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shawnsmith
Czech Republic
2048 Posts |
 Posted - 01/16/2013 : 05:54:23
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Good morning all,
I went to a therapist yesterday with a view to un-surfacing some issues that may be contributing to my flare-ups. He is very open to pyscho-somatic ailments and the role of stress in human health, BUT he wants me to investigate fibromyalgia and report back to him regarding what I found. Yes, I number of doctors have tried to place this label on me and up until now I have resisted it having read what Dr. Sarno says about it as well as Dr. Nancy Selfridge. (see: http://booksthatteach.com/books/fibro.htm)
The therapist also wants me to report back to him regarding major and minor stressors in my life. |
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Ace1
USA
1040 Posts |
Posted - 01/16/2013 : 06:13:17
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| Why does he want you to get this diagnosis? How will that help you? I would personally decline doing that if it was me as it will not help you in anyway. |
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pspa123
672 Posts |
Posted - 01/16/2013 : 06:14:45
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| Shawn, good luck with the new therapist. Even leaving aside Dr. Sarno's views, my impression has been that FM is more of a descriptive term than a concrete diagnosis, and overlaps a great deal with so-called CFS, so-called chronic Lyme disease, etc. Interestingly, at least among the conventional medical community, anti-depressants are a mainstay of treatment. |
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shawnsmith
Czech Republic
2048 Posts |
Posted - 01/16/2013 : 06:22:05
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| Yes, I agree pspa123, that is how I see it also. |
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pspa123
672 Posts |
Posted - 01/16/2013 : 06:29:46
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| Back in the day when I was searching up the wrong trees, I saw a very well-known fibromyalgia doctor who happened to be in my area. I waited months to see him. His recommendation was to take Cymbalta, which just by coincidence (ha!) happened to be the most recent anti-depressant to have come on the market and was being heavily promoted. I was very disappointed by the whole experience. |
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tennis tom
USA
4749 Posts |
Posted - 01/16/2013 : 06:32:08
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Sounds like you will be educating him on TMS/fibro, maybe you should be billing him for your time or at least bartering.
g'luck! |
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shawnsmith
Czech Republic
2048 Posts |
Posted - 01/16/2013 : 06:45:54
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| I don't see why I have to be educating my therapist. He is being paid to educate me. He is the one with the PhD. Fortunately, I am not paying for these first 3 of 4 sessions as they are part of a benefit package I have access to. |
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tennis tom
USA
4749 Posts |
Posted - 01/16/2013 : 07:29:08
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quote:
Originally posted by shawnsmith
I don't see why I have to be educating my therapist. He is being paid to educate me. He is the one with the PhD. Fortunately, I am not paying for these first 3 of 4 sessions as they are part of a benefit package I have access to.
I agree, it's amazing to me that of all the psycho-therapists I meet in the hot-tub, there's no interest in TMS, Sarno or psychosomatic mindbody stuff. You'd think they'd be the first to embrace it since supposedly that's their field--the mind. I speculate it's due to their zeal to be accepted as white-coats and appear "scientific" rather then airy fairy. Give yours a chance, maybe you'll get lucky and they know their stuff--it's not the violin, it's the violinist--bring a TMS book along just in case they may want to learn. |
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Birdie78
Germany
145 Posts |
Posted - 01/16/2013 : 07:35:07
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Hi shawnsmith,
I often got the fibro-diagnosis, too because of the coincidence of pain + fatigue + other symptoms.
I agree, the fibro is more on the descriptive level and I see on this level no opposition to TMS-symptoms. It comes to be a problem when one tells you (as I was told several times) that fibro (althought the exact roots were "unknown") is a uncurable syndrome. Allegedly the best thing one can achieve is a symptom-reduction via altering your biggest stressors, sleeping patterns and nutrition.
Dr. Sarno proofed this to be wrong. He told us it IS curable, it's just a severe form of TMS (and I totally agree!).
So perhaps you can check out what exactly your therapist thinks about fibro. If he thinks that's a uncurable condition it's perhaps not the right place for you there. If it is only the label and he is open to everything (the possibility that you can heal), then in my opinion it doesn't matter which name you give to the child, if fibro, or chronical pain syndrome or in the best case TMS.
Good luck!
Kind regards from Germany sends Birdie |
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Birdie78
Germany
145 Posts |
Posted - 01/16/2013 : 07:40:34
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@tennistom: I've a qestion...I often read the "hot tub" when you answer. Not sure if it's due to my poor English understanding (on a concrete level that meant that you spent a lot of time in the hot tub watching films and meeting people like therapists and what else... ) or is it an "idiom" and being in the hot tub means something different?
When I read your posts I always imaginge somebody sitting with his tennis racket in the hot tub...
Ok sorry for the off topic...
Kind regards from Germany sends Birdie |
Edited by - Birdie78 on 01/16/2013 07:42:01 |
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tennis tom
USA
4749 Posts |
Posted - 01/16/2013 : 08:08:55
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quote:
Originally posted by Birdie78
Hi shawnsmith,
I often got the fibro-diagnosis, too because of the coincidence of pain + fatigue + other symptoms.
I agree, the fibro is more on the descriptive level and I see on this level no opposition to TMS-symptoms. It comes to be a problem when one tells you (as I was told several times) that fibro (althought the exact roots were "unknown") is a uncurable syndrome. Allegedly the best thing one can achieve is a symptom-reduction via altering your biggest stressors, sleeping patterns and nutrition.
Dr. Sarno proofed this to be wrong. He told us it IS curable, it's just a severe form of TMS (and I totally agree!).
So perhaps you can check out what exactly your therapist thinks about fibro. If he thinks that's a uncurable condition it's perhaps not the right place for you there. If it is only the label and he is open to everything (the possibility that you can heal), then in my opinion it doesn't matter which name you give to the child, if fibro, or chronical pain syndrome or in the best case TMS.
Good luck!
Kind regards from Germany sends Birdie
Yes Birdie, fibro, cf, lymes MAY all be mis-dx'ed morphings of TMS. When I was dx'ed with "clinical depression" thankfully I remembered it's an AFFECTIVE form of TMS. Possessing this TMS KNOWLEDGE PENICILLIN, helped me greatly to quickly recover and return to "functioning". |
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tennis tom
USA
4749 Posts |
Posted - 01/16/2013 : 08:24:47
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quote:
Originally posted by Birdie78
@tennistom: I've a qestion...I often read the "hot tub" when you answer. Not sure if it's due to my poor English understanding (on a concrete level that meant that you spent a lot of time in the hot tub watching films and meeting people like therapists and what else...) or is it an "idiom" and being in the hot tub means something different?
When I read your posts I always imaginge somebody sitting with his tennis racket in the hot tub...
Ok sorry for the off topic...
Kind regards from Germany sends Birdie
Birdie, Your English is just fine, I find most Germans speak better English then Americans. Nothing is off topic in the twilight-zone of TMS, ask Dave the MOD who is really Rod Serling. Sometimes a hot tub is just a hot tub. It's where I go after and sometimes before playing tennis or power yoga class. In my neck of the woods it happens to be populated by a lot of psychotherapists, docs and "patients". You aren't far off on the tennis racket, the courts are close by. But I play with gut strings and h2o is anathema to them, synthetic would be OK. I've never thought of bringing my sticks to the tub with me, but maybe they need some rage/soothe relaxation too. There was a guy who lived next to the tub who would bring his TV out to his deck where we could watch sports (or was it porn?). Most habitues of the tub want to talk small talk like weather, sports, restaurants and movies--staying away from anything relevant to reality like TMS, sex, religion or politics for fear it would make the water TOO hot. I read my water-logged SteveO and insulate myself from the small talk with my Underwater FM radio and run in the pool for a half hour and some backstroke to stretch out.
Cheers,
tt, LSMFT |
Edited by - tennis tom on 01/16/2013 08:34:50 |
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chickenbone
Panama
398 Posts |
Posted - 01/16/2013 : 08:29:45
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Shawnsmith, this is really outrageous for doctors to be telling patients that they have or may have fibromyalgia. First of all, doctors admit that they don't know what causes it, but somehow they know that it is incurable. WE all know what Dr. Sarno had to say about fibromyalgia, it is simply the worst form of TMS.
I belong to organization of health forums called Inspire. You can find most of the posts about fibromyalgia under various topics like autoimmune and endocrine disorders. You simply cannot believe what doctors are putting these people through and telling them. The patients are literally hysterical. They are mostly taking all kinds of psychotropic and pain medications. None of them are getting better, only worse. When I read these, and I usually try to avoid most hysterical posts, I can't help thinking that this phenomena is nothing but raging TMS and hypochondria on a massive scale. If these people only knew about TMS. I have never mentioned it because no one would believe me, but I have been tempted. This state of affairs is good for the remuneration of the doctors and drug companies, but bad for the patients. |
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pspa123
672 Posts |
Posted - 01/16/2013 : 08:47:42
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| For some reason, nothing is more demeaning to a FM or CFS person than suggesting their problem may be psychological in origin. I don't really understand why that is. |
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bryan3000
USA
513 Posts |
Posted - 01/16/2013 : 08:57:13
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Shawn,
Dr. Schubiner has done a lot of work in this area ans without question believes it is TMS in nature. |
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shawnsmith
Czech Republic
2048 Posts |
Posted - 01/16/2013 : 09:10:47
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| Yeah, I got Dr. Schubiner's work-book. I didn't care for it though. |
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Ace1
USA
1040 Posts |
Posted - 01/16/2013 : 12:31:07
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| I second the fact that I felt Dr. Shubiner's book was not very helpful at all to me. It added no more information than Dr. Sarno's books. It had some extra stuff on mindfulness, but in the way it was portrayed, it was not helpful to me. Also the way the journaling was to be used to help someone was also not very productive to me. I tried it and did not have a single bit of progress from it. |
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alix
USA
434 Posts |
Posted - 01/16/2013 : 13:14:03
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Shawn, I am so sorry of what that therapist said. FM is a dead end. If you see a FM doctor you will be diagnosed with FM and prescribed Lyrica and/or Cymbalta.
I have been down that path unfortunately several years ago. |
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bryan3000
USA
513 Posts |
Posted - 01/16/2013 : 13:44:37
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For clarity, I wasn't advocating his book in this case. (Though I thought it might be helpful for some.)
My point was that he is involved in clinical trials on this subject and is of of those who believes FM is absolutely TMS, in case you wanted to reference any of his work on the matter.
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shawnsmith
Czech Republic
2048 Posts |
Posted - 01/16/2013 : 13:50:02
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| I already believe that FM is TMS, there is not a single shred of doubt in my mind, so no worries. I have not taken even a Tylenol for pain even when at times I have been in a lot of discomfort. |
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Dr James Alexander
Australia
127 Posts |
Posted - 01/16/2013 : 19:37:45
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tennis tom- one of your earlier statements was that you are amazed at how uninterested/uninformed most psychotherapists are about TMS. This is clearly the case- most are both uninformed and uninterested. This has resulted from 3 decades of CBT being the 'flavour of the month'. One of the consequences of this has been that any notions of the unconscious have become viewed as anachronisms- the depth psychology baby has been thrown out with the Freudian bathwater, in preference to a focus on surface level thoughts and feelings. CBT is about as effective as most other approaches in psychology with dealing with most problems, other than chronic pain. As we know, a depth-psychology focus is needed with chronic pain in order to go beyond the surface level, as the symptoms serve an unconscious emotional purpose. CBT barely even acknowledges unconscious thoughts/feelings, and has even less of an idea as to what to do with them. I would think that any psychologist or psychotherapist who utilises a depth-psychology approach, whether they have heard of Sarno/TMS or not, is in a better position to work with people regarding their chronic pain than most CBT practitioners. Those not utilising a depth-psychology approach (and i think this is most psychologists- certainly in Australia anyway, and i suspect in America too) can at best help people to adjust to the pain. This may be welcome, as any relief is better than no relief; but most people actually want to get over their pain, not just learn to accept it. Acceptance is really important though, and can provide some relief, but eradicating the pain is a viable goal as well. There are some signs of hope on the CBT horizon- Acceptance & Commitment Therapy (ACT) is a more recent development and does entail some depth elements, and can be effective in helping to reduce chronic pain (although it is questionable how true to CBT it is?). Psychology as a profession clearly needs to go beyond a focus on the surface level and rediscover its depth-psychology legacy (ie. not just Freudian, but also the psychology of William James- the founder of psychology in America). My profession has failed people in chronic pain for the last 3 or so decades, and this needs to change. As such, one of the purposes of my book (The Hidden Psychology of Pain) is to bring TMS theory into maintstream psychology, highlighting its points of confluence with other elements of contemporary psychology and neurology. Most psychologists are basically less informed about such issues than are most people on this forum.
James |
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