As far as I can recall, my early TMS symptoms began in late 2017. To my ignorance at the time, my perfectionistic, self-critical, and people pleasing personality pushed my stress levels to the extreme. Juggling a busy corporate job and working on my side-business until late at night, I started to have trouble falling asleep, laying awake for hours with a racing mind thinking about all the problems in my life, past, present and future. I started developing chronic tension headaches and experienced my first panic attack, and my reaction to this was anger & frustration - "What's wrong with me and my body? Why am I suffering these symptoms?".
Eventually I reached a breaking point sometime in 2018, after I fell victim to a financial scam that robbed me of my years of hard-earned money. I was clearly in despair and needed a long rest both mentally and physically, yet I kept thinking to myself "Why can't I get over this already?", "I must be weak if I can't move on from this", "Something must be wrong with me". I remember watching a lot of inspirational videos about people who overcame hard times and thinking "Why can't I be strong like them?". After an intense and embarassing panic attack at work, I left my job.
Desperate to "fix myself", I began seeing doctors, getting MRIs, etc. My pattern was to google my symptoms, convincing myself I had X rare disease only to be later told "I was perfectly fine" by a doctor post examination. By the end of 2019, I was a nervous wreck. Not only did my chronic headaches and panic attacks get worse, I developed dozens of other mysterious symptoms such as dry eyes, face pain, neck pain, blurry vision, caffeine and alcohol sensitivity, insomnia, light sensitivity, freezing cold hands and feet, and more. I floated through each day, disassociated and unable to enjoy anything, reluctant to go outside at all because the wind and sun hurt my eyes and I would suffer a crippling panic attack walking into a cafe or train station.
Clearly, traditional doctors couldn't help me and naturally this led me to explore the realm of alternative medicine, namely Chiropractors. During my visits to these Chiros, they had me take some X rays and affirmed my suspicion that all of my problems were due to a misaligment in my spine, and were confident they can fix me through their adjustments. But I needed to visit every week, for many months and possibly years to make my adjustment "hold". Over the next 3 years I was stuck in this world of Chiropractors, trying one after another, yet my symptoms continued to persist/get worse. One particular Chiro treatment used a machine to tap my neck so lightly I can barely feel it, and this made me question everything and I was finally able to escape the world of Chiropractors. But I was still suffering from dozens of symptoms, unable to work, and desperate to heal.
One day in late 2023 I stumbled across this site after my google search miraculously matched with words from someone's forum post (I forgot which one). Dr Sarno's and Dr. Claire weeks books, success stories on this forum, and trying out alan gordon's healing program has given me a new perspective on life, my body, and hope for recovery. I no longer let my symptoms dictate what I do and when they do appear I can meet my symptoms with ease and gentleness instead of frustration and anger. When I do so, the symptoms usually subside a bit or at least doesn't get worse. I believe this new attitude towards my symptoms is gradually breaking the patterns of chronic tension and fear.
Also I don't know why this is but I feel like discovering TMS is extremely hard. If you search for symptoms etc on google, TMS is never at the top of the results or listed on any medical websites as a treatment option, despite it having helped me (and so many others).
After about 1 year of applying the lessons of TMS, here is my list of symptoms and a rough % of healing progress taking into account both the frequency and intensity of the symptom.
- No screens 2 hours before bed - this has really helped me sleep better
- Exercise - weight lifting 5x a week - gave me confidence back in my body
- 20 minute walk after dinner - improved my digestion and bloating
- Meditation (bodyscan and sitting meditation) has helped calm my racing mind so I can tune into my body/emotions better.
- Stopped obsessively googling every little symptom I had trying to find the cause/cure and focused on principles of TMS.
To people starting their healing journey, I understand what it's like to feel like you want to get better FAST, but I emphasize the value of patience. Don't expect day to day progress, or even week to week progress. It took months of consistent application of TMS principles and healthy life habits for me to feel noticable symptom improvement. So don't give up and always remember to be gentle to yourself.
I consider myself about 50% healed as I feel I am living life to about 50% of my full capacity. I can drive around, do grocery shopping, go to the gym, travel with my wife, socialize with friends, although I am not comfortable all the time. I have made considerable progress but there is still work to do.
I feel my nerves are still on high alert and sensitive to stress. For instance when I go to a unfamiliar, crowded place something is triggered in my nervous system and I can feel my neck/jaw/face getting tight, headache coming back, vision blurring and I also start sweating quite a bit. I can't seem to pinpoint exactly what is triggering because there are times where I feel fine, but because of this problem I don't feel like I am ready to go back to work. I'm convinced this is a form of anxiety/TMS that I still need to work through. If someone has any tips, I'd appreciate it.
I'm now going to try out the structured educational program (SEP) and will report the results here.
Eventually I reached a breaking point sometime in 2018, after I fell victim to a financial scam that robbed me of my years of hard-earned money. I was clearly in despair and needed a long rest both mentally and physically, yet I kept thinking to myself "Why can't I get over this already?", "I must be weak if I can't move on from this", "Something must be wrong with me". I remember watching a lot of inspirational videos about people who overcame hard times and thinking "Why can't I be strong like them?". After an intense and embarassing panic attack at work, I left my job.
Desperate to "fix myself", I began seeing doctors, getting MRIs, etc. My pattern was to google my symptoms, convincing myself I had X rare disease only to be later told "I was perfectly fine" by a doctor post examination. By the end of 2019, I was a nervous wreck. Not only did my chronic headaches and panic attacks get worse, I developed dozens of other mysterious symptoms such as dry eyes, face pain, neck pain, blurry vision, caffeine and alcohol sensitivity, insomnia, light sensitivity, freezing cold hands and feet, and more. I floated through each day, disassociated and unable to enjoy anything, reluctant to go outside at all because the wind and sun hurt my eyes and I would suffer a crippling panic attack walking into a cafe or train station.
Clearly, traditional doctors couldn't help me and naturally this led me to explore the realm of alternative medicine, namely Chiropractors. During my visits to these Chiros, they had me take some X rays and affirmed my suspicion that all of my problems were due to a misaligment in my spine, and were confident they can fix me through their adjustments. But I needed to visit every week, for many months and possibly years to make my adjustment "hold". Over the next 3 years I was stuck in this world of Chiropractors, trying one after another, yet my symptoms continued to persist/get worse. One particular Chiro treatment used a machine to tap my neck so lightly I can barely feel it, and this made me question everything and I was finally able to escape the world of Chiropractors. But I was still suffering from dozens of symptoms, unable to work, and desperate to heal.
One day in late 2023 I stumbled across this site after my google search miraculously matched with words from someone's forum post (I forgot which one). Dr Sarno's and Dr. Claire weeks books, success stories on this forum, and trying out alan gordon's healing program has given me a new perspective on life, my body, and hope for recovery. I no longer let my symptoms dictate what I do and when they do appear I can meet my symptoms with ease and gentleness instead of frustration and anger. When I do so, the symptoms usually subside a bit or at least doesn't get worse. I believe this new attitude towards my symptoms is gradually breaking the patterns of chronic tension and fear.
Also I don't know why this is but I feel like discovering TMS is extremely hard. If you search for symptoms etc on google, TMS is never at the top of the results or listed on any medical websites as a treatment option, despite it having helped me (and so many others).
After about 1 year of applying the lessons of TMS, here is my list of symptoms and a rough % of healing progress taking into account both the frequency and intensity of the symptom.
- Panic Attacks - Gone!
- Anxiety - 60% healed
- Tension headaches - 60% healed
- Dry eyes - 70% healed
- Face numbness - 60% healed
- Light sensitivity - 80% healed
- Blurry vision - 30% healed
- Insomnia - 80% healed
- Caffeine sensitivity - not healed
- Alchohol sensitivity - 50% healed
- Cold hands and feet - 80% healed
- Neck pain - 70% healed
- Bloating/Gas - 90% healed
- Jaw Clenching/Teeth Grinding/TMJ - 80% healed
- No screens 2 hours before bed - this has really helped me sleep better
- Exercise - weight lifting 5x a week - gave me confidence back in my body
- 20 minute walk after dinner - improved my digestion and bloating
- Meditation (bodyscan and sitting meditation) has helped calm my racing mind so I can tune into my body/emotions better.
- Stopped obsessively googling every little symptom I had trying to find the cause/cure and focused on principles of TMS.
To people starting their healing journey, I understand what it's like to feel like you want to get better FAST, but I emphasize the value of patience. Don't expect day to day progress, or even week to week progress. It took months of consistent application of TMS principles and healthy life habits for me to feel noticable symptom improvement. So don't give up and always remember to be gentle to yourself.
I consider myself about 50% healed as I feel I am living life to about 50% of my full capacity. I can drive around, do grocery shopping, go to the gym, travel with my wife, socialize with friends, although I am not comfortable all the time. I have made considerable progress but there is still work to do.
I feel my nerves are still on high alert and sensitive to stress. For instance when I go to a unfamiliar, crowded place something is triggered in my nervous system and I can feel my neck/jaw/face getting tight, headache coming back, vision blurring and I also start sweating quite a bit. I can't seem to pinpoint exactly what is triggering because there are times where I feel fine, but because of this problem I don't feel like I am ready to go back to work. I'm convinced this is a form of anxiety/TMS that I still need to work through. If someone has any tips, I'd appreciate it.
I'm now going to try out the structured educational program (SEP) and will report the results here.
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