Day 1 ... again.

[wendyd]

My story is similar to so many others. Lower back pain for at least 15 years. I read Sarno's books a while back, went thru the process, totally see myself and intellectually accept Sarno's theory. I have carried on with 'normal' activities, for the most part. I have had flare ups and gotten thru. The brain is pretty powerful, though (duh) and recently has stepped it up a notch to the point that I have been having more than my usual lower back discomfort. Now, I am getting spasms in my buttocks, especially in the morning when I get out of bed. It got so bad, I went to the doctor to see if there was anything else going on. Had an xray and MRI. Doctor referred me to neurosurgeon, who I haven't seen yet (appt on Dec 15). I went to chiropractor on Friday, who read MRI and said compressed disk, yadda yadda. Same day, one of my (college) students asked me if I had heard of Dr. Sarno. My jaw dropped. I had just been wondering if this wasn't just TMS. As we started talking about it, wonder of wonder, it felt a little better. Not much, but a little. So, I spent the weekend re-reading Sarno and found this forum. I'm all in. Ready to do the work. The thought of being 'pain-free' makes me giddy with excitement. I want that. I want that so badly. I feel impatient, but I know it will take time. Thanks in advance for the words of encouragement. I'll need them.

 

[Walt Oleksy (RIP 2021)]

Hi, Wendyd. It's great that you learned about Dr. Sarno and TMS. I healed from severe back pain after reading his book
Healing Back Pain and doing the Structured Educational Program. You need to believe 100 percent that your pain is from TMS or it won't work.
Here are two things to help you along. One is a video by Herbie, one of this community's best friends. The other is his list of expanded thoughts on
Dr. Sarno's 12 Daily Reminders. You can also find lots of other help in the subforums. Welcome to a very helpful and friendly community.


http://tmswiki.org/forum/threads/what-to-know-to-heal-from-pain-pt-1.5482/



Herbie’s Extended Version of Dr. Sarno’s 12 DAILY REMINDERS

1. The pain is due to TMS. This is real pain or anxiety but its caused by subconscious tensions and triggers, stressors and traits to your reactions and fears and also when at boiling point your conscious tension can and does cause real pain too.
2. The main reason for the pain is mild oxygen deprivation. This means that when you get in pain or in anxiety then the the blood is restricted from going to your lower back for instance. The blood being restricted causes oxygen deprivation which causes the pain - remember, where theirs no oxygen then there is pain in the body. Also, The pain stays because of fear and focus to physical organic symptoms and repressions.
3. TMS is a harmless condition caused by my REPRESSED EMOTIONS so even though you think you can harm yourself from the years of pain you have felt and how you feel in general -- so far no reports have been heard from tms healing knowledge causing damage to anyone, it only helps.
4. The principle emotion is your repressed ANGER -- this means under your consciousness lies something that happens automatically to everyone. Tmsers have repressions that are stored because of our personality traits,traumas, stressors, fears, strain, etc... When these stored repressions build and build then eventually they cause the brain to send pain into your body to keep you from having an emotional crises. The mind-body thinks its helping you.
5. TMS exists to DISTRACT your attentions from the emotions, stressors, tensions and strains of your personality traits because if you can get distraction then you wont have to be in emotional turmoil. When you don't face and feel your emotions and they get repressed cause you didn't want to deal with something -- they are just adding up in this beaker, ready to pour over and create real pain and anxiety in your body.
6. Since my body is perfectly normal, there is nothing to fear. So in reality when I fear the pain or anxiety I just cause myself undo strain and tension adding to the beaker of pain. If I fear then I feed the pain, If I fear Its impossible to recondition. Fear keeps the pain and anxiety alive in the body through focus.
7. Therefore, physical activity is harmless.If I want to work against the pain I could but its better to lose some of the pain so when I start my life over I=t have to be in pain trying to heal cause facing the repressions and all the other activities that cause the pain and reversing my fear and focus to them then I can heal.
8. I am resuming all normal physical activity. I don't fear moving anymore. I believe in my bodies ability to heal now. I can move how I want. I will not fear moving with a bent back anymore. I will also practice going out and acting normal again, not in fear of what pain might do to me.
9. The pain is unimportant and powerless. Its only power is how its hidden -- its illusion, Its fear.
10. I will keep my attention on the emotional issues. I will think about my emotions and feel my emotions throughout the day. I will not judge, criticize or fear my emotions. I will not run from my emotional issues but face everyone of them. I will feel my emotions fully and cry if I need to. Then I will release the emotion and get my mind and thoughts back to my life and living in the present, in flow.
11. I am in control of all of this. This is how I recover.
12. I will be thinking PSYCHOLOGICALLY AT ALL TIMES. This means I will keep my thoughts on psychological issues like happiness, fear and anger -- traits and triggers, conditioning and journaling. The science behind mind-body/tms healing, etc.... This way I will not feed my thoughts to the body -- that is a trick of tms. Tms will always try to get me to focus on the body caused by the pain until I break its show and flair. When I get my attention off psychical symptoms and on emotional issues and psychological issues then I will not feed the fear of the physical issues anymore thus making the tms of no effect. This will in return, give us the cure.