel what you feel (body AND mind). I reckon that's what my dad does! :) |
Edited by - Hilary on 03/01/2010 09:52:08 |
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catspine
USA
239 Posts |
Posted - 03/01/2010 : 18:24:01
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from Jerika
quote:
I should feel better. I just got a fine EKG! I just got reassured! Why don't I feel any better? I'm literally laying here thinking, "It will happen again, what will I do? I won't be able to breathe, I'll smother, maybe it's my heart, could it be, what about this what about that what if it gets worse and I can't breathe...." and so on.
I'm beginning to think that the reason you don't feel better is because you can't yet, because there is something in the way: Considering all you wrote already obviously you have something to gain from perpetuating this situation and you are not willing to let this go yet because you haven't found what to replace it with that's emotionally powerful enough to fill the need.
The immense fear generated by this enormous potential void is probably at the origin of your extreme obsession: you desperately MUST find something wrong like a bad heart or "the benefits" will dry out. In the meantime anxiety will satisfy the greatest need and create the symptoms accordingly.
Of course none of this makes sense because consciously nobody wants to be sick or feel bad but unconsciously you may have all the reasons in the world to want to be sick and get what comes along with it even if it is only the best of the worst. If your therapist hasn't figured it out yet she might get there soon and the sooner the better.
Jerica I'm sorry that in order to try to help you I had to say what I see even if it's not pleasant. The good news is that with appropriate help there 's probably a lot that can be done to fix this problem.
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jerica
USA
94 Posts |
Posted - 03/01/2010 : 22:10:47
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I've thought of that, too. Some of the payoff is a false sense of security (I know, it's weird.) I don't feel well when I feel well, I feel scared and vulnerable. I don't feel safe when I feel well. So a great part of this is the comfort it brings because at least when I'm feeling bad I'm already feeling it. It's not like I'm losing anything like when you feel well it's all when will the other shoe drop?
Like Hilary was saying about her father -- he doesn't feel guilty, he doesn't care what people think, he doesn't waste time and energy worrying or thinking bad thoughts that would hinder him.
I feel like I'm this person trying to feel safe and I can't. So I "need" this stuff as a way to go to docs and be reassured over and over and over and over and have them constantly tell me I'm ok I'm ok because on my own I don't think I am ok at all.
My therapist today was really interesting, we talked a lot about my father and my childhood and things I'm harboring inside. At the end of the session she said, "I think Sarno's onto something." We had talked about the physical stuff, blood tests and cholesterol and foods etc. but I don't like going there if I need to go full TMS. If I go TMS I want to do it fully and not even consider the medical. I need to put the medical aside.
I'm working on things. Felt better today and also noticed that my wrist and arm and chest muscles would hurt when I moved them in certain ways and some of that tightness in my chest seemed really muscular like stretching when I breathe and my shoulders being really tight and hurting which goes across my chest as well. I stoped holding my shoulders "up" (didn't even realize I was doing that) and felt the muscles across my chest just kinda ache like they weren't used to that.
I think I'm looking in the Sarno direction more now. I also am going to get his books from the library - they're on hold there no.
I think both of you Cat and Hilary are totally right. It is just that I need to pick this direction and go in it and not keep looking back and wondering if it was the right road to choose. |
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mcone
114 Posts |
Posted - 03/01/2010 : 23:42:46
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Me Too (or Me Three, Me Four, Me Five)...
And the chest pains symptoms I've had have been PROFOUNDLY distressing - accompanied by breathlessness, overwhelming fatigue and pain spreading all allound my chest, my back, down my left arm (sometimes left arm getting numb and painful and even rarely going completely dead with no sensation). And I still have these symptoms virtually every day (to a greater or lesser extent) but nowhere near as bad as I had them a few months back.
And I am regularly overwhelmed with the morbid feeling that it it is impossible to have symptoms this severe without having some kind of serious cardiac abnormality
And I've had the experience of near COMPLETE remission of symptoms - infrequently - one time it occurred right after I spent an hour with my doctor - literally in tears resigned to the notion that the integrity of my body was now forever compromised...and everytime I had an outburst explaining how my heart "must" be damaged, he explained to me (based on all my testing, and his extensive experience with "real" cardiac patients) - and rammed it into my head, that ever concept and theory I was describng was not sensible - that I don't have heart disease and that there is nothing wrong with my hear.
After going through this intense "debate" with him (which completely lacked any kind of medical visit decorum) I finally and actually believed him - and his explanation must have penetrated into my psyche (into the autonomic nervous system programming?) somehow. I left his office virtually symptom free! and stayed that way for about day - This exercise was an amazingly illustration to me, but paradoxically, even the most aggressive de-programming, if only performed once, somehow doesn't really last. (or there is more to it than that - like perhaps toxic emotions that keep mucking things up)
But what you've said about your cardiolgist being confused ... yes. And here is what it boils down to. Assuming that this IS ultimately some form of TMS/Anxiety/, the fact that the doctors cannot advance a confidence-inspiring alternative and benign explanation for how such real, severe and discreet sysmptoms are part of an anxiety disorder, is part of the problem. In other words, the absence of any really good explanation as to why and how this is occurring the way it does, may itself be contributing to the problem.
And finally, after an echocardiogram, and two stress tests (not to mention countless ECG's) I did a non-invasive angiograpy and calcium scan. Result? Everything looks normal and my calcium score (an early marked of heart disease) was zero.
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jerica
USA
94 Posts |
Posted - 03/02/2010 : 10:08:07
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I was just sitting here trying to stay calm and was reading a post on another site about someone's symptoms and blam, I started feeling a weird sensation in my chest. Not pain, not pressure, not anything I can describe. Just like I wasn't going to be able to breathe but I was breathing fine. Like apprehension or something, just weird in my chest. I took a Xanax.
All last night I was having bad dreams and freaking out. I decided I don't really want to keep seeing my new therapist and one of the main reasons is that she keeps encouraging me to get scans and blood tests and she nearly fell off her chair when I said my cholesterol total and I feel really lectured, and like she doesn't believe herself that my problems are psychological. Then we got into some deep stuff in my past and I think she started changing her mind, but I am wary about going back for more lectures on what to eat or not to eat or what tests to get etc.
I see my cardiologist on Friday and I already know what he will say, what he's been saying for the past couple of years. He really just says well nuclear stress test or heart cath for peace of mind. I never did get to a therapeutic level of Zoloft so I don't know if that would have helped.
You're right about everything: the doctors and the therapists won't just come to the diagnosis that it is psychological. They keep waffling, saying maybe it is, I'm 99% sure (that's what my cardio doc says to me), even the therapist yesterday was all, "I won't rule out it being medical"...WHY NOT??? Only my old therapist who costs way too much (like 185 an hour who can afford that?) is the only person who INSISTED to me that it's psychological and due to anxiety and obsession. His method for my healing was really just a lot of telling myself off and I can do that for free. If a therapist isn't available to talk me down when I freak out, it's not worth it. I need someone who can be around for quick phone calls a couple times a week not just a one hour session twice a month.
Anyway, I have felt so many things and it seems in the past couple of years things have been so much worse. It's around the time my mom and I moved into an apartment together before I was married etc. That was a DISASTER and it made my health anxiety and symptoms go through the roof.
I just had the EKG the night before last. barely 24 hours ago and here I am thinking I need another one, I am all scared and freaked by my body.
I want reassurance, complete BELIEF from someone who knows what they're talking about who isn't going to say "get scans, get bloodwork, etc.".
The only things I can do medically are the calcium score and the CT angiogram or the nuclear stress test or heart cath and all that except the calcium score come with risk, and I don't like to take any risks when nothing's shown up so far. I can go up the stairs fine etc and when I just sit there doing nothing I get weird feelings.
I found my wrist and forearm pain seems to be some kind of carpal tunnel because both wrists are hurting now and when I flex my wrists they hurt and sometimes my shoulder hurts so I'm thinking the shoulder/neck/jaw/arm/wrist/collarbone "zings" are due to nerves compressed from all my tension.
What can I do??? |
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jerica
USA
94 Posts |
Posted - 03/02/2010 : 10:27:57
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Is that non invasive angiography the one where you get injected with stuff? I had a ct pulmonary angiogram last March because I went to the ER with chest pain and shortness of breath and they thought it might be a PE so they did that scan and the doc then told me I was fine. I told him I was afraid of having CAD and he said I didn't and I said how do you know and he said because he could see it on the scan. I said you can see my coronary arteries? And he said yes and looked at me like I was nuts. I remember asked if I needed a nuclear stress test and he said why would you need a stress test? and I said well my cardiologist said I could gt one and he asked "Why do you need a cardiologist?" So I mean doctors since then have said they don't think that doc could rule out heart disease with a pulmonary scan so either he was lying to me or he really could see my arteries. I did read something online
http://www.radiologysource.org/periodicals/medima/article/S0009-9260(04)00262-4/abstract
That said you CAN see if a person has CAD with a pulmonary scan but I mena I don't know, I am not a doctor. All I know is that one doctor who viewed the scan said I didn't have any disease and that it picked up 10% or more of whatever's there if anything and it didn't pick up anything. So I'm like, what do I do, who do I believe? |
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jerica
USA
94 Posts |
Posted - 03/02/2010 : 10:35:33
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I think I just had the weird chest feeling only this time it also felt like a throat spasm. It only lasted a few seconds and was so vague. I'm so scared of this stuff. I'm keep going back and forth -- medical, psychological, heart, stress, freak out, don't freak out, go to a doc, you just went to a doc. How can anyone live like this?
I'm also annoyed with my therapist today for even telling me yesterday that she thought one possibility was that I could be "haunted" by my dead father. I couldn't sleep because of the paranormal stuff she was bringing up yesterday. Out of an hour of talking I think she only got about ten mins of really getting into TMS stuff. |
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Dave
USA
1864 Posts |
Posted - 03/02/2010 : 10:51:25
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Your obsessive anxiety continues, and this forum has become a new outlet for this symptom.
If your therapist is not helping then perhaps it is time to change to another therapist, especially if it is true that she is bringing up "paranormal stuff." Though, I wonder if this is really true, or if she is just trying to present your issues in a different way in an effort to reach you. Have you ever explored issues with your father? The death of a parent could be very significant, especially if there were unresolved issues between you.
Since your anxiety seems to be at extreme levels you may consider asking for a prescription for Xanax or similar anti-anxiety meds. I'm not a fan of pills, but maybe if you are able to quiet your mind, you can stop the obsessive behavior and start to focus on something other than the symptoms.
Your messages seem to be 99% about physical symptoms and 1% about psychological issues. It seems you have been cleared by medical doctors yet you still fear something is wrong with you. Why can't you accept what the doctors are telling you? |
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catspine
USA
239 Posts |
Posted - 03/02/2010 : 12:30:20
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Mcone
I have had many of the symptoms you mention for almost a year before I was able to read through them as TMS symptom imperatives.
I did not have insurance or money to get tested with the full tests you describe but ironically that's what allowed me to find what really was going on. Compared to not knowing the recovery was a piece of cake and I wondered why I was so concerned about knowing.
I found the answer to that in my previous recovery from back problem when I recalled that it was not so much what the nature of the emotions was that did the trick but more the fact that was emotions at work to create the symptoms and somehow the tension went away and a malignant cause was dismissed.
Finding what the underlying emotions were would likely prevent symptoms to reappear but there is enough evidence for me now that a new source of stress can do that just as well and instead I use the investigating time to do something else while being aware of the limits not to cross and we 'll see what happens ...
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jerica
USA
94 Posts |
Posted - 03/02/2010 : 12:41:37
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Dave,
I get completely sucked in once I feel something in my body. It's blinding. The fear is so intense that i can't feel or see or anything anything ELSE. the physical symptoms envelop me. It's like being sucked into a black hole.
My dad was schizophrenix and a pedophile and justall around mean and our relationship was terrible, no communication just constant abandonment, neglect or punishment. Mom worked so she wasn't there to witness or defend us and she painted herself a victim with us and has since "let herself off the hook" for staying loyal to Dad and *allowing* him to destroy the family. There are so many emotions there that in the years after he died I couldn't talk about him without becoming physically ill, every time.
i know what you mean about the paranormal stuff, she kind of mentioned it as possible but also said that a possibility is I have created a dad "interject" as she calls them. A version of my dad that I've created from inferred messages through my experiences.
one reason why I never believe doctors is that they continue to offer me more scans, more tests and they will say they are 99% sure it's nothing BUT we can do a (fill in the blank test). I don't want any more tests. At the same time they introduce doubt that it's truly psychological.
At the beginning of my therapy session yesterday it was the same talk about cholesterol levels, blood tests, eating this and not eating that and what Dr. Oz says etc. Then as all the psychological stuff about my dad came out the whole thing switched to "Sarno is onto something." She started getting more ideas and theories about why I'm this way that WERE NOT medical/physical. I need a doctor who has seen enough TMS patients and a cardio who has seen enough cario patients that both know the difference between me and someone else. I need them to be in agreement on my treatment goals and what should be reinforced in me.
What I get from docs is basically "I have these tests, which ones do you want?" I don't like that. I don't want to be seeking out my own tests and my own diagnoses. I want someone who KNOWS this stuff to diagnose me and stick to that 100%. Let me walk out of there with a diagnosis and a firm goal of believing it. Let not any hint of medical doubt come between me and that goal.
I don't have that. There are few people who even think mindbody stuff is real. I need someone to take that risk with me and to be firm. When they waffle, I become jelly. |
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Hilary
United Kingdom
191 Posts |
Posted - 03/02/2010 : 14:15:14
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It's a shame you don't live in the UK, jerica. In the UK on the National Health Service you simply wouldn't be offered endless tests if your GP (primary care physician) didn't think it was worthwhile because it's so expensive. In the US it seems that patients can have test after test after test because it's all such a money-making racket.
Personally I would run not walk from a therapist who started talking about paranormal hauntings by dead relatives. Are you able to express your anger at your therapist to your therapist?
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jerica
USA
94 Posts |
Posted - 03/02/2010 : 15:20:07
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For all my talking here I'm actually really timid when face to face with people. I don't tell them what I really think because I am afraid of being judged. I felt so judged when I told her my cholesterol she asked) because she made it seem like I was about to explode all over her furniture. If I express my resignation that's wrong, too. It's almost like everything I think is wrong, anyway. I just am a ping pong ball and I realized sitting there with the doc that I believe everything everyone tells me to an extent and I will not usually contradict them or correct them or feel comfortable telling them what I really think. Instead of saying that's a load of bunk, I don't want to even go there, I will just say, "oh that's interesting, I'll look into that, I'll try that etc etc."
I know I talk a lot but it's just online, I have trouble communicating with people. I always feel like they know better than I do, I don't trust my own self at all. And then at the same time I am distrustful of others, too. |
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Dave
USA
1864 Posts |
Posted - 03/02/2010 : 15:56:21
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quote:
Originally posted by jerica
I get completely sucked in once I feel something in my body. It's blinding. The fear is so intense that i can't feel or see or anything anything ELSE. the physical symptoms envelop me. It's like being sucked into a black hole.
This is the exact purpose of the TMS symptoms. You need to do your best to break that cycle. When this happens, yell to yourself "STOP!" Tell yourself you won't let it happen this time. Then focus instead on "dangerous" thoughts and feelings.
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There are so many emotions there that in the years after he died I couldn't talk about him without becoming physically ill, every time.
Strong evidence of a mindbody connection. The physical illness served to distract you from thinking about your father. There is something buried inside that your mind is desperate to keep you from feeling.
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I need someone to take that risk with me and to be firm. When they waffle, I become jelly.
First try being firm with yourself. Don't allow the old patterns to repeat. Become aware of your bad habits and try to break them. It is not easy. Like stopping smoking or losing weight, it takes commitment, hard work, and a life long change in your thinking and behavior. |
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jerica
USA
94 Posts |
Posted - 03/02/2010 : 16:27:01
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| Great just suddenly out of nowhere got a weird feeling in my chest/stomach like a tightening up. Like something just tightened and it feels like pressure or tightness on the right side like in the right lung or stomach. So weird! Maybe it's a muscle spasm? Ack. I'm freaking out now. |
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Yeah, I Googled and scared the tar outta myself
