Believing the Lies

I believe one point is to come to understand that we were handed a sack of lies as children and if you want to find anger get angry that these lies have controlled our thoughts, behaviors and health.

I have one hell of a time nurturing myself and using supportive self talk – I hardly even know what to say to me that is positive. This is part of the negative bias many of us developed that was designed to protect us – think the worst and hope for a bit less than the worst.

I am also becoming aware that the internal sadness created by believing and acting on these lies is a form of nurturing to me....pathological, yes but maybe all I could muster up while living in a drama storm.

Sadness is a forum of going into the fetal position emotionally and rocking yourself when you hurt. Protecting the exposed parts so they wont get hit again.

So my new tactic is when I hear one of these lies come to consciousness I inwardly yell – damn it no! We are not going to do this dance again today.

Was it not enough that I lost the joy and comforts of being a child and now I should continue to carry this sack of sh...t with me today. For me this is hard because I now have to separate out the real me from the programmed, wounded me.

Believing these lies is creating things in my life I don’t want

 

Rik, what are some of the positive things others have said about you in your lifetime? They may have been said but you might not have believed them. What were they?

I will say something positive about you now. You are doing a great job in your posts with 'thinking psychologically'. It takes time for lots of people to get this. I didn't get it at first. You got it.

 

How about countering the lies with a statement of truth?

 

And sometimes we need to couner them with a statement we hope will be the truth

 

I for one, Rik, don't think it's just believing the lies you listened to in early childhood that do the most harm; it's the false persona you adopt as a defensive strategy as a child that you continue to impersonate the rest of your life. You sure seem to have cut through the BS to see that important truth a long time before it ever dawned on me. You're so aware that in time you'll get done with your old unfinished business I'm sure of that.

 

Hey Morcom

I am still learning about how my childhood engendered personality traits that continue to cause internal stress. I like the work of Monte on this.

I still don’t see that any are bad enough to cause the damn near total disability I have now. I cannot use any part of my body without extreme pain. Last year at this time I could hike all day, lift weights and bike for hours. We have a lot of property and I could work around it all day.

Unless I have a miracle I am going to have to hire someone to do it.

 

A psychotherapist I am definitely not, but the Dr Freud in me noticed your reference to "a lot of property" and often (but not always) what people say off the top of their heads has some deeper significance. Could this property have something to do with the stresses you are experiencing?

My sciatica and lower back pain did not begin at the time my mother died in 2001, rather it was 6 months later when I inherited the family home, which, as you might imagine, is haunted with all kinds of unresolved issues left over from my childhood and adolescence and of course later too. Never really wanted it and now it feels like a big psychic burden. Sometimes it's the elephant in the room that everyone is overlooking that's the real driving force behind TMS - something that obvious.

In 2002, incidentally, I was flat on my back like you with pain messages coursing throughout my entire body, but of course concentrated in the lower lumbar region. I realize now that I always tried to avoid my parents' house like the plague and now here I am taking care of it "for them" years and years after they departed this world.

Would be good if you could isolate the reason behind your pain. Would make it a lot easier to get rid of.

 

Morcom

While I am not happy that I probably wont be able to work my property this spring (when everything is growing) I do not think that is my source of stress.

As I have stated in other posts I have absolutely zero outside stress. I retired very early, I have financial independence, no living relatives or children to worry about and a wonderful wife who is my absolute best friend. So I cant blame it on externals.

What I am upset about is the pain taking away the ability to do everything I value and love. My life has been using my body for athletics and adventure sports. My wife an I exercised every day and spent the weekends on our bikes, kayaks, hiking etc.

If you notice my photo it is after climbing in a national park. Now it is damn hard to climb out of bed.

Now I can hardly open a stuck jar lid and getting out of a chair to walk to the other room is excruciating.

 

RikR,
I am so happy to have met you here on TMS Wiki.
Maybe not being able to take care of your property or doing all the wonderful adventures you had in enjoying the outdoors (hiking,
biking, kayaks...) is probably causing frustration which causes tension and stress. Maybe, this is not the root cause but I believe it probably
is adding to whatever is going on in your inner heart or inner man. Sometimes, as a defense mechanism we have denied feeling certain
feelings as a way of protection we do not even know when we are stressed.

One thing that really helped me and I would strongly suggest it, is to listen and I mean really listen how your talking to yourself. Have
fun doing it. Capture every thought right in the beginning when it is negative and try to reframe it. Our thoughts are often the products
of our tomorrows. This is very hard work. When you want to release the negative take maybe two twenty minute times each day to
journal all that stuff from whatever; your childhood, repressed and suppressed emotions and have a good time writing it out. Always
ending on a positive note. But limit the negative emotions to journaling and the rest of the day focus on trying to be in the present,
the now. This is just a suggestion.

When all day we concentrate on negatives or even the pain going on in our body (although it is a catch 22) we just get more negative
and I believe the pain increases. Maybe, when you get frustrated with the pain this is a good time to investigate what is going
a psychological level with your emotions through journaling. I know I have resisted this for a long time. I have been doing it more consistently now and
it is really helping. The symptoms have really decreased and I am sleeping better.

At first with journaling, I just couldn't really write too much but would try to do it as much as I could. Now, it is flowing from me.
I am so surprised all the junk that is down there. It feels so good.

Did you ever feel tired and all you do is think about how tired you are; you will surely feel more tired. Life breeds life, that thought
for me is so powerful.
I would highly encourage you to say positive affirmations; maybe just take one or two and use these are your mantras. You just say them
all day long. Believe I know that every ounce of you does not want to say them but just do it. You will change not only your mind
set but also your body chemistry. I also know how hard this is when everything is in pain and you cannot enjoy your life.
I have been there.

Your conscious is much stronger than your subconscious and by doing this you are reprogramming your subconscious.
One key is to be consistent. Just take some very small steps whether it be two affirmations or journaling or visualization.
Just keep doing it. It definitely has a cumulative effect even when we do not feel like it does.

We have the ability and the power to change our thoughts to reframe them even when we do not believe what we are reframing
them into.

I hope this helps. You are going to get there.
G.R.

 

GR

Thank you for taking time to write a loving and astute post. You are one of the really great people I am meeting on this forum.

For many years I ran community anxiety and mental health support groups. When we would ask for responses on what they found the most valuable in the groups they always answered the people in the group. Connecting with people and growing.....our phone list was also extremely popular – connecting with people in real time and becoming real friends not faceless posts.



I will also say that this group is populated by people searching – growing and sharing. So many support groups simply share symptoms,woes and the latest drug or treatment.



Hands clapping for “Everyone” on this forum !!!

 

Hi RikR
This is just a thought, but I read your post to Dr. Schubiner after I read this one. You specifically mention your inner child wanting to be free and have a good time (likely enjoying all those outdoor activities you're missing so much due to the pain) and not wanting to pull weeds. When I read that it took my mind back to MorComm's comment regarding your property in this post.

And in a recent post on the SEP you wrote: "Years back we sold everything but our photo albums so we could travel - we felt so light and happy with nothing to tie us down"
Possibly there is more to the property's implications for that deprived inner child than you are recognizing currently?

 

I have considered that but the property also gives us great satisfaction - it is adjacent to several thousand acres of wild life refuge and natural area and it is like a park -is also surroudns us so we dont have neighbors close and we dont even have blinds on the windows -so yes takes some spring upkeep but it also is a nice place to play -

When I owned second homes I liked going to them but then sold them bercause I did not want the responsibility - I also have a cat that owns my wife and I and he is a responsibility but the bell curve of love to responsibility is one that we are OK with

 

It also reminds me years ago I crated a Japanese garden in another yard - loved thelook but it became a time trap - it needed care all the time - also why I wont have grass

 

It sounds beautiful, you've just described my dream world (cat and all!). The benefits would certainly seem to outweigh the costs to a logical, analytical adult. The trouble is, the logical, analytical adult is not generating your TMS pain. The pain is being generated by that illogical, irrational 3 year old inside who wants nothing but to go out there and explore that beautiful playground without a care in the world. Time stands still for that child. Maybe he can't see the difference between the constant maintenance of the japanese garden and the (albeit minimal in comparison) maintenance of your current property. Maybe all he sees is something (anything at all) that's preventing him from getting what he wants. Then the sub (or not so sub) conscious parent comes along and tells him to calm down, tries to point out all the differences between the child's perception and the reality without realizing that perception and reality are one and the same to a child.

Not suggesting that the physical property itself is the problem, but the child's inability to recognize the difference between this property and previous ones. Maybe to little RikR it's just something that interferes with his freedom to have his own way at times and therefore must be the enemy.

 

RikR, I'm assuming that you have already read Steve Ozanich's The Great Pain Deception? You may recall that he has a section entitled The Four Phases of TMS - Timing of the Symptoms and one of the most common of these is Phase 4: After the Storm TMS, where pain symptoms come on following periods of "high tension, personal loss, or goal achievement" (p. 20). Could this in fact describe your situation just before the onset of your TMS symptoms? The idyllic situation you describe seems to be so perfect that it may be forcing you to confront larger existential questions about the meaning of life. I noticed that my TMS came on after I seemed to have achieved everything I could possible want: a big house in the suburbs, an orchard, a stock portfolio and big bank account and nice road bike. It seems to be during those calm moments after a period of struggle or achievement that one is forced to grapple with larger life issues that can fuel the psychic tension behind TMS symptoms.

 

Rik, I think MorComm and Leslie may be on to something. My reaction to your description of being able to retire early was to remember that my symptoms came to a head (and crisis point) after I was relieved of a dysfunctional marriage that was making me miserable. I had been wanting to end it for some years but didn't have the nerve - finally it became a mutual goal and it was over quite painlessly, with no financial problems, no fights over property or pets, no attorneys. So I couldn't figure it out, because I was pretty happy living alone, and had forgiven myself for the failed marriage. I was (still am) friendly with my ex, and I even worried about him a little. So while I know there are some issues around that stuff, I seriously didn't think that the divorce itself explained the sudden and alarming increase in my symptoms more than a year later.

The conclusion I've reached since learning about TMS is that I've had it all my life, but my difficulty in living with my husband served as a distraction against deeper emotional issues that I had never examined. And the timing of the divorce just happened to coincide with approaching the age of 60 - and aging issues are a well-known trigger for TMS. Having a 90-year old mother who is really feeling the fear of the inevitable makes it worse. My siblings and I (and she) are fortunate that caretaking is not yet an issue - but of course the fear of that is lurking, too.

These things hit all the core issues of Existential Psychotherapy: freedom, isolation, meaning, and mortality. And my inner child doesn't want to deal with ANY of that crap!

Retiring (which I have not yet achieved) is also a well-known trigger. We all say we would LOVE to retire early - and we seriously envy those who do. But is there by any slim chance some guilt there as well? Have your peers retired or are they all still working their butts off? I'm just askin'.

You're doing great work, so I know you will get to the bottom of this eventually.

Jan

 

Yes, Jan & Rik, my first bout of TMS (really bad!) came right after death relieved me of the grinding responsibility of taking care of my late mother in a retirement home while working my butt off at two jobs. The second bout came when I turned 60 and turned around to notice that I had "retired early" despite my best efforts to the contrary. Jan, I like your Existential slant on this a la Peter Zafirides. I think Dr Zafirides is really on to something there! It's at those existential moments that your unconscious starts bubbling up with all those fears of isolation and, let's put it bluntly, Death with a capital D. What's that Grateful Dead lyric: "Just when life looks like easy street, there's danger at your door"?