Can Peripheral Neuropathy symptoms be TMS?

Hello,

I am currently experiencing numbness in my feet (since Labor Day (9/1/13) and I think it could be TMS related. I have gone to all the appropriate doctors and had all the appropriate tests and I have been diagnosed with Idopathic Neuropathy which I am told means: "We don't know why your feet are numb!" Several years ago I recovered completely using Dr. John Sarno's book "Healing Back Pain" andI am now thinking that my brain is trying a different approach for distracting me from my emotions. In the last two years we have had a terrible crisis occur in our family that has caused a tremendous amount of rage in me. I have done all the right things - therapy etc. but I think there is still more and this situation is not fully resolved so I think the rage is manifesting itself through numbness in my feet. Since my brain knows it can't trick me with pain, I guess it is trying to distract me with numbness. Is there anyone out there who has ever experienced this type of symptom and recovered? I am open for help, support and suggestions! Thanks, Laura

 

Hi, LauraD. I think everyone who has had any kind of TMS pain knows what you're experiencing. Since the white coats said they don't know why you feel numbness in your feet, it just has to be some repressed emotion. And you say you've been in a rage because of some crisis in the family. That's TMS doing its work to get you to resolve that rage, as best you can. Put some labels on the crisis. Try to write about it in one sentence, even if it' s a long one. Write down the names of those in the crisis. If you can identify the person or persons that caused the crisis, great. Write down what effect the crisis has had on you, directly or indirectly. Tell your feet and your unconscious mind you KNOW why they feel numb and you're working on the family crisis that is causing the pain. As Herbie posted today, you can try to be in control of the pain. Dr. Sarno says we don't have to even know
what repressed emotion is causing our TMS pain. Our unconscious gets the message that you know it's TMS and eases up.

You know the pain comes from your rage. You're halfway toward healing. The other half is dealing with the crisis problem. If it's something beyond your control, maybe you'll have to just accept it. Make peace with it in yourself. Let it go. Let God handle it. If it involves forgiving, forgive.

Good luck healing and let us know how it's going.

 

Thanks Walt so much for your kind words, encouragement and suggestions. I will be in touch. Laura D.

 

You're welcome.
My sister had a good friend named Laura and she looked like a young Gene Tierney
who starred as "Laura" in the 1944 classic. A fantastic film noir, if you haven't seen it.
And the song became a standard.
But I'm sure you know all this.

 

Yes, I was named after the song and the movie. Loved both of them. I also danced with my Dad at my wedding to it instead of "Daddy's Little Girl".

 

Hi Laura,

I have idiopathic neuropathy as well. At it's worst I had numb feet, burning skin, tingling, pins and needles, etc. The numbness is gone and just a few symptoms remain in my legs, but my feet are almost completely normal. This is way more scary than pain, which is why I think it manifested for me. It's been a very long road, but I just wanted to let you know you aren't the only one. I've struggled for a long time because I doubted TMS as this isn't the typical symptom set that we mostly hear about.

Best wishes to you! Mandi

 

Hi Mandi,

I can't thank you enough for replying. Yes, for me also this has been much more scary than the back pain I had experienced years ago. You have truly given me hope that I will start to believe that this is just another form of TMS that has visited me. I have copied your reply and will read it daily as part of my road to recovery!

Wishing you all the best as well! Laura

 

I've been having this symptom as well. Even scarier for me is that my father recently had emergency surgery for a blod clot, so when I have numbness/pain in the feet, that's the fear I have. Glad to know I'm not the only one.

 

My pain also went to leg numbness as a shift in SI. You would think that would be better than pain, but fear is fear, si?

As long as the person fears, there will be odd disorders for the brain to torture you with. I would like to publish a paper on the wild things people have told me they've gotten. The brain has carte blanche to do what it wants if you allow it. You can't keep going back to the dark side, it feeds your fear.

A lady contacted me about a muscle "twitch" that was driving her crazy, and one about "itches" (no relation to me, but I did end up dating her).

Fear = anger = energy increase = imbalance = symptom = obsession = distraction = misery.

It all begins with fear. The people who are by far the most successful at healing are the ones who know how to address fear. They have less fear; you could say they are fear-less, but they aren't. They just learn what to worry about, and what not to.

Remember the bulk is unconscious, you don't have a clue what the culprit is, and you don't need to find out. The proof is in the healings that are occurring all the time.

Steve

 

Steve - your quote about Fear really rings true. When I am faced with a health issue or sensation I associate it with the worst outcome and the fear takes over.

My wife however...I am amazed by her. She has had a lifelong struggle with GAD and knows how to calm herself when she is anxious. I think her coping mechanism has helped her handle stress so it doesn't make it to that fear level. She started to have ringing in her ear and the doctors could find no cause. She was losing hearing so they all ut decided she had a specific brain tumor pressing on her ear. They did a MRI and I was about to lose it thinking I would lose my wife. She on the other hand never wavered and continued on with life as normal. It turned out she was find..no tumor. I asked her how she stayed so composed and she simply said I was scared but until I was given a reason to be concerned I chose not to be.

 

Hello Laura: this is my first post in this web site. I also was diagosed with poly neuropathy in Sept of this year. I'm desperately hoping we have TMS. I also stopped my back pain a few years ago by using Sarno's suggestions. The fact that no one seems to understand what these feelings are like is very upsetting. So many physicians can't diagnose it properly. I read a book "Peripheral Neuropathy, when the numbness, weakness, and pain won't stop" by Norman Latov, MD,PhD (on amaon's web site) this was helpful but of course no mention of TMS. I'd LOVE to hear that others have found this ailment to be TMS, in the mean time I'm going to assume it IS TMS and proceed with the same procedures I used in curing my back pain. I've also joined the Natl Assoc of Neuropathy and their news letters is informational as well as showing how so set up support groups in your area. Best of wishes. Pugs

 

Hi Laura,
I have a similar story. After suffering from leg spasms for a year and a half {I was taking 7 Ultrams a day )I was able to conquer them after reading "Healing Back Pain". At a later time was diagnosed with RSD after suffering the most hellish pain imaginable. RSD causes neuropathy and severe vascular issues. I had it in both feet and was even in a wheelchair for a while. I'm a little tired right now to go in depth but I just wanted to give you hope. It's been 8 months but my confidence is growing and I know I will get better. You can read my posts on the site to get a better idea of some of the issues I was dealing with. Hopefully you will see some commonalities. The members on this site are all incredible and I encourage you to follow one of the programs and read an array of books on TMS. You are fortunate to have this knowledge because it will put you on a path to wholeness and healing. I struggled with the thought that nerve and vascular pain were in a different category than TMS but they are not in my opinion. Anyway you are at the right place and I want you to know this is TMS and you will get better!!

 

You are all posting such helpful Sarno knowledge therapy. It's great. Keep searching for the repressed emotions
and all the pain will go away. It takes time and effort, but it pays off.

 

Hi Pugs,


Thanks for your reply. I truly do believe I have TMS, given my history, personality etc. but there is 1% in my mind that is keeping me back and so, the symptoms continue. I am sooooo busy at work right now that I have not been able to look into starting a support group for people with neuropathy who think they have TMS or have been cured because I think that would push me right into total recovery! But this wonderful website continues to give me hope. The more I can connect with people who have this symptom, the stronger my belief in the TMS diagnosis becomes. I do know of one woman who was cured of idiopathic neuropathy using Dr. Sarno’s techniques ( Mandi) but she said it took her a long time because she doubted – but she DID recover!! I would love to know how she did recover. Maybe she will read this and reply. For me, I continue to read Dr. Sarno's books and try to put his suggestions into practice everyday. Let's try to stay in touch to support each other!

As Norman Cousins said in his book, "Anatomy of an Illness" -- " I WILL make it ALL the way back" (meaning back to total health!)


Laura

 

I've known quite a few people with TMS whose first symptom - even before lower lumbar pain and/or sciatica - was tingling in their feet. All part of the same ball of wax to my way of thinking. Of course, that's after you've been examined and ruled out such other nasty medical diagnoses as diabetes etc. etc. etc. In fact I know a doctor whose first TMS symptom was tingling in his feet that started, not coincidentally I'd say, on his 40th birthday and on the eve of his first divorce. The psyche seems to have a way of selecting symptoms that'll scare the heck out of you.

 

Hi,

I fully recover from RSD/Idiopathic Neuropathic Pain using TMS approach, and Reading John's Sarno books, I've been pain free for years. Unfortunately, I'm having a relapse. And the only thing that is keeping me from geeting better again is fear, and doubt, and the amount of things I read in the Internet, that creates more doubts and scare people about RSD, Ideopathic Neuropathic pain, and such.

For me Chronic pain, Is TMS.

Thank you,

 

I think one of the keys to recovery from TMS is being able to direct your attention to where you want it for your own health and happiness. I have actually done experiments with this with my own TMS. I have an array of about 5 persistent TMS symptoms that my brain cycles through. The obsession, symptoms, attendant fear, and distraction seems to happen in response to some repressed stressor related to social phobia, anger, fear, etc. When an episode happens, it begins with my attention persistently going to a part of my body where I imagine pain or uncomfortable sensations. The more my attention is lost to this, the worse the symptom gets. This leads to more fear, obsession and distraction. What I need to do is to take back my attention for my own. I have learned to do this, but I am not always successful right away and I cannot expect the symptom to diminish right away. But it works once you learn to do it. One thing I have done is, when I have one of my symptoms and cannot immediately focus my attention on something happening in the NOW, is to imagine having a different symptom and focus my attention on it. So I focus my attention on a different part of my body and deliberately create a symptom there by imagining some slight body noise and building it up into uncomfortable sensation. Once I do this it gets my attention off the symptom I had originally feared and shows me that my brain could create symptoms all over my body. Then I am usually to get my attention off symptoms entirely. Your goal should always be to focus your attention on what is happening in the NOW moment, whatever it is that you are doing, and stop letting your brain distract you with this symptom fantasy.

 

Hi, thanks for replying.

My problem is that I read a lot of "crap" in the Internet, about misterious diseases like RSD/CRPS and so on, and that Neuropathic pain is for life, before knowing about TMS. That is still used in moments of stress by my brain to keep TMS going and to have relapses once in a while.

Lets face it, RSD and fibromialgia is all about ischemia, which is the basis for TMS.

 

In Dr. Sarno’s book, The Mindbody Prescription you can read:

"Because of the physical findings and the history, I concluded that you had TMS and proceeded to tell you what that meant. I said that the structural abnormalities previously identified were not the cause of your pain and I would present evidence then and in the course of my lectures to buttress that conclusion. The pain, stiffness, burning, pressure, numbness, tingling and weakness were caused by mild oxygen deprivation in the muscles, nerves or tendons involved in each case. In itself this was harmless. Although it could produce more severe pain than anything else I knew of in clinical medicine, you would not be left with residual damage when your symptoms disappeared."

John sarnos don't use rhe term neuropathic but talks about the burning pain (which is the same,)

 

Hi everyone,

I actually have not been in touch but have made progress with the peripheral neuropathy. Steve, thanks for replying to me back in June. After you told me that peripheral neuropathy IS TMS - I started to walk around barefoot and surrendered to whatever my body symptoms wanted to do - and the fear began to diminish...I have also connected with a TMS therapist and this is moving me forward more quickly. The numbness is still there but two things are fading away - the pain and the fear. I know that once those are not important anymore, the numbness will fade but the miracle of it all is - I DON'T CARE WHEN THAT HAPPENS!! I am at a level of acceptance now that I never thought I would reach. It can only get better from here on.....Thanks everyone for sharing - it boosts my confidence. I hope my sharing is encouraging someone as well. Someone recently said to me, "The body speaks and the body does not lie - I believe there are emotions beneath every symptom and disease...and healing is possible if we are willing to look within ourselves.

Slowly making it back all the way...

Laura