Childhood Trauma, Resistance and attachment to Victimhood

[LexH108]

Hi,
I am new to TMSwiki. Landed here while Googling for some insights on relationship between stress and seasonal allergy. I'm fairly new to the concept of TMS as well.
In a thread on this I came across a reply by @JanAtheCPA that touched on something more fundamental in my experience of life. I'll quote what she wrote here:

First I don't believe there is any such thing as someone who can't recover from TMS symptoms. HOWEVER, there are definitely people, particularly those with childhood adversity, who are extremely resistant to doing the deep emotional work which is required in order to recover. The characteristics I've seen in these people tend to be:

Giving up on a program or a therapy as soon as it makes them uncomfortable, claiming that it's not working.

Seeing themselves as victims, and being very attached to their victimhood.

Unable to be emotionally vulnerable in a therapeutic program or setting. Sadly, the brains of some emotionally resistant individuals can be extremely skilled at blocking the efforts of even very skilled therapists to break down walls that have been created over a lifetime.

Childhood trauma/adverse childhood experiences are almost always associated with emotionally resistant brains, which is why Dr Sarno recommended psychotherapy for people with trauma. Unfortunately the resistant brain will find a reason to give up quickly.

You definitely won't get anywhere if you don't take emotional risks. This IS the bottom line between those who experience recovery and those who do not. That being said, since I brought up the issue of childhood trauma I must also say that if someone has trauma, doing this effectively and without creating more trauma requires professional therapeutic support, not self-help programs.

I guess the real answer to your question is that anyone CAN recover, but there are definitely some individuals who won't be able to do so with self-help programs, because their traumatized brains are simply too resistant, and too skilled at maintaining the repression that was required in order to survive the trauma.
​

I am hoping to get some more clarity on this, since I recognize the tendency that Jan described above in myself.

I hope she and others on this forum with insight on this can help me gain a deeper insight so that I can better deal with this.

I'll direct my questions on this to Jan, but am looking forward to contributions from other posters as well. So my initial questions would be:

• What do you mean when you say that one has to take emotional risks. Can you elaborate on that?

• What is the benefit in this in working with a therapist?

• Because I have experiences years of misery from a really young age, I sense I have developed a severe resistance to feeling emotional (and physical) discomfort. (At the same time another part of me is convinced that life can not be another way.
  Do you think this is the reason there is such a resistance to a program and/or therapy when discomfort comes up?

Looking forward to replies to these and exploring these further...

Thanks, Lex

 

[Scott G]

Hi Lex, I'd like to comment on your question about the benefit of working with a therapist; as I've been in a therapy program since January; and transitioning to an outpatient therapist who will continue to help me with my anxiety and TMS.

If your psychological issues are severe enough, the benefit of working with a therapist is that they are going to take the utmost care in helping you heal while keeping you as psychologically safe as possible during the process; particularly in the case of childhood trauma. The last thing they (or you) want is a process that would cause you more harm. That's not to say that therapy isn't going to have tough moments - it absolutely will. But tough moments arising from good therapy sessions is one thing; damage from incorrectly dealing with a difficult and traumatic issue on your own is quite another. One has an element of risk. The other has an enormous element of risk. Those risks - or 'emotional risks' - for me are all about opening up myself up to vulnerability by feeling certain emotions that might be uncomfortable, scary, etc as part of the therapy sessions.

As to resistance, a truly excellent therapist is going to assume this and work within those 'constraints' delicately, and over what could be a considerable amount of time; with the goal of getting the patient feeling safe enough to lower the resistance and start to open up. There's no guarantees, of course. In the end, it's still up to the patient as to whether or not they wish to continue.

In my case, I cannot imagine dealing with my psychological issues solely from self-help books / online resources. My anxiety in particular was too severe, and the results would have most likely been catastrophic.

 

[Cactusflower]

Emotional Risk is in terms of utmost honesty and vulnerability with yourself. Many folks with TMS have personality traits (described by Dr. Sarno, who you should read a book by, if you have not already) that prevent us from leaning into our emotions - it's what usually is at the root of our symptoms and we often have trouble admitting that we have more difficult emotions (Sarno specifically states subconscious inner rage, others touch on sadness etc). The form of self-help most often utilized is journaling (then tearing it up and sitting with your emotions for a moment) and there are many styles of journaling that can be done. The idea is that you begin do get the crap off your chest without having to confront anyone or talk about it. There are many forms of psychotherapy but only a few have been shown to work well with TMS symptoms and many forms of talk therapy aren't as successful with severe anxiety, pain, trauma and OCD tendancies are all symptoms.
You can utilize a TMS coach - most of whom are not therapists and do not really go into the psychological side of the work, but will help you do the work yourself (eg. journaling etc). You can also see a therapist who may not have knowledge or even believe in TMS but has the skills to guide you thought the emotional work while you do the other TMS work yourself.

I saw a few types of therapists and EMDR was what helped me with severe anxiety, OCD type thinking (which I still have but in a positive way I utilize instead of obsessing over symptoms) and unknown to me, trauma. Other therapists I saw were TMS specialists but we just didn't click. My EMDR therapist didn't believe in TMS when we first met - but we decided that we could agree to disagree and still do the inner work. I had a coach I worked with once a month while I went through the TMS work on my own (free on this website, you can find a link to the Structured Education Program at the top of the forums page). The "other work" consisted of exploring journaling, moving consistently, dealing with fear, discussing things like Claire Weekes who's book Hope and Help For Your Nerves is also excellent for anxiety, and being a general support which I needed at the time.

I was absolutely uncomfortable with the physical, mental and emotional aspects of the TMS work but as @JanAtheCPA likes to say, What the F*ck Else Can You Do - I learned that being there for yourself can be uncomfortable. Learning new interpersonal skills you were never taught can be challenging, others close to you might be uncomfortable with the changes you might for yourself but it's all part of the "work" and over time, you'll just adopt the skills you need to get through it all, and you'll find your joy again.

Everyone's needs are different. You might not gel with the Structured Educational Program (SEP) but do better with Dr. Schubiner's Unlearn Your Pain or some other self-guided program. I started the SEP and had a lot of anxiety over it so I decided to seek a therapist. More anxiety when that one didn't work out...but I still kept on because something told me this was the path.

All I did was choose to begin. I just started with day 0 of the SEP (read a book by Dr. Sarno) and did a little at a time. That helped me decide what I wanted to try next: help or on my own. It's really up to you as @Scott G says. There is no singular way but you'll know when you hit on the things that resonate with you. Lots of times the things you dislike and fear the most (eg. the psychological work) are the things you need to do.

 

[LexH108]

Thank you @Scott G and @Cactusflower for your elaborate and thoughtful responses. Will re-read and reflect on them today...

 

[Scott G]

My EMDR therapist didn't believe in TMS when we first met - but we decided that we could agree to disagree and still do the inner work.

Love your response to Lex, and this part really stood out. Do you know if your EMDR therapist ever 'came around' to believe in TMS?

My new psychologist is at Cormendi here in Chicago with Dr. Stracks and Dr. Schubinar, so no issues there, LOL.

However, the therapist in my recent PHP + IOP program had never heard of TMS / Mindbody / Pain Reprocessing Therapy / Etc. She was skeptical, but interested - as was my psychiatrist/prescriber in the same program. What ended up happening was that they both, almost at the same time, did their homework (in part based on links I sent them (such as the published, peer reviewed Colorado study from JAMA Psychiatry) and fully accepted that it was a legitimate, scientific-based condition. Pretty amazing.

 

[Ellen]

I agree with all the wise comments made above. I feel the need to chime in, though, because I was able to succeed in recovering from TMS using a self help approach, even though I was a life-long TMSer, had a very high ACE score of 6, and met all the criteria for Complex PTSD. Because of all my emotional challenges, I was never able to open up and be vulnerable with a therapist, so working through things on my own was my only option.

I used Dr. Schubiner's Unlearn Your Pain program initially, and while it has been over 10 years now since my initial TMS recovery, I do remember how painful the emotional insights I had while doing the program were. Still, I was able to keep going. After about 18 months total, I was 100% free of TMS symptoms. But I want to emphasize that I still had many symptoms of Complex PTSD. I've continued to work on those over the years, also using a self help approach (developed by Dr. Nicole LePera). I still have a ways to go working on that, but I am free of TMS (except for an occasional relapse).

If you can find a therapist that you can be emotionally open with, then go that route. But if that doesn't work for you, it is possible to recover from TMS with a self help approach.

 

[JanAtheCPA]

There ya go, @LexH108 - from actual forum members who have actually been there.

The post you quoted was based on my observations over many years on this forum, but not from personal experience of trauma. Or, rather, I guess you could say that my experience of a fairly straightforward recovery process following a significant amount of "book cure" convinced me that there is a vast spectrum of recovery depending on the amount of trauma that may or may not be in any person's background - because that one factor is what I consistently saw in the many different recovery stories we encounter here.

After you posted your questions, I was thinking about how I wanted to help answer them while also pointing out my lack of personal experience - and the fact that at the heart of any answer, it always, and I mean ALWAYS, comes down to "it depends, because everyone is different". These responses have illustrated that perfectly, I think.

The two "V" words are at the heart of the issue. Victimhood and Vulnerability. Part of my recovery was the discovery of vulnerability - and recognizing that it is pretty terrifying, even for someone without childhood adversity.

Victimhood was not part of my TMS portfolio, ever, but I see it all the time in the members of this community who come back, over and over, complaining about their lack of progress. In those cases, victimhood is like an addiction - it's become an essential part of the personality, which means it can't just be kicked to the curb without a significant emotional replacement. And after all, someone who has suffered from adverse childhood experiences actually IS a victim.

These are very complex distinctions to work through, on top of the fact that victimhood is the antithesis of true emotional vulnerability, which requires admitting the depth of the losses that are at the heart of trauma.

By the way, if you don't know about the study of Adverse Childhood Experiences, referred to as the ACEs, there's an introduction here:
https://www.tmswiki.org/forum/threads/aces-quiz-online-printable-versions.27061/

Don't skip the recommended reading, and also be sure to read the comments below - Cactusflower and I both contribute to those with examples.

 

[Cactusflower]

Love your response to Lex, and this part really stood out. Do you know if your EMDR therapist ever 'came around' to believe in TMS?

My new psychologist is at Cormendi here in Chicago with Dr. Stracks and Dr. Schubinar, so no issues there, LOL.

That was myself who's EMDR therapist didn't believe in TMS work as Sarno layed it out. She was however more into a somatic camp. Her dissonance was knowing that something might be physical/trauma related or the "other" (Sarno) because she had been working with Vets (and was one herself). She mentioned a few times she felt deep down that there was something actually physically going on with my symptoms. I've never said there was or there was not, it does not matter to me if there is no medical "treatment" it does not matter. I needed to stop obsessing and focusing on any of the symptoms and find the joy of life. That was absolutely where we agreed.

Before discovering TMS I was utilizing a sort of life/exercise/pain coach I met via through my physical therapy. Although very versed in pain science, she wasn't that familiar with the psychological side of TMS aside from any immediate symptoms. We discovered TMS together - and she completed her degree with Lorimer Mosley in Pain Science and then continued to take Dr. Schubiner's course to become a TMS coach. She herself has TMS too. All though her own education and self-discovery she realized that it was more of the somatic/meditative and mindfulness side of things that helps her the most so she has developed her own little niche which is mainly dealing with athletes and very active people.

My physical therapist absolutely believes in TMS now. 95% of his clients will not follow that path at all but he now incorporates as much of Allan Gordon's style of TMS work into his treatment plans - as much as clients will accept - he frames it more from a nervous system perspective because that seems to be more palatable. Our work together has really helped him communicate to his clients how to chase joy in even the tiniest moments, to celebrate every victory and to be persistent without self pressure even when there is a flair up or a life change.

 

[Scott G]

My physical therapist absolutely believes in TMS now. 95% of his clients will not follow that path at all but he now incorporates as much of Allan Gordon's style of TMS work into his treatment plans - as much as clients will accept - he frames it more from a nervous system perspective because that seems to be more palatable. Our work together has really helped him communicate to his clients how to chase joy in even the tiniest moments, to celebrate every victory and to be persistent without self pressure even when there is a flair up or a life change.

Hey, thanks for the reply. This is so cool, and you've got to really feel great about it! Major KUDOS to you! Think of all the people down the line that you've helped directly/indirectly! Amazing. Love it.