Day 3 Anxiety and feeling unwell

[jwiles]

When was the last time you exercised or did another physical activity? What was this activity? How did it make you feel physically and emotionally? If it is has been a while since you last exercised, why? I exercised today and it made me feel exhausted and it didn't help me mentally or
Physically the way a workout should. I lifted weights. I suffer from anxiety depression and panic attacks along with my TMS. My anxiety plays a huge role with my TMS. If I'm less stressed the pain is worse. If I'm stressed the pain may not even exist. The pain has been cooling out some these last few days and Now my anxiety is back up. When my anxiety is up I suffer from other physical symptoms. I get dizzy lightheaded nauseous tired weak. I'm also a bit of a hypochondriac so all this plays in my head. I tend to think something worse is happening. The key to this TMS program for me is not to steal my pain but hopefully my anxiety as well. I've read a few stories of people recovering from it with this approach and I hope to be one of them too

 

[jazzrascal]

Hi jwiles...I've been working with my TMS for a few months. I read Steve Ozanich's book, The Great Pain Deception, and I started trying to move around more and do more exercise. I've been housebound for a couple of years with imbalance, tightness in my chest, and interstitial cystitis, which is quite debilitating. Well, like you, after doing quite a bit of exercise on a regular basis, I found that I felt no different, and still had no desire to go out. So I did more reading and poking around on this forum and finally realized that my MAIN problem is anxiety, and it simply fuels the physical stuff. I don't know why I didn't realize this before, because it's been with me my whole life (had my first panic attack at age 15 back when nobody knew what it was and I thought I had a brain tumor).
After I realized this I decided to switch my MO. Now, instead of pushing so hard with the exercise, I'm facing whatever makes me feel anxious with the thought that I know it's TMS and it can't hurt me. The things I'm facing range from some types of physical movement to confronting situations I'd rather avoid...in short, anything that triggers my anxiety. I'm taking it slow, one thing at a time. I honestly think it's more important for me to address the anxiety than the physical problems as a separate thing, because I think the anxiety is the cause of those problems. Hope that helps!

 

[Laughalot]

Hey jwiles,

Welcome to the SEP! I don't lift weights, but since starting the SEP I decided to run six days a week for 2-4 miles and practice yoga every morning. It's been *awesome* (although at times, TMS painful). Exercise definitely helps, not just to feel good. But even when it doesn't feel good, learning to recognize that pain isn't the end of the world, that it's usually an indication of TMS rather than something physical.

Do you have a goal for yourself physically? Maybe to lift a certain amount of weight or master a certain weightlifting technique? I want to be able to do the splits (definitely can't do it right now).