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smbrost2001
USA
5 Posts |
 Posted - 04/01/2012 : 14:35:47
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| i've been avoiding posting this because if i gave every detail i could type for a long time. but in the least i can say i overcame rsi, back pain, knee pain, foot pain, and shoulder pain. after x-rays and mri's showed physical abnormalities in my neck and back (bulging disks) as well as my knees, foot, and shoulder, all of which i had surgery on, all of which failed to alleviate the pain. this was from nationally renowned surgeons in chicago. i chalked it up as years of contact sports mixed with genetic bad luck and something i'd have to deal with for a lifetime. i finally came upon sarno in my early 30's when my little world was crumbling worse than it ever was, with one of those factors being debilitating rsi that would wake me at night, and often leave me tingling and shooting with pains during the day. it took me a while to embrace sarno, i waded into it. clearly i was being described in his pages, both my history and personality type. one of the last things that helped me feel safe to embrace tms was not telling various massage therapists about the rsi, but rather saying to them: "give me a full body massage and let me know if you find any 'abnormal tissue', different than other people." between that and a visit to Dr. David Schechter, i felt i could start to go all in. so i started to test the waters more with what i would do physically, giving myself self-talk all the while. i have come so far from the days of using voice activated software, crawling up and down stairs, and revolving my life around medical treatments. i also know that my emotional history hasn't changed, nor has my personality type, and that i will be battling rsi for a life. there is always a new symptom imperative, seemingly wiser and more convincing than the last. so be it, as long as i don't let it stop me from living life like the old days. |
Edited by - smbrost2001 on 07/10/2012 22:47:42 |
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jitterygal
18 Posts |
Posted - 04/05/2012 : 16:38:27
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Thank you for your story. It inspires me to continue along doing the things I truly love, such as running and cycling, which I had given up due to pain of "bulging disc." This group and Sarno's book have helped me in regaining my life.
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smbrost2001
USA
5 Posts |
Posted - 07/10/2012 : 22:19:34
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other things that helped me embrace this:
why was my bunion so painful, but i'd meet people much older than me that had no pain in their bunion? this is very similar to the study referred to in the book about all the people with "structural damage" in their backs as reveled by mri's who reported no history of pain. why did my foot continue to hurt after my surgery!!! it finally disappeared when i accepted tms.
listening to my mom and dad's lists of physical complaints and knowing how stressed and high strung my mom is (just like me) and what a traumatic history my dad has. their ailments were all over sarno's pages. just as i saw myself in sarno's book i saw myself in them, and many other family members. is it a family disease? :) chuckle. i think so.
it helped to start secretly (sometimes overtly) diagnosing others, especially when their personality type fit the description. when you start seeing it in all these other people, it is only fair to turn the lens on yourself.
really confronting the mental-emotional things that bothered me and realizing how scary they are to me and how i feel hopeless against many of them. the nice thing about debilitating physical pain is that we can look to the medical community and think, "they might fix me, soon i might come upon the cure." with some of the emotional baggage, you're stuck, and no one is coming to save you.
in some ways i have a pretty good memory, and i was able to make a timeline of various ailments, and saw a lot of the symptom jumping in my history. sometimes every few years, months, or days! a lot of times it correlated with certain emotionally strenuous moments in my history.
as i wrote before, i still battle it. but i am better at battling it. i am back to running, hiking, weight lifting, dancing, typing, sitting improperly, sex (when i'm lucky! ha!). but seriously, all that stuff used to cause serious pain (knees, back, shoulders).
like many people on here, i tell others about tms and they scoff, or i just keep my mouth shut. i know how hard it is to take this leap of faith. i hope what i've written thus far can provide a piece of what you need to immerse yourself in this. again, that is how it was for me: little pieces here and there that made this thing make sense. a recovery story here, a tms doctor there, some reading here, some personal reflection and evaluation there. just piecing it together... |
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smbrost2001
USA
5 Posts |
Posted - 07/10/2012 : 22:41:04
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| btw, i was just reading my old post. my wrists haven't hurt for months. i even do bent wrist push-ups! although they still, snap, crackle and pop, oh my! i remember how i was sure that the crackling was a sign of injured, tight tissue. maybe they haven't hurt for awhile because for the past few months my shoulder and neck have flared up. can somebody scream SYMPTOM IMPERATIVE? what a great distraction it is. it really serves it's purpose. it's funny how just typing about all this stuff can alleviate it for a time. |
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LuvtoSew
USA
327 Posts |
Posted - 08/25/2012 : 12:15:41
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Thank you for your post, did you have bunion surgery? I really was encouraged reading your post. |
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smbrost2001
USA
5 Posts |
Posted - 07/18/2013 : 00:50:42
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Two things:
One, the symptom imperative is strong. But I don't give in and continue to do the things I want to do physically. I've put on 15 pounds of muscle since I embraced TMS by lifting weights for the first time in years. the symptom will jump around every few weeks or months, sometimes they disappear all together. I press on regardless; I follow the Sarno protocol. it would be so easy to believe: "i lifted that heavy weight and now i am hurt." I have to battle against it constantly.
Two, Back when I was in chronic physical pain, I never understood what Sarno meant when he wrote that this was our mind's defense mechanism to distract us from the mental, emotional, and spiritual pain and stress of our lives. I thought like everyone else: "is he nuts? I'd do anything to get rid of this physical pain. It is the worst." Now that I have practiced with success the principles of his discovery, it all makes sense. I sum it up like this. When we believe in the physical pain there is always some doctor or procedure we haven't tried, or some friend or family member that can help us do something we can't do anymore. There is always hope over the horizon. With most of the mental-emotional stuff, there is no fix, no promise of a fix, there is nothing you can do. The calvary ain't coming, you have to sit with it. One day when the pain was gone and I was forced to look at the things I've done, the things done to me, what my life was at that moment, and the things yet to come, the magnitude of that mental pain was so real, his comment finally made perfect sense to me.
BTW, Yes, I did have bunion surgery (Lapidus procedure) and the pain persisted for years until the discovery of TMS. sorry for the very delayed response, i don't come on here that often. |
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TMS, my frenemy and partner for life
