accepting diagnosis

So this is me trying to help anyone else out there that is struggling with TMS in any way. I first discovered Dr. Sarno back in 2013 after having a year of terrible back pain. I read the books, lived my life and in time I began to heal. three years later I had terrible back pain again and it took me a year to heal but I did, I had to accept the diagnosis again and stop fighting back so hard. I took the long way to healing then because I did everything in my power to beat TMS on the spot every day, and it really triggered my OCD and made me obsessed with fighting TMS like I had tried years ago with fighting my pain as if it were structural. So about three months ago my pain came back out of no where, and I am going to admit that I hit panic immediately. I journaled, i listened to every video, i read books looking for answers I already knew, i dug deep into my emotions.... nothing worked, what I had to finally come to terms with is that if you are fighting it and fighting it as a means to get it to go away, its still on your mind and still keeping you focused... The past months have not been easy mentally on me, but I have slowly come to terms to what is occurring and I have been able to tell myself more and more that this is TMS (because i have literally had this 2 times before and beat it)... Now I will admit that in my mind I wanted this to be physical so I didnt have to actually come to terms with what it is, and for a few months my mind made me go into physical symptom panic. I went to a DR and had myself checked out for major things like tumors and life threatening illnesses... Everything came back negative and allowed me to check things off the list and make my mind finally accept what I am dealing with.. The past week has been a wild ride and my denial of what I am going through is slowly fading and by accepting what is happening I am feeling better for it. I can feel symptoms shifting and moving as I type this, and having the awareness that I am healthy and fine is allowing me to move forward. so anyone out there that is struggling, know it works, and know that doubting things is very common, if you are doubting it is fine, if you are obsessing over finding the magic bullet for things know that this is normal, give things time... I mean seriously I have fought this 2 times and I still struggle with coming to terms with things, because in my mind i shouldnt have pain, my unconscious shouldnt do this because I know what TMS is, but what I am undertanding more and more is that I wont understand all of this, I wont know why thing happen the way they do, and that is fine, you're conscious mind understands things but you have control of that, your unconscious takes time, and how you spend that time is up to you.


I posted a few months ago telling everyone on here that I was taking this in a calm manner, that wasnt true at all, I wanted to take things in a calm manner but my mind was not allowing that to occur the way I wanted it to. so if you need to get things ruled out in the physical manner, Sarno even says that is a thing to do so the diagnosis sticks when nothing else works or is there, I wish I could explain how I finally felt the previous two times I healed so I could tell people how you know you finally accepting things, and what that means the next days will be like, but I cant put the feelings in words.

this post is really a post for hope for others, as well as a chance to spark conversation. I'm in the process of healing, and I am aware of it. take things day by day, and understand that dont fight things, take things slow, and trust me all of that is easier said than done

 

Great post, dharn999! I've certainly experienced something very similar. I always thought I had to push myself and fight to accomplish anything. It didn't occur to me that the fighting and pushing can make the problem worse

It wasn't till recently I learned how important it is to soothe, love, and care for my inner self. The analogy that Alan Gordon uses is, imagine someone hurt your little child. Wouldn't we do everything in our power to comfort and console that child? Wouldn't we stand up to that bully? Then why don't we do everything we can to comfort and soothe ourselves when we are hurting... and stand up to that inner bully?

That simple analogy provided a pathway and permission for me to be kind, loving, soothing, etc., to myself.

 

being kind to yourself is pretty important, and I am always my worst critic and probably why I end up in these situations. I dwell in the past and get frustrated, and look into the future and get upset way to often, and with current TMS issues that occurs more. I wish I could say I am entirely out of the woods this time and come to complete terms with everything but I wouln't be here on the forum if that was the case. I have OCD and i know thats argued on this forum often as a TMS equivalent but with me it makes me constantly worry that there is something else wrong with me. I know that the structural things believed to cause pain arent factual because again I have healed in the past, but my mind is always wanting to find the next thing to obsess over in regards to the cause of things. its mentally draining to constantly fear that you are overlooking something major like cancer. The fear continues this way, and its not the thinking of the spine or bones being broken that caused the pain, but the constant fear and belief that something is wrong with you, that keeps me preoccupied and obsessed, thus feeding the cycle. Your brain unconscious mind doesnt know what discs or anything back related is, it just knows that pain gets your attention and that if it can keep your attention to the pain then it believes it is protecting you. I personally just have a few things for me to probably get crossed off my list of health concerns before I can get my preoccupation with things to subside, once I am no longer preoccupied with things I will heal. Just very frustrating to know you have had success in healing in the past and still can't get yourself to just accept that you are fine. again, I dont believe in the back pain causes such as discs and so on, but fear of major health concerns are there still.... Just one of those things where the fear is slightly still there so the symptoms still have my attention