I can so identify with your share and rage about powerlessness over livimg situation. My symptoms started after a couple of years of extreme financial stress, at that time I was jobless and about to lose my unemployment benefits. I lived in constant terror of not having enough money and how would I ever make ends meet. At that time I had taken a series of terrible jobs to support my self and lost them all, then had lost 3 jobs in 3 years. Even though much of the other people in these jobs were let go as well the sum total of being let go so many times became very personal and crumbled my self esteem.
I had suffered so much loss and interestingly my symptom was a sudden onset of hair loss after taking a new anti depressant to " calm my nerves". My hair fell out in a matter of 5 days after taking the meds and never came back. I've lost 60% of my hair and have been devastated by the loss. To the point I don't socialize and find it increasingly if not all but impossible to function in the work world as my appearance has changed so dramatically and I look so awful. In fact I can not bare to look in the mirror as I am so devastated by the change in my appearance, it haunts my every waking moment.
That was 2 years ago, the onset of my symptoms. Since then my outside circumstances have gotten expostenitally worse. I lost that apartment after it went under construction so loud and awful for an entire year that I I was not able to be home during the day and had the roam the streets all day until they would finish construction so I could go home. Everyday for. I this on end. I couldn't work and function after months of the stress of doing that and the noise and invasion of privacy. I had another two jobs which went terribly and I lost and have had to move twice in the last month alone into places that were so terrible as couldn't unpack my food or bathroom and so small I can't open my closet door to get to my clothes because my bed takes up my whole room. I've had to put much of my things in storage and throw out the rest - so painful and the losses keep coming. I lost my health insurance and just yesterday my PC Dr wrote she is retiring so I am without a Dr. I am so overwhelmed by it all and suffer from complete and utter depression and anxiety. I am furious at God for all the losses in my life and enraged at myself and my life in general for it turning out this way, a total failure at 52 with nothing to show for it and no secure present or future. Terrifying and enraging.
To make it worse , I reached out to my family from who I am esgrabbed to be,p me find a place t live when I lost my apartment and they completely turned their backs on me. I was close to ending up in a shelter and even so they refused to help me. Heart wrenching, they are very wealthy with multiple vacation homes and left me stranded. They believe mental illness is my fault and left me to deal with it all on my own despite my pleas for help and admission that my anxiety and depression had been kicking my but to the ground.
And my symptoms just keep getting worse. In addition to hair loss I suffer from pretty bad scalpm pain burnig and stinging all the time. Medically I've been told it's everything from stress to low iron to hormones. The sudden onset and the symbolism of the symptoms always made me suspect TMS particularly since I was cured of my debilitating back pain years ago by reading Dr Sarnos books and meeting him, a program which resonates with me deeply to the core . I came to the wiki when this happened and thought I'd check back in. Sarno worked for me completely and everytime I read a book or a wiki share I feel a small mental shift in symptoms.
That said after months on the wiki and with the books when my symptoms started My hair loss failed to improve and I got discouraged and eventually gave up.
I am in such fear and goal panic over my symptoms I can't breathe and have so much anxiety over my financial situation I feel like I could break into a million pieces. I start a job this week but at half the pay I've had at the past and am also being hounded/hunted by the IRS who is threatening to seize what little money I have to live on to lay back taxes. I feel there is no way out and have returned to my 12 step program to help me grind a higher power to help resolve some of these overwhelming problems. All said, I am mostly distraught over my symptoms which have not let up one bit in two years. I am enraged to the core from my symptoms - hence altered appearance and would give all the tea an China just look normal again. If every Dr, all 6 of them that I saw said my hair loss was stress related - based on the sudden onset and the fact that my scalp biopsy was normal- I have to believe its TMS and am hoping for a Way for it to click in like happend with my back pain and I just get better.
I get the powerlessness thing, I really do. It's terrifying to the core and enraging. I'm so scared my hair is falling out
