Day 42 Done!

I finished the SEP program. It took me way longer than 42 days. I did learn a lot about myself.

• I learned that my childhood was hard. I had on rose colored glasses. Those are finally off and I can see that it was not ideal. I had an absent father and an authoritarian mother. I learned to people please very early in life and be hyper vigilant of my surroundings.
• I learned that earliest TMS memory started around when I was 9 years old and has popped in my life during various parts of my life. I've had TMS for at least 35 years and I can't expect to deal with my emotional repression in just a couple of months.
• I still struggle with feeling emotions. I do recognize happiness and sadness a lot better now. I catch myself stuffing feelings down when they pop up.
• I like my "alone" time where I just sit and write what I am thinking.
• I still struggle with belief that I have TMS. I keep my evidence list handy though. Cause I have had where my pain has moved around and even disappeared for moments when I thought my pain level was at a 10 just moments before! It was the weirdest thing to experience. Almost like my brain was glitching.

What's next? I just finished reading Mind Your Body with Nicole Sachs. I'm going to journal speak for the next 28 days. She has a little (free!) course on youtube. I also read The Secret Language of the Body by Jennifer Mann and Karden Rabin. It has a lot of somatic exercises that I have started to do. My goal is to journal speak and then meditation or somatic exercise afterwards. My time limit is 30 minutes each day. I want to focus on consistency since I lacked that during the SEP. Lastly, I'm going to find out what my hobbies are. I have no clue but willing to learn. First up is gardening!

 

@Joulegirl
What a great list of things you learned! You should be really proud for finishing the SEP! It’s actually hard to do. I’ve started it twice and haven’t finished it. I love your next game plan— free Nicole class followed by the somatic tracking. And I really like your 30 minute idea. Good for you! You’re setting a great example for all of us!

 

Rockstar. Nicole is great, I'm in her FB group (she did put it up as a paid group recently but it's only 2.99 a month, so I figured it was worth it) and her mods are amazing. The combination of JS and meditation hasn't done much for my pain yet but it definitely has brought me to a different place with my anxiety, being able to get the rage out that I can't vent out loud.

 

Well, that’s something!

 

This is wonderful, @Joulegirl! You've built a strong foundation - a wonderful place to continue to build with your plans for the course / meditation/ somatic exercises.
Wishing you well on this journey. Hope you will continue to keep up updated!

 

@Rusty Red I debated if I should pay for her facebook group for this month while I journal speak. But then it would be one more place to check and focus on TMS. My goal is to not focus on it and just make life fun! Who knows what will happen the next 28 days. I have a vacation/visiting family in a couple of weeks. I'm starting a new job position in July. I'm sure I'll get some good journal speak about both of these events! I can always join later if I feel I need the extra help!

Thanks all for your encouragement! I wish I could say all my pain was resolved but I realized that I've had TMS for 3/4 of my life. It's not going to go away that fast and I have so many ingrained habits with my negative thoughts that will take a while to retrain. Thankfully, I had glimpses of no pain during the SEP journey to keep me feeling like I'm on the right track.

 

Congrats @Joulegirl !
Not many people have the ability to support themselves enough to finish this program and even fewer understand that the program doesn’t promise magical 45 day complete reversal of all TMS but is the tool to teach you to simply pay attention the rest of your life!