I have had RSi (TMS) in my elbows which radiates to my hands on and off since April. It’s gotten a lot better as the fear has lessened. I played in a volleyball tournament yesterday, volleyball is somewhat demanding on the hand and elbow. After one game my elbow was screaming at me, meanwhile we had like a minimum of 6 games left to play. What has consistently worked for me is talking to my brain “I don’t care what pain you throw at me I am doing so this”, I’ll ask the pain to come along with me as I do the activity. And then while I am doing the activity I praise myself for my resilience, and inner kindness to try to build a life that I want, which involves doing activities that I want to do in spite of pain.
but without a good degree of acceptance that you have TMS doing the above and believing what you’re saying will be tough. I definitely recommend keeping an evidence log for definitive proof it’s TMS. Something tangible to look back on especially during flares so you avoid going down the fear loop.
One of Sarno’s key points was to think psychologically. So a good place to start when having pain is to ask. ‘If I wasn’t thinking about this pain what would I be thinking about’ for me with volleyball, I am quite a shell of my former self athletically speaking, so a lot of the times I notice I get pain during sports and I start mentally using that as an excuse for a poor performance. If I didn’t have the pain my thoughts would be holy fing shit I suck, lol. So I try to change that with the above dialogue by just trying to be a bit kinder in these low moments and just trying to find joy in the present actions and moments.
thanks so much H
