Allergies, Sinus Issues

Hi
Has anybody tried using TMS techniques for allergies/sinus issues. I suddenly started having them few years ago and now for the second time dealing with the surgery option that I want to avoid. I seem to get them randomly. So thought of asking how you dealt with it and if there are any successes/tips. Thank you

 

Hi CMA, I have dealt with sinus and respiratory issues most of my life. I think most of it was TMS. I am
better now, but still sometimes have bad attacks, usually when I am under a lot of stress. I frequently have trouble with this when I travel because I have travel phobia. The only physical problem I have had that could have contributed to the allergy symptoms is a parathyroid tumor (benign) that I had removed last year. I have only had 1 attack since them. Most of it has been related to my TMS. Something that I have had to really be always aware of is my allergy triggers. If I get a few sneezes, where most people would hardly notice, I can get very fearful that I am going to have a bad attack. The fear of having a problem is what sets off a lot of this. I almost had surgery a couple of times out of desperation, but other doctors have told me since that I have nothing wrong with my sinuses. I do believe that most allergy is TMS. The trick, I found, is to not look outside myself to find a trigger. In the past, I would tell myself that there was pollen, dust, smoke, musty smell, etc. as the reason for my attack. This would only serve to worsen the attack because I was giving it justification. Now I turn inward and ask what is going on psychologically with me. What am I afraid of? What are the psychological triggers? This has worked quite well for me. I had the same kinds of issues with headaches and back pain, which are also TMS equivalents.

 

My first allergy symptoms occurred a few weeks after my Father told he and Mom were getting a divorcel I was 10 Years old.

I have suffered sinus problems for years but finding Sarno has resulted in them being significantly less.

This week my sister was planning a visit to my parents. I have had several new symptoms anticipating her arrival. The inside of my knees have been very painful, both thumb joints hurt and terrible itching of my eyes, nose and throat plus a runny nose. All have gone away with my awareness of how TMS is trying to distract me with something new (or old).

 

Wow Stella!

Yes, I used to sneeze when I mowed the lawn. Why? I didn't like mowing the lawn. Changed my mind and started to view it as good exercise and helping out my dad. Didn't sneeze anymore!

If I seem to be sensitive to pollen or something, I usually check in with myself first to see what I'm anxious about or angry, etc. about. can usually find something going on and then do some work to adjust my thinking. This works for me.

 

CMA- i cured myself of chronic rhinitis after around 10 years of almost constant sneezing- using the TMS approach. There was a lot of deconditioning which needed to take place as i had internalised all the standard bull about food, pollens, dust mites, etc, etc- the list is endless. As with TMS pain, it is essentially an indicator that at a deep level, our mind/brain is struggling with unacknowledged and unwanted forms of emotional distress- and the sneezing comes either as an expression of that emotional/physiological tension, or as a means of ensuring that the distressed emotions remain on the 'back-burner' rather than front and centre in our minds. Despite having been free of this for around 10 years now, in the last month, i have had a return of it- it reached a high point a couple of days ago. To deal with it (when i finally got motivated to deal with it- after a couple of weeks), i began listening to my own Guided Imagery for Hay Fever cd. While doing this a couple of weeks ago, in a somewhat meditative state, it came up for me that the distressed emotions were about my father having died last year (grief) and my mother now having to live on her own and juggled having to sell a house, relocate and create a new life for herself after 61 years of marriage- on her own (my guilt- i live 2000km away). I am not confident that she is managing (anxiety, fears) or that it will be ok. Still, i kept on sneezing. It also occurred to me that my daughter is getting married this year (feel fine about it on a conscious level, but can believe it raises deeper issues of my aging and a sense of loss); and a week ago i was told i have to have a potentially dangerous skin cancer removed along with a skin graft (not happy about this- stress, some grief, sense of aging; worries about worst case scenarios- has it spread? etc). I am ok with myself or others using medications to help them manage symptoms while they are thinking psychologically about the issues. So, 2 nights ago i went to sleep with an antihistamine due to a terrible attack of sneezing; had to repeat that again yesterday morning. All the time i was still listening to my hay fever guided imagery cd. Yesterday afternoon, i listened to it again; then did some EFT tapping while i was listening to a bi-lateral stimulation recording i have made- and hey presto! My sinuses cleared up (they had been terribly congested and inflamed) as though i had taken the most powerful antihistamine. I repeated the procedure again this morning and am getting the same result today. My sinuses have gone from probably the worst congestion i have experienced them (and uncontrollable sneezing) to relatively clear and no sneezing at all- my diet, pollens, exposure to dust mites etc has not changed at all. I already knew this from my experience of getting over chronic rhinitis years ago, but i am again blown out by the reality of it- yes, i think our (or at least my) sinuses are incredibly sensitive to our emotional state- in fact, much more sensitive than our conscious mind/awareness is. Good luck with it- improvements are certainly possible.

 

James, let us know how you make out with the surgery, we all care very much about you. It sounds
like you are doing well with the sinus problems. I know for me, I always see a clear connection between
my stress level and allergies. It is odd that I never saw that before I became knowledgeable about TMS.

 

Thank you chickenbone, stella, Lori and James for your support and sharing your experience. I started having allergies 5 yrs ago when I had my second daughter and was in a stressful phase of my life. Since then been through 4 ENT doctors, tonnes of ABs, Steroid, one surgery for deviated septum.I am now being recommended a second surgery. I think my allergies and sinus congestion is TMS because I notice I get them usually the same time of the year when I have some ongoing stress, my allergy tests say I am allergic to mold and ragweed but ragweed doesn't start till August and I get sinusitis in April/November/March; I never even knew what is allergies or my septum is deviated till 5 yrs ago when it all started.
So I am planning to postpone or not think about surgery and just complete my current second round of stronger ABs and try to treat it like TMS. I guess I worry if I ignore it, it will get worse and then I have to take steroids/more ABs.
Any thoughts? Thanks so much again

 

How about journaling about your stressors and how you FEEL about things?

Dr. Alexander -- how interesting about your allergies! I have also started to listen to Nick Ortner about tapping, and it's so intersting how they also delve into feelings and our childhood to resolve issues.

 

i have had some sort of sinus/pnd going on for over 15 years. i have all the right background pieces for tms - alcoholic father, emotionally unavailable parents, parents divorced when i was 12 (this was my first remembered experience of feeling desperate and powerless). i am a perfectionist, driven, a bit ocd, and in social situations wanting to be heard and understood. i cured my lifelong migraines a few years ago when reading dr. sarno's "the divided mind", but did not after that consider that this sinus issue could also be emotionally driven until running across steveO's GPD book. my husband and i had some issues going on around the time i came down with this....whatever it is - don't even have a label for it, rhinitis is as close as i can come b/c nothing has been "diagnosed". sinuses show normal on ct scan and ent exams. allergy testing with immunotherapy drops for over a year and diet restrictions. nothing changed. but SOMETHING is there b/c i feel it every day. it gets better and then comes back. the most frustrating thing i have ever encountered. at some location in the rabbit hole i went down with that through these years, i developed other symptoms that are equally as mysterious and frustrating and painful. gut issues (ibs?) that come and go drove me into yet another level of anxiety over my health in general. i began to experience orthorexia (irrational fear of unhealthy food and exhaustive search for an external culprit). all this created this anxiety loop that exacerbated EVERYTHING. it's all so connected...one feeding the other. when one thing is better, the other comes up to say hello again. currently, i am dealing with two of my siblings dying at the same time and i just feel numb about it...and guilty that i am not grieving (yeah, i know!). i absolutely KNOW with my KNOWER all this body stuff is tms, but am continually tempted to go for more information...you know...just in case. aaarrrggghh! i appreciate your story and the reinforcement that this is tms and can be handled successfully this way. thank you!

 

Dr. Alexander - thank you for your story. This is extremely helpful. My sinuses have been sensitive since childhood, but now in my 50s, I'm finding them particularly bothersome. I too believe it is TMS as there are a number of things happening in my life that, together, are certainly aggravating my levels of stress, repressed anger, and so on. And ageing is definitely something I too have been struggling with as well. If you happen to have online resources that can be shared for the guided meditation, that'd be really great. If not, I wish you many years of uninhibited breathing!

 

@honey badger, it's been a while! This thread is more than ten years old and you're unlikely to get a direct response, but times and the internet have changed! Although we always advise against consulting "Dr Google", Google is definitely your friend when it comes to looking up resources like this. All you have to do is search with the keywords "stress allergies meditation" and I bet you'll find all kinds of things. Review them carefully and choose the ones that appear to be associated with legitimate educational or medical publications or institutions.

You and I have conversed in the past, so I forget what I might have said in some of those old posts, but I discovered when I first read The Divided Mind by Dr Sarno that age was the trigger which brought my lifelong TMS to a crisis point in 2011 when I turned 60. It's certainly well worth getting out your TMS tools and examining that topic if you haven't already been doing so! I expect you already have a better handle on it at an earlier age

 

Thanks so much for the reply JanAtheCPA! I appreciate your ideas and I certainly like the reminder about the TMS tools to look at aging. Although you're very right in saying the thread is old, you just never know who will answer, so I never hesitate to write if the threads intrigue me or move me in some way. Thank you again for replying! It's very helpful.

 

I have allergies too, they don't come on often but inexplicably, any time of year, I'll have an entire day where I am absolutely consumed by allergies, sneezing probably 100 times in a day, watery eyes, etc. Once I discovered TMS work, I immediately believed that was the root of the allergy symptoms. I actually appreciated this thread coming to the top of the forum so I could read the discussion.

I haven't had a bad allergy day in over a month now, which is pretty good for me, so maybe that's actually some progress!