Day 12 Dear Reliability....

[Urbanjourney]

Today I wrote to be personality trait, reliability. I chose this because I instantly knew this has had the one of greatest impacts I believe in fuelling my TMS symptoms.
I've always been someone who can be relied upon. If i say i'm going to be there at 9am, I'm there at 8:30 and happy to wait around so I can ensure that my reliability status is never damaged. I made this choice at every workplace i've been at and more recently, the job i'd been at for nearly 10 years, because i lived nearby, I would easily be able to get in most times 45 minutes early so i can relax into things and overcome any challenges before we rolled the doors open for customers. I actually enjoyed this process and felt no trouble or obligation doing it (I wasn't get paid for this time) however looking at it holistically, this unfortunately fuelled the other side of the equation where I felt i had to go in even if i was unwell. During this year, I've felt awful (like a dread) at the prospect that i'd be losing my reliability status as I was so uncertain that i'd be able to commit to certain days in the future because of the pain I was in. It was compounded further by the fact that I had some specialist skills so without me, certain things couldn't easily be completed (someone else would have to struggle through learning how to do it quickly)
Even as writing this, I remembered the fear then relief I felt when I met with my employer mid year after having my injection and they were totally happy for me to take 4 weeks leave to get better - they'd just work everything out which felt great....then as it got closer to going back and i felt i wasn't ready, the dread returned.
I'd been stuck in the fear - pain - fear cycle all year due to my want to be reliable (to make others life easier and to the detriment of my own health)
I think this is closely related to the "Gooder" trait which I also have - i was also the good boy, good manners, did what he was told and rarely complained.

Thinking back at the origin story of this brought up a memory from when I was around 12 of my Dad, having got a new job after us moving back to Australia from England and our car had broken down maybe a few weeks into this job. He either couldn't deal with it at that point or we didn't have the money for it but he then got up at 4am and walked nearly 20km into work and returning the 20km at the end of the day so he could be reliable. He was not prepared to have it effect his job which would then flow to our reliability on him as the breadwinner.
That was no doubt a big stamp on my forehead as "Son, this is what you do - show up to work unless you're just about dead"
I can see the duality of this lesson - it is honorable to be reliable for sure but the danger is when it happens at the detriment of your own needs.

On another topic, As I was driving my wife to work today, I decided to detour through our state's precious botanical parklands which is right on the edge of the City (Kings Park). I remember how nice it felt to be amongst it so on dropping her off, I went back through, parked up and climbed up the DNA tower which has amazing views in all directions. I previously used this as training for a nonstop 100km walk and it gave me great joy at the time so I felt like it would be medicine. Then I remembered there were some areas of parkland nearby that were based on a rainforest and I used to love going there for reflection (It also has significance in Aboroginal Culture).
It was bliss to be amongst, reading more from my Dr Joe Dispenza book, You are the Placebo whilst taking in all the bird sounds and dappled light. I made the connection that rewiring my brain would require me to ake different choices each day - rather than go home to do some reflection excerises, i'd begin building different neural pathways this way.
Dr Dispenza said in the opening pages of this book, "In order for some of us to wake up, we sometimes need a wake up call" The gift of my TMS diagnosis has been to come at the mind - body connection and it's amazing potential through a doorway that's meaningful to me....previously, I'd kind of rolled my eyes whenever certain friends would mention Joe Dispenza or anyone of that ilk.

I have the wonderful people who have built this website and filled it with the greatest information and also those who show up every time to assist others to thank for what is going to be just the tip of the iceberg for me in way of mind - body exploration.
Some pics attached of our beautiful parkland and my climbing experiment...

Oh, and for the Holmes and Rahe Social Readjustment Rating Scale, I scored a pretty low 518

 

[BloodMoon]

@Urbanjourney
I really relate to what you said about making different choices each day. That feels like one of the key realisations in mind-body work.

So many of us say we want to “get back to our lives,” but often what we mean is that we want to be symptom-free while keeping everything else exactly the same. Yet it is often those very patterns—the fear, the pressure, the self-imposed rules, the putting everyone else first—that helped create and maintain the symptoms in the first place.

Recovery is not about becoming less caring, capable, or dependable. It is about changing the way we relate to ourselves and our lives, so that we are no longer constantly overriding our own needs. Your walk through Kings Park is a perfect example: not waiting to feel better before living differently, but using a small positive choice today to begin building a different response tomorrow. (Fabulous pics btw - thanks for sharing! )

I also relate to what you wrote about reliability. In my case, I used to take work home and do it for free. What I eventually noticed was that if I made a mistake, or if my productivity or responsiveness dropped even slightly, my bosses would come down on me like a ton of bricks. My reliability was taken for granted. Meanwhile, colleagues who were far less reliable, less productive etc., were not held to the same standard—and would sometimes receive praise, or even "performance related pay", simply for doing a little extra when they felt like it.

It made me realise how unfair and self-defeating that dynamic can be. Being dependable should not mean becoming the person who absorbs all the extra pressure. Part of my recovery was recognising that I needed to get out of an atmosphere where I was not appreciated.

 

[Urbanjourney]

It made me realise how unfair and self-defeating that dynamic can be. Being dependable should not mean becoming the person who absorbs all the extra pressure. Part of my recovery was recognising that I needed to get out of an atmosphere where I was not appreciated.

yes, it's hard to do but you do get the multi levels of awareness with educating yourself with lots and lots of new knowledge and then it becomes easier to spot rather than be the unconscious pattern that gets repeated every time.
For me, having learned about the power of the mind from this perspective has really got me thirsting for more and more education from different authors knowing, and not taking for granted, that each new piece of knowledge is a rewiring and by trusting deeply in the process, it will slowly create change.
My wife works at the University of Western Australia and is dealing with a lot of researchers on various commercialisation projects and it makes me want to really get TMS pushed hard to them - what we need here in Australia are way more doctors who really understand the neuroplastic conditions (actually i'm pretty confident we have none!) and who actually take time to work on them - we seem to have a model here of "book your appointment, wait 45 minutes after your appointment, go in to see the doctor then get chucked out within 20 minutes with a script and be charged for an 'extra long consult'"

 

[Margot!!]

Beautiful pictures!! Thank you for sharing! I agree, the education piece is my favorite and so helpful. Sometimes if IM struggling w symptoms, the best thing I can do is read an article on TMS or MBS or a success story. I am fascinated by the brain and love to learn about it. I am reading "7 1/2 lessons about the brain" by Lisa Feldman Barret, recommended by one of our awesome Beloved grand eagles, one more lesson to go. Education on the brain really helps me and I enjoy it so much. Next is How emotions are made by the same author. I am so blessed that I get paid to do research and create trainings, literally my dream job. I am just a naturally curious human, and I love learning