1. Our TMS drop-in chat is today (Saturday) from 3:00 PM - 4:00 PM DST Eastern U.S. (New York). It's a great way to get quick and interactive peer support. Bonnard is today's host. Click here for more info or just look for the red flag on the menu bar at 3pm Eastern.
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  2. Alan has completed the new Pain Recovery Program. To read or share it, use this updated link: https://www.tmswiki.org/forum/painrecovery/
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Thread:
How do you not give the pain attention?
I am one of those people you are jealous of.... and 'instantly' was about a month of intensive focused work and countless hours and hours of 'maintenance' work to fend off new issues.

The most important part of my month (5 weeks actually, though most of the symptoms left by week 3) was the fact that like any problem I want to solve I gave it my UNDIVIDED attention. I was fortunate enough to be off work so I was in a sort of 24 hour a day TMS recovery clinic albeit of my own making...

Just like the pain once dominated my thoughts and actions, now the three R's dominated my thoughts and action. I used to wake up and the pain was always the first thing to greet me. so....

greeted IT like : "Good morning you useless POS. Wow, I am conditioned like a lab rat. OK...what unsavory topic can I focus on? Oh yeah... Dave ripped me off in that deal... I'd love to beat the F=+K out of the son of a bitch. What would that look like?"...and then I would run a very visual and graphic fantasy of Dave and I that looked a lot like the last scene from 'Casino'

...and about my second cup of coffee when the pain gets my attention again, I realize that I have not noticed the pain for about 15 minutes. ... But now it's back. I see the pile of dishes in the sink as I rinse my cup and realize that my 'stay at home' wife hasn't washed the dishes again for the umpteenth thousand time. More RAGE..so Rather than focus on the sciatica burning in my leg I think:

"... every time I try and wash them she gets indignant and says "Stop! I'll get those later"... It is F=+king exasperating to live with a chronically filthy kitchen. I liked living in state boarding houses better than living with this spoiled princess. I really wish I never got married at all" and then I play a movie of living free and alone not having any family responsibility, being a skateboarding bum musician with no kids, no wife,etc

You get the point. Goodism is at the root of all of our anxiety and rage. We have to let our wildest most selfish thoughts run wild. Fear not. I never acted on any of them, but letting them fly was super effective. I have never seen a TMS doc, never done any of the 'programs' on this forum. A copy of HBP and my imagination

I cursed a LOT! People near me might have thought I had tourette's. I yelled a LOT. I thought terrible things. I made lists of people, places and things that enraged me. I beat the snot out of many trees, bushes and discarded appliances. I got into shooting and unloaded thousands of rounds of ammo into Cans, furniture,whatever....and I was back at work in 5 weeks in my heavy labor job...painfree.

Sarno's three R's are all action oriented. This is a program of action! Refute the diagnosis, Return to activity, Recondition your Brain. Simple academic appreciation won't suffice. The actions and activity in which we engage must be as intense or moreso than our pain or it's all just a theory...and a peculiar one at that.