Is this PGAD caused by TMS?

B

Beaulieu

New Member
Hi everyone, I need support/advice/reassurance. Sorry for my English, i'm not a native speaker, but I'll try my best. It's gonna be a long story I guess. I would like to know if my symptoms might be linked to TMS.

So, on the 3rd of March this year I went to the doctor to get an IUD placed in my uterus. I was extremely nervous and scared and started to shake because of anxiety during the placement. It hurt like hell and I was crying. A few days before the placement I started to feel like I was developing a UTI. The doctor gave me antibiotics but it didn't do anything. Now I think this was a sign of muscle tension in the pelvic floor because I got scared of the placement of the UTI.

After the placement I kept experiencing a lot of pain in the uterus and the pelvic area. I even had to go to the emergency doctor at night because they thought the IUD perforated my uterus. This wasn't the case after all. But it gave me a lot of anxiety. I also had to go to the gynaecologist the next day to check if the IUD was placed correctly. The gynaecologist told me everything looked perfect. That reassured me a little but everything kept hurting.

After two days I started to feel weird sensations in my vagina and around my pubic bone. It felt a little aroused and I felt like I needed to orgasm to make it go away. It made me very nervous since I was not mentally aroused, I wasn't mentally horny, only between the legs. So i tried oral sex with my boyfriend since I was not allowed to have actual sex yet because of the recent placement of the IUD. It didn't help at all and it actually made it worse. My left leg also started to feel numb and tingly. I could touch the bottom of my left foot and feel it in my vagina. So this is when all the anxiety started. I panicked because I thought there was something wrong with my nerves, I thought the doctor pinched a nerve during the placement and damaged it. My left leg started to have cold flushes and I felt muscle weakness.

Besides the genital arousal I also started to feel like I had a UTI again. I had to pee all the time and my bladder burned. I did two tests, but they were negative. I didn't have a UTI. I also started to feel something like a pressure around the pubic bone, the vagina, the perineum, and around the anus. It feels like I have to go to the bathroom and something has to come out, but it also feels like I have to put in something to release the pressure (?!).

I'm really worried that I have PGAD. Within a period of 3,5 weeks I experienced 3 days of crazy genital arousal. I couldn't help but masturbate. I HAD to, and some days more than once. On the other days I also feel a little arousal sometimes, but not as much as on these 3 days. I do feel pelvic pain/pressure, burning and tingling sensations and have to pee a lot on those other days. Masturbating doesn't make the feeling go away and now I'm scared of having sex with my boyfriend and having an orgasm because I fear it will make it worse or it won't give me much pleasure.

My doctor thinks I overactively tensed my pelvic floor during the placement of the IUD and that I'm now experiencing these weird symptoms because of muscle tension. She thinks the ischiadic nerve is irritated (since I had the tingling and numb left leg and since I could feel that down to my foot). She also thinks that a tight pelvic floor is the cause of the pressure and arousal. I have to admit that my symptoms started to subside a little after I got more and more reassurance, but today I'm having a flare and I had to masturbate twice to feel better, but it didn't make me feel better. Also my period started today and I think this might be of influence.

Could this be PGAD caused by anxiety and stress (TMS)? I also experience a lot of stress because next week I have to move to another house, I experience a lot of work pressure and I suffer from general anxiety and mild depression. The coronacrisis isn't helping either.

Can someone please give me advice or some calming words?
 
My TMS coach said something very interesting. I had a UTI 6 weeks before my PGAD started - I had total panic, severe pain during the UTI, and I did 10 tests a day.
So my brain has already created a link to this part of the body. My mind had created a connection - private area = a place where there is fear and panic, an area to be protected, an area on alert.

I got a feeling of sexual arousal down there just brushing my dog's fur - like you, I got panicked right away! I googled directly you too? Since then I've been stuck in the state, I had it with my legs or even have it again and again, I started to get a million symptoms down there because I read so much about Google and co!

Your mind has already connected to down there when you were afraid of the IUP intervention.

Where are you from ?
 
I also think I created a link to the pelvic area before the IUD placement. I was constantly focusing on it in my head. Days before I got sooo scared and I started to google and read stories of women that had de IUD, and many women said that the placement was horrible. So it was very stupid of me to google and read all that information before the intervention. It became a self fulfilling prophecy. And here I am with all my weird symptoms. I truly hope this is all psychological and that it will go away.
My symptoms always change and move to different parts of the body. If it's not my vagina, than it's my legs, if it's not my legs, it's my pubic bone, if it's not my pubic bone, it's my bladder and if it's not my bladder, it's my tailbone. And then it comes back to the vagina. It not always feels like arousal, but the last 2 days it does. More often it feels like pressure, burning, tingling or a UTI. I'm trying to ignore it and distract myself, and it helps a little but it's difficult.

I am from the Netherlands, and you?
 
then we are neighbors I come from Germany :)

It really sounds like me, my symptoms are also moving. I have chills in the legs and buttocks, then I feel arousal in the clitoris, then deep in the abdomen, then a tingling sensation on the vulva, then the anus, then pain in the anus, then pain in the pubic bone, Stinging in the urethra etc.
i can write 3 pages of symptoms i have :oops:

Symptoms that change and move in the body is a sign of TMS.
I don't think all the nerves of the pelvis are broken - not yours and not mine.

It may well be that your pelvic floor is tense and cramped - I have the suspicion with me too and our symptoms are very similar. BUT your symptoms are not there because your pelvic floor is tense, your pelvic floor is tense because of your fears and worries.
I think as soon as you start working effectively on TMS your muscles will relax on their own.

there is a great TMS book that is not only about back pain or typical pain which gives me a lot of understanding for TMS. It is from Steve Ozanich - i don’t know if his Book is translated in the netherlands. In Germany its translated :happy:
 
It's so nice to find someone with exactly the same symptoms, even though the situation itself is horrible of course. I feel less alone in this right now, and I don't feel like I'm a freak.
It's very hard to explain to other people what you're experiencing, especially because it's so weird en seemingly uncommon. My mother and boyfriend are trying to be very understanding, but they don't feel what I feel, so that's why I feel like I have to do this on my own. In fact I do have to do this on my own because it's my (psychological) problem that I need to solve, but it's nice to find other people dealing with the same problem so you can support eachother.
I am going to search for the book you're referring to. Thanks so much!
 
Sorry if this is TMI, but I really would like to know if my symptoms could be TMS.

So, after my last post I started to calm down mentally. I started to have better days and I even regained the courage to have sex again after a month of not having it on purpose. I didn't want to disturb anything in the pelvic area and i first wanted to work on myself.

So the last days I felt a little better and in my mind I wanted to have sex with my boyfriend, not just genital arousal, and it was not just a PGAD flare. I genuinely wanted to have a moment with my boyfriend. This happened last friday. I was very scared to trigger the PGAD but felt positive enough to have sex. Afterwards I was pretty sure it didn't trigger the PGAD. The fact that I was mentally ready again to have sex without extremely panicking about the PGAD seems also positive to me.

On saturday my vagina ached and felt very sore. I think its because of the tension in my pelvic floor and because of the fact that the night before I was still a little anxious to have sex again. But then again, I felt good enough to try it after a month.

Today the sore feeling was gone and my vagina felt normal again. Today I didn't have sex (penetration), but I did orgasm twice (not spontaneous but I was doing stuff with my boyfriend). Afterwards I felt good I guess, but not really satisfied. I now have a PGAD flare and my left leg and foot are tingling again. It's very weird. When something touches my left foot, I can feel it in my vagina. Like a nerve is very sensitive? I'm panicking again and all I can do is google, google, and google. I'm not sure whether I have something physical or that I'm just making myself crazy with all the fear and anxiety. It seems to me that this could all be a self fulfilling prophecy, and that I get symptoms because I fear them and think about them all day, but it's so hard for me to truly believe that.

Is it normal for TMS to come back when you're fearing symptoms? And how do you people deal with a flare? I find it very difficult to calm myself down and focus on other things. I get this OCD-like attacks where I constantly feel the need to google for information to reassure myself, and I can't get out of that loop.

I'd really appreciate some encouraging words or advise. Anyone?
 
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