A Breakup and an Exam: Could My Tennis Elbow Be TMS?

[Wolfgang]

Hello everyone,

I have some good news to share first. I finished my six-month part-time job contract, working from 9 a.m. to 3 p.m. Sitting was never a problem, and I completely forgot about my back pain. It was as if it had never existed.

Now for the bad news.

Last month, my partner and I broke up. She told me she couldn't handle my worries and anxiety anymore. She was also going through a very difficult time preparing for employment, and I think carrying both her own struggles and my anxiety became too much for her.

Even though my back pain was gone, I still suffer from generalized anxiety disorder and health anxiety. I was constantly worrying about "minor" health issues like anal fissures or stomach pain. I had become capable of working again, but I hadn't truly escaped TMS.

At first, very much in the spirit of TMS, I didn't really feel anything emotionally. In fact, I even thought, "I'm handling the end of a four-year relationship better than I expected."

But little by little, everything started becoming harder.

Before I even felt emotional pain, I developed symptoms that resembled irritable bowel syndrome. Every time I ate, my stomach would rumble, I became constipated, and if I took magnesium for the constipation, I'd end up with diarrhea. Gradually, I realized just how much I was actually suffering.

More than anything, I blamed myself because it felt like my mental health was the reason we broke up. I kept thinking, "If only I had been a little better at pretending to be okay, we wouldn't have broken up." That thought has stayed with me ever since.

There's something else going on, too.

I'm preparing for a certification exam that's important for getting a job. People say it's an exam you can pass with about four hours of studying a day for one or two months. It's not considered brutally difficult.

But for me, it has felt overwhelming.

My anxiety kept getting worse. I've studied for about three weeks, but with the exam only two weeks away, I felt completely unprepared. Eventually, I became afraid of studying itself.

Sometimes I'd suddenly think, "What if my right arm hurts so much that I can't even take the exam? What if I study this hard, only to miss the exam because of arm pain?"

Then, after spending a day typing more than usual on an unfamiliar keyboard, I developed symptoms that seem like tennis elbow.

I'm not even sure it's actually tennis elbow.

The exam requires studying on a computer, so I have to type constantly. But whenever I put my hands in a typing position—especially with my wrist slightly extended—my arm feels very uncomfortable. More specifically, the discomfort is in my forearm and the back of my hand, where I'm using force. It feels heavy, tight, and strangely weak.

Because of that, I haven't been able to study.

To be honest, I've almost given up on taking this exam.

I don't want to go back to living the way I did before, when pain stopped me from doing everything. On top of that, I start a new part-time job next week—this one is from 9 a.m. to 4 p.m., so I've gained an extra hour! Haha. I also need the emotional energy to adjust to that.

So... yeah.

I think TMS may have come back.

I just ordered The Way Out by Alan Gordon. Until now, it had never been translated into my language, but it was finally published here last year. It should arrive next Monday, and that's the first thing I'm planning to read.

What I'm wondering is whether this really sounds like TMS.

I mean... I do feel that TMS is the most likely explanation. But I feel like a complete beginner again.

My arm genuinely feels wrong.

When you type on a keyboard, your wrist naturally bends back a little, right? That position feels incredibly uncomfortable and unnatural. My forearm feels heavy and tight. It doesn't even feel like my own arm, and there's this strange sense of weakness.

I don't really want to go to the hospital. My experience with my back pain taught me that, unless you've actually broken a bone, doctors usually aren't very helpful with problems like this.

How do I get through this?

I need to recover from this so I can take the exam, and I need to pass the exam so I can build my career.

This post ended up much longer than I intended. Sorry about that.

At the same time, I'm both happy and sad to find myself back here again.

 

[Adam Coloretti (coach)]

I have some good news to share first. I finished my six-month part-time job contract, working from 9 a.m. to 3 p.m. Sitting was never a problem, and I completely forgot about my back pain. It was as if it had never existed.

Congratulations!

Sometimes I'd suddenly think, "What if my right arm hurts so much that I can't even take the exam? What if I study this hard, only to miss the exam because of arm pain?"

Then, after spending a day typing more than usual on an unfamiliar keyboard, I developed symptoms that seem like tennis elbow.

That sounds like way too much of a coincidence - part of you wants to pass and wants the job, but another part of you can't be bothered with the stress of it all and just wants a break from all of this - you gave the latter part an idea, and from the sounds of it it has taken on your suggestion (because it makes sense in the circumstances - it wouldn't have tricked you if it sent pain to your toe as you don't type with your toe) and sent pain to your elbow as you feared.

Whilst no one here can be sure, it sounds like typical TMS!

 

[Rabscuttle]

Sounds 100% like TMS. There’s a root underlying issue/dysfunction that makes the brain think the generation of symptoms is necessary.yes its easy to point to a break up, or a looming big test and think the stress related to them is what’s causing it. But why is it that you are naturally prone to such stress and anxiety? Because even if you get over this bout of pain, which I think is probably inevitable, you are running the risk of moving through life always being thrown for a loop by stressors, and getting symptoms. If we don’t make changes then we’ll just keep dealing with waxing and waning symptoms. Yes you absolutely need to work on the emotional side and feeling emotions as they relate to triggering events, but you also need to address how you are generally moving through life and what you’re putting out in the world both externally and internally. What’s your inner world like on a day to day basis. How do you talk to yourself and treat yourself.

and I’m sorry for the break up. Relationships are tough.

I had golfers elbow (who makes up these names, I don’t golf) pretty bad April 2025 and lasted several months. I had extremely painful tender points or trigger points, I forget what they’re called, but if I’d press them it actually felt like the bony process was moving, lol, it was just a shit ton of muscle tension. I saw an orthopedist because I had fracture my knee cap at the same time and asked him to take a look at the elbow and he said just monitor it. Yeah they’re kinda useless for chronic stuff like this as you mentioned.

 

[BloodMoon]

I agree with @Adam Coloretti (coach) and @Rabscuttle, it certainly sounds like typical TMS.

"If only I had been a little better at pretending to be okay, we wouldn't have broken up."

Imo it's important for recovery to be generally authentically ourselves as much as we can be. However, we can make it a general policy to not talk about our mind-b0dy/TMS symptoms to anyone else because it helps us not to dwell on them. That said, when we can't do things because they are too debilitating it's hard to keep them to ourselves especially when it comes to sharing our lives with people we are very close to. The pain and other symptoms, although caused by the brain, are very real so treat yourself with kindness and compassion about this.

I know the general instruction is that we should get on with our lives despite our TMS symptoms, but you're dealing with a fearful brain here... a new job and taking an exam is a lot for it. If it were me, I would get my brain used to the new job with the extra hour first and, if you can, consider postponing taking the exam for a while. It's true to say that there are some people who have recovered from TMS by being 'gung-ho' and taking on loads of new stuff all in one go (on top of getting on with the other things that life throws at us) but for many of us, myself included, we find we have to take a gradual 'baby steps' approach in regard to this. I've gone from being bedridden and housebound to functioning pretty normally by comparison by taking things in 'baby steps' to teach my brain that the activities I'm involved in are safe, that there's no danger.

My arm genuinely feels wrong.

When you type on a keyboard, your wrist naturally bends back a little, right? That position feels incredibly uncomfortable and unnatural. My forearm feels heavy and tight. It doesn't even feel like my own arm, and there's this strange sense of weakness.

We're not medical professionals on this forum so we can't say with absolute certainty that what you are experiencing with your wrist and forearm isn't structural. However, to give you an example of how TMS can masquerade as seeming like something structurally very "wrong", this is what happened with my own wrist and hand... Many years ago, out of the blue my dominant hand suddenly felt like a truck had run over it, the pain was excruciating and I could not move my hand. It seemed that I was suffering from De Quervain's Tenosynovitis and it went on like this for many months, and it only stopped when I was contemplating having surgery... my brain became fearful of the prospect of the surgery and then my symptoms went within just a few weeks! What brought the symptoms on? Well, all I could put it down to was some very difficult email 'conversations' that I found myself having with someone who meant something to me at the time.

Imo this is very sound advice from @Rabscuttle...

... why is it that you are naturally prone to such stress and anxiety? Because even if you get over this bout of pain, which I think is probably inevitable, you are running the risk of moving through life always being thrown for a loop by stressors, and getting symptoms. If we don’t make changes then we’ll just keep dealing with waxing and waning symptoms. Yes you absolutely need to work on the emotional side and feeling emotions as they relate to triggering events, but you also need to address how you are generally moving through life and what you’re putting out in the world both externally and internally. What’s your inner world like on a day to day basis. How do you talk to yourself and treat yourself.

It ties in with what I wrote earlier about treating yourself with kindness and compassion.