Bizarre Symptom...TMS on the run??

I've posted a few times, most recently was saying how I've been working on my TMS since October with little to no improvement. Then Alan Gordan sent me a video on 'Conditioned Responses' and it really resonated with me. Anyway, I believe I've been seeing some small improvements in my pain (part of my problem is not accepting that small improvements ARE improvements and not down playing it and convincing myself it wasn't really any improvement...do others struggle with this?) Anyway, yesterday I had two symptoms that are completely out of the ordinary for me.

I went to put my 2 year old down for a nap and we had been reading books lying on the floor, when I got up my low back spasmed. Never has this happened in my life! I immediately thought TMS! It was a little off the rest of the day and now is fine. TMS or just a weird thing for a few hours?

The next symptom is really strange though. Getting ready for last night I looked down at my arms and freaked out when I saw both arms covered in tiny, red bumps. Slightly raised and like a rash. It covered both arms and my entire torso but that was it. I had never ever seen anything like this in my life. I didn't really think it was TMS at first. I had the stomach flu the day prior and wondered if it tied into that perhaps the stomach flu was in fact something more serious. My husband convinced me that it was just a rash and it wasn't life threatening and to go to bed and if it was there in the morning, I could see the doctor. It was gone this morning! All gone! TMS????

My regular pain is kinda more back to normal today so it seems a took a few steps backward there.

Thoughts?

 

sorry this posted twice...having wifi issues!

 

TMS is very idiosyncratic. I've had weird manifestations of it pop up for a few days and then disappear. These have included back spasms, though I hadn't had them before, and weird rashes. I had tiny water blisters that would appear on my finger tips off and on for years, and no doctor ever knew what they were.

Try not to worry about these symptoms. It is part of the weird experience of having TMS. It amuses me now that I know what it is. I think, really brain? This is your new trick to distract me?

 

WanttoBelieve: I struggle with the same thing you mention in your first paragraph.......I have days when it seems I have improved and days when I seem to be the same and I cannot seem to fully buy into the improvement and sometimes find myself doubting that it is even TMS. I'm a glass half empty guy, that is very obvious.

Like right now, my arms/hands are hurting like heck and at some point today it will be completely gone within a 5 minute period, always gone for a while after I bathe or shower, etc...........everything seems to point to excess tension. So what is my problem?

I think the believing thing is much more difficult for some than others, which makes the latter (incl me) a lot harder to heal.

 

I guess I should add I'm hoping you guys think those symptoms are TMS b/c I've read when symptoms move around maybe TMS is one it's way out? My pain has never moved elsewhere. i guess my feet pain didn't change when I got the other symptoms but since my pain had been less I though maybe my brain was struggling to come up with new distractions?

 

The rash is pretty common with TMS, although not commonly pretty. If you're on new meds it could be a dangerous sign of reaction.

The back spasm is one of the most common responses. Your tension rises as you lay there (due to demands), your brain ready to create a diversion. All it needed was a trigger that standing-up provides. The trigger is usually bending over.

The spreading is usually a good sign if you know about TMS, and are trying to heal.

If you don't know about TMS, and it spreads that could be a sign of getting worse (or better). As long as you don't fear the pain as much, and keep moving, living, it will try to spread because you're not in fear enough to hold the attention it needs. So it comes up with new ways via new distractions.

Fear is your only problem. When you no longer fear your pain it will fade.

 

You make it all sound so simple Steve

 

Good point mdh, and well taken. It is easy(er).

I’ve been a Buckeye my entire life, I even talked to Woody Hayes my senior year in high school about playing for him. In 2006, Buckeye quarterback Troy Smith won the Heisman Trophy at Ohio State. When he was asked by a reporter how he went from basically being on the kickoff team not long before to winning the top trophy in college football he said, “I watched a lot of films… it slowed the game down for me.” It’s about getting the bigger picture, and more experience, coupled with a desire to overcome.

Now, take that concept to the man himself, Dr. Sarno. He probably saw more pain patients than any doctor in history, right? We live in an age of modern transportation and also in the information age. So, he was able to see people who flew into NY from other countries, and to talk to them by phone and by email, that no physician 50 or 100, or 200 years ago would have been able to do. Does that make sense? Then, when you add in the fact that he worked for 50 years, which is more than some doctors even live, you get a physician that probably was in a position to see and evaluate the entire situation, as if the game was slowed down for him. You can call it experience, but experience means nothing without a craving for the truth. Without truth we make the same mistakes over and over, never really caring to know more.

When we keep replaying the game over and over, it slows down for us, we’re able to get a bigger picture and then evaluate what the hell just happened. It’s a unique perspective of aging as well. People suffering from TMS are confused, the game (of life) is moving too fast for them. They don’t want, they do want, they may want, they too want (my Seussian reference for the day). TMS is trying to slow them down to be able to show them the entire playing field: to show them how to win. But, they aren’t paying attention, yet. They keep making the same mistakes.

I’ve been working on TMS in some form for 14 years, full time. I speak to people every day whether it’s sufferers, or TMS docs and psychs, or MDs interested in TMS. I’ve seen enough to slow the game down some, including patterns of healing and patterns of mistakes blending together into convoluted forms. It may look easy, but it isn’t. It’s just easier. If I need TMS again in my life it will be there to help me see again.

There are people here asking the same questions I did in the late 1990s. I can see where many need to go, but that doesn’t mean it’s easy to get them there, or to explain to them how to get there. Everyone needs to come to their own truth. Part of the process is in finding your own path and to stop looking for outside answers. There are none. Everything we need to know already exists in us, but is blocked by ego.

I don't have the answers for sufferers, they have their own answers. I can’t make a person go this way or that way, they need to make their own mistakes. Their own failures are part of the healing process. People are here at various levels of consciousness. Some haven’t read Dr. Sarno’s books yet, they’re just curious. Others, are making the same mistakes I made along the way.

I play guitar, and I often hear a song and think the player is awesome. Then I go out and learn the song and realize he or she just knew something at that time that I didn’t. The song wasn’t that hard to play. I just didn’t know it yet, so I had to go through all the tedious grinding through notes, failing repeatedly until I finally get it down. Now, when I play the song it looks easy to people. But it wasn't.

To anyone reading this, your time is coming, if you want to heal (not all people do). Be patient. If you have an open heart and mind, and the courage to allow light to enter your life, you will heal. I promise, or I'll give you all the money back that you gave me.

SteveO

 

how great is it to have Steve 'on demand' ?

excellent insights and helps to reinforce belief that can stray too easily.

 

Thanks for this, Steve. You keep writing things in a way that makes me "slow down" and consider what I am learning from TMS.

I went on vacation and had very little pain for a whole week! The night before I had to come home, I developed a rash on my neck, which has spread to my chest and now arms, and just as I was about to freak out about it, my sister pointed out the timing and suggested it was TMS. I love the idea that the TMS is still here (or here again) to help me see something about the bigger picture of my life. This is a brilliant, helpful insight. I hope to someday be able to see TMS as my greatest gift, and just when it was starting to annoy the hell out of me, I am able to reframe and see it as blessing thanks to this post.

Many blessings to you here who are helping me keep my perspective.

 

Hi Cara, I don't remember this thread but I'm glad it helped in some way. Rashes are of course a common stress manifestation but can be brought on with certain meds.

Suffering pushes you to get somewhere, once you get there light then pulls you along. That means, fear is usually the motivator that pushes people to act, but at a certain point the light begins to guide you as the motivating force. There is only fear and love, choose.

Had I not suffered as I did I wouldn't be happy today. There is always higher power in play.