Day 31 and a question

[Imagyx]

I have a question that's been bothering me very much.
It might be the last step for me until I can finally push through.
Considering the mild oxygen deprivation that is causing pain in my arms
and Sarno's suggestion to pursue rigorous physical activities:
How can I be sure not to hurt and injure myself, when the muscles are
already oxygen deprived ? Isn't it like driving a car without water for cooling ? Or without oil?
I think that is why I still stop any action from the point where the pain is too much for me.

My biggest stressfactor is currently the question when to start working again and especially what do I do?
I'm not so sure about being a programmer. It is my dream but maybe that's not what I really want deep down
in my emotions I cannot even explore yet.
Fear is a huge factor here and I know that.
It's just that my life consists of so many ups and downs with a big difference in altitude
and I don't want to fall AGAIN.

 

[charcol]

Start slow. We learn to walk before we run. Slowly push yourself to do more.
The best time to begin is now. You're starting over, to a certain extent.

And try to ignore the pain. If the pain is there to distract you, then I feel the best thing to do is ignore it. It's helped me.

For more detailed info on my approach, you can find my posting "pain in neck/left shoulder/arm/elbow".

 

[charcol]

This saying just came to mind...

Distract yourself on your own terms!

Sounds like a good t-shirt. Hmmm...

 

[BruceMC]

Considering the mild oxygen deprivation that is causing pain in my arms
and Sarno's suggestion to pursue rigorous physical activities:
How can I be sure not to hurt and injure myself, when the muscles are
already oxygen deprived ?

I believe Dr Sarno says that sure you should begin vigorous exercise again, but not until the pain is gone (or has almost disappeared). This seems only prudent to me since when TMS is still active, it is reducing oxygen flow to your muscles, nerves and tendons, which might, in their weakened oxygen-deprived condition, be more subject to injury. I don't think it's any coincidence that I suffered a torn rotator cuff in my left shoulder not long after my TMS relapse in 2008, which involved the classic lower back-sciatica symptoms, all on the left side. In other words, TMS is a general condition; at least that's been my experience. My advice (not a diagnosis or prescription) is to wait until the pain has subsided or disappeared before attempting any vigorous exercise. Face it: you'll know when you're pain-free. Don't try to push too hard before then in order to avoid the risk of real injury. If you have any doubts, be sure to consult a physician to give you the go-ahead for resuming rigorous physical exercise.

 

[Imagyx]

Thank you charcol, that is what I'm doing right now, starting slowly and moving one step at a time.
I feel better this way, only I kept questioning myself if this will ever help, because
for the last 10 years I've been doing the exact same thing. I got better and better over time, moving
from half an hour of pc work to 8 hours. That's when I had the relapse and went down to zero again.
I feel I don't have much of a choice and thought Sarno's approach of going all out might be different.
I'll read your info on your approach.

MorComm, I appreciate your advice, but I don't understand what those people should do, that have pain all the time.
There were times when that applied to me as well. Now my pain level depends on how much I do every day.
If I understood Sarno in the right way, one should do everything as if there weren't any pain, weakness or tension.
He also wrote not to start off too fast, as you said. But what is "too hard" really ? The last thing I want
is to take those small steps again over years and then have another relapse like before.
This is the worst and I don't know if I'm able to get over one more of these.
I'm totally frustrated.

 

[Imagyx]

Curtis, I read the thread you mentioned above.
It gave me some insight and as Lala suggested, I just bought "The great pain deception".
Reading helps me a lot.
What still bothers me is the fact that so many in this forum - you, too - have pain moving around, the symptom imperative...
It may sound stupid, but I want that, too. It's always in my arms and what little pain
I had in other body parts before was either not for a long time or not that bad.
And furthermore all other pain problems resolved itself.

Reading, writing, learning and doing the SEP. I'll continue.
Thanks again.

 

[Leslie]

It doesn't sound stupid at all that you would want the positives that someone else is describing - it sounds human! I'm right there with you. I wanted the pain to magically disappear by the time I finished reading my first TMS book. It happened for other people, I wanted it too. Didn't happen. What I got instead, was no change in physical pain and more emotional pain - self inflicted because I gave myself a thrashing for the "failure"...other people could do it, why not me? My SEP experience was only slightly improved from my book experience, and my self-thrashings were fueled by the posts of others, many of whom were realizing and posting wonderful things in very short periods of time.

I don't know if you'd find more negative than positive posts if you were to look back through mine but I'm thinking it's not likely. That would be the result of my perfectionist/goodist traits I suspect. Don't want to admit my failures or risk bringing others down I guess. The phrase "if you don't have anything nice to say, shut up" was popular in my family growing up so I find myself guided by it more often than not today. Just because there aren't a litany of negative posts out there doesn't mean negative experiences didn't happen.

The reason I tell you all this is simply to let you know that you are not alone. I see a post about a wonderful breakthrough or healing from someone, and while I am totally happy for the person's experience, I am also totally jealous that it is not my own - immature, maybe, but true nonetheless. I find that the "patient excerpts" in the TMS and psychology books will do that to me every time. I read about the discovery of some memory or hidden trauma someone discovers that suddenly makes all the "pieces click into place" and the pain stops. I want that. At least I think I do, until I stop and think about what it is that I'm doing. I'm reading the abridged version of someone's experience and measuring myself up against it. The measurements are always going to be inaccurate because I don't have the whole story.

My TMS symptoms haven't moved. I may get a new one (at least I think they're new TMS symptoms) here or there, but the old ones remain along with the new. We're only human. Our bodies may be structurally similar but our minds are ALL different. We're all the unique product of our own individual experiences so it seems reasonable that if our minds are involved in the pain, our journeys to heal will likely be as unique as we are.

 

[Imagyx]

Thank you very much Leslie for your guidance along such a difficult matter.
I can find myself in your post to a certain degree. I must admit, I thought,
that in this forum, where we are all more or less in the same boat, everyone would be trying to be honest about
their feelings as much as possible. Maybe I need to read between the lines more.
I can relate to everyone wanting to tell only nice success stories though.
I find it hard to be honest about my negative feelings as well but here I thought I could be straightforward
about everything bothering me.

Everyone, be honest with yourself and all people here who try to help you or want to gain insight by your posts !​

You can only win.​

​

​

I read about the discovery of some memory or hidden trauma someone discovers that suddenly makes all the "pieces click into place" and the pain stops.

That was the most disturbing thing for me when I read the Mindbody prescription. I could see myself on many pages but​

it seemed to me I'm the only one who didn't get better in the same way.​

But I know now that it's not that easy, even those with book cures get relapses and I certainly don't want that, as I said before.​

So I try not to measure myself against any success story anymore and read different books.​

 

[RikR]

Pain is there for a reason – it is saying leave me alone. Skeletal muscle uses both carbohydrate (in the form of glucose, a sugar molecule) and fat (in the form of fatty acids, the building block of fats) for fuel and is capable of functioning with or without oxygen. In the absence of oxygen, metabolism produces lactic acid and consumes glucose stores. When a muscle works without oxygen, the situation is labeled anaerobic or hypoxic.

When a muscle in hypoxic it is prone to micro and sometimes macro tears. Also when a muscle is in a chronic tension state as with TMS it is full of metabolic toxins and not capable of working correctly. Overdoing it can again cause muscle tears then you have a real injury and not just a psychological issue.

Sports teams inject players with drugs to shut off the pain signals so they can play – many wind up permanently crippled later on.

If your pain is strictly phobic then you can challenge the muscle – if it is real pain don’t push it – torn soft tissue can take longer than broken bones to heal

 

[Leslie]

I thought,
that in this forum, where we are all more or less in the same boat, everyone would be trying to be honest about
their feelings as much as possible. Maybe I need to read between the lines more.

The expectation of honesty from those dealing with a similar issue seems reasonable and it's one that I share with you. I think there's honesty to be found here both in what is and is not posted. While we're all working toward that same pain-free goal, we're all bringing our individual life experiences, strengths, weaknesses, and comfort-levels along for the journey. I've found that I often learn as much or more about myself from what I don't or won't share as from what I do, it shows me where my own comfort-levels lie). My own experience with my negative feelings is that they are my pre-programmed natural tendency, a program that I desperately want to change. My hesitation to post them is rooted more in my concern that posting them will serve to perpetuate programming that I am trying to change. It's not that I'm being dishonest about them or denying them, I'm simply making an attempt not to feed them. I want to believe that we are all honestly endeavoring to be as helpful as possible to ourselves and each other here with whatever we share.

That was the most disturbing thing for me when I read the Mindbody prescription. I could see myself on many pages but
it seemed to me I'm the only one who didn't get better in the same way.

I felt the same way when I finished reading that book, and some others. Then I read somewhere (don't remember if it was in the SEP here or where exactly) that the research shows that the less complex the issues it stems from, the easier the pain resolves. Just convincing myself of that was difficult. It was much easier for me to believe that I wasn't better because I was a failure, or any of a vault of other negative thoughts about myself. Once I was finally able to believe the research is true, I was also able to see myself there. My issues are multiple and complex, far more than I was even aware. The more I learn the more I can see that I am not trying to remove the knots from a single piece of string. My pain stems from various balls of yarn that have been tangled, knotted, and intertwined over many years. The unraveling will require time and patience, it's not going to happen immediately, as much as I might like it to.

We're all at different stages of the healing journey. Our needs and wants are as different as the methods we use to meet them. Listen to your body and don't doubt that you best know what you are needing at any point. You post what you need or want to post, in the way you want to post it - that's where your healing starts.