Day 4 Doctors: An unknowing ally of the TMS Sufferer?

TMS DAY 4.

What was the most disheartening thing a doctor has told you about your symptoms? In what ways have you kept that in your mind? If you feel comfortable sharing, post your response in the Structured Educational Program section of the PTPN's discussion forum. We would love to hear from you.


To be perfectly honest, in past episodes the things doctors have told me have been more heartening than disheartening. Although unwittingly, in the past the doctors have set me free by doing nothing but confirming my TMS – although only through an unability to find anything structurally wrong. They have enforced the idea that I have TMS because they couldn’t find anything wrong. That makes me wonder if maybe it would be a good idea to go ahead and get the foot MRI. In the past I have heard things like, “We don’t know why your neck/trapezius is spasiming”.
“There doesn’t seem to be a reason for the pain” “This should respond well to conservative treatment” and finally “Your neck MRI shows no structural abnormalities”. Once I saw my neck MRI had no problems – I believed I was suffering from TMS on a much deeper level.

With the current incident with my foot – the doctors keep saying it should resolve. They offered cortisone injections and oral steroids. Those things reduce inflammation universally. But in my case they did not reduce inflammation. My foot is still visibly swollen. Is that proof of TMS? My foot is not responding to medical treatment so I am left to believe that the pain is caused by TMS?

I am like the soldier who came to Christ and said, “I believe, please help my unbelief”.

If I had clearer evidences of TMS in my foot – I feel like I would be better able to internalize the diagnosis. If I could see the pain moving around from one foot to another, or sometimes not hurting after I walked on it – it would be so much easier to believe in TMS.

Also – with so much inflammation, even if it is caused by TMS – is it even safe to walk on the foot? Wouldn’t walking on it while it was swollen cause damage? How do you resume normal activity when you can’t ease into it? I can’t put 20% of my weight on my foot. My foot just hurts – every time I put it on the ground.

Final question: would any of you care to share at what day in the SEP you started to get symptom relief?

 

This is a brilliant observation about everyone who engages in Dr. Sarno's work. All you can do is see and question your doubts, and do the "education" which will go deeper in time, like reading Dr. Sarno and connecting his ideas to your life.

A natural question, but one which, with respect, may end up pressuring/comparing/judging you and your progress against others. This tendency can be seen and held as personality propensities which cause rage, hurt, etc in the Inner Child. So just seeing this, your personality, you can begin to find the true source of your pain, and thus unwind it. Without judgement, just seeing... So I am saying that while this question is so natural, try to observe the emotions around this question, and release yourself from the fear that if you don't get xy or z results in a certain time frame, that you are on the wrong track.

Andy B

 

What Andy said!

There is no one way to do this work, and I guarantee you there is no one way to recover. We're talking about brain function here, not any kind of physiological certainty! Some of us came to this work with many symptoms, and as I mentioned in another post just now, I still have one symptom which comes back as soon as I'm stressed. The change is that I have a completely different relationship with it now - instead of fearing it, I'm reminded that I need to calm down, breathe, and think about what's going on. I may even pick up the pen and paper and do some journaling or free-writing.

I think this is a legitimate question, so did any of the three docs who diagnosed you address it? They should have given you advice about using/not using your foot before they let you go. We here can't answer that question, although I know that a lot of members have recovered from all kinds of foot issues - have you looked for foot pain posts in the Success Stories subforum? I'm pretty sure that I've seen people describe inflammation and swelling symptoms that went away when the TMS diagnosis was accepted and the individual did the work they needed to do.

Recovery takes a 180-degree mind shift, and it requires vigilance to maintain, thanks to our lifelong conditioning in the other direction. The question for each individual is: what is it going to take for that mind shift to happen? You've done it before, you just need faith in yourself that you you can do it again!

 

I might also add - the TMS mechanism could be increasing your pain beyond what the actual inflammation and swelling are responsible for. Remember, pain is a signal created in the brain and sent back to the injury, it is not created at the injury. It's designed to warn us that there is danger. Your brain may have decided that this upcoming trip is too dangerous for you to go on, and in addition to creating the inflammation, it's also increasing your pain level to make you too afraid to go.

Again - try to honestly and deeply sort through the negative messages and examine where they are coming from, as well as openly acknowledge them and accept them as perfectly normal under the circumstances.