Day 1 Mind Over Ankle

After 5 months of Chronic ankle pain, I am thinking it might be TMS and want to give TMS recovery a try! Back in April I was diagnosed with Posterior Tibial Tendonitis. I developed sharp shooting pain in my ankle and shin while running. I went from running 25-30 miles a week to barely being ankle to walk. After weeks of PT, ultrasounds, graston, two rounds in a walking cast, icing, etc. I still have chronic ankle pain. Luckily I am able to walk and get around, but still have discomfort whenever I am walking.

Yesterday i went to see a new doctor and he said he though I had tarsal tunnel syndrome and recommended surgery. After being anxious and depressed all day (any my ankle feeling even worse!) I came across TMS in my google searching. I know my ankle seems to get worst the more stressed I am, so I am hoping that following the TMS structured program will help get me back to my old active lifestyle!

 

Hi, overcomingmyankle. Welcome to the TMS community. I'm sorry you have ankle pain, but I had severe back pain and it led me to TMS and Dr. Sarno. I strongly suggest you read his book. HEALING BACK PAIN. It applies to all pain because he believes pain is most often not caused by anything structural but from our emotions. In the book, he suggests 12 Daily Reminders. Another TMSer wrote his longer version which I will print here.

The SEP will help you discover the emotions causing your pain. Look at the success stories in the subforum of this web site to learn how TMS "penicillin" healed thousands.

Also, deep breathing helps a lot to relieve pain. Breathe in through your nose to the count of 6, then open your mouth and hold a breath for the count of 2, then exhale through your mouth to the count of 8. Repeat as often as you want to during the day. It brings oxygen to the brain and is profoundly relaxing to relieve pain.

"Mind over ankle" is a good philosophy. With TMS, you will heal and be back running again.

Herbie’s Extended Version of Dr. Sarno’s 12 DAILY REMINDERS

1. The pain is due to TMS. This is real pain or anxiety but its caused by subconscious tensions and triggers, stressors and traits to your reactions and fears and also when at boiling point your conscious tension can and does cause real pain too.
2. The main reason for the pain is mild oxygen deprivation. This means that when you get in pain or in anxiety then the the blood is restricted from going to your lower back for instance. The blood being restricted causes oxygen deprivation which causes the pain - remember, where theirs no oxygen then there is pain in the body. Also, The pain stays because of fear and focus to physical organic symptoms and repressions.
3. TMS is a harmless condition caused by my REPRESSED EMOTIONS so even though you think you can harm yourself from the years of pain you have felt and how you feel in general -- so far no reports have been heard from tms healing knowledge causing damage to anyone, it only helps.
4. The principle emotion is your repressed ANGER -- this means under your consciousness lies something that happens automatically to everyone. Tmsers have repressions that are stored because of our personality traits,traumas, stressors, fears, strain, etc... When these stored repressions build and build then eventually they cause the brain to send pain into your body to keep you from having an emotional crises. The mind-body thinks its helping you.
5. TMS exists to DISTRACT your attentions from the emotions, stressors, tensions and strains of your personality traits because if you can get distraction then you wont have to be in emotional turmoil. When you don't face and feel your emotions and they get repressed cause you didn't want to deal with something -- they are just adding up in this beaker, ready to pour over and create real pain and anxiety in your body.
6. Since my body is perfectly normal, there is nothing to fear. So in reality when I fear the pain or anxiety I just cause myself undo strain and tension adding to the beaker of pain. If I fear then I feed the pain, If I fear Its impossible to recondition. Fear keeps the pain and anxiety alive in the body through focus.
7. Therefore, physical activity is harmless.If I want to work against the pain I could but its better to lose some of the pain so when I start my life over I=t have to be in pain trying to heal cause facing the repressions and all the other activities that cause the pain and reversing my fear and focus to them then I can heal.
8. I am resuming all normal physical activity. I don't fear moving anymore. I believe in my bodies ability to heal now. I can move how I want. I will not fear moving with a bent back anymore. I will also practice going out and acting normal again, not in fear of what pain might do to me.
9. The pain is unimportant and powerless. Its only power is how its hidden -- its illusion, Its fear.
10. I will keep my attention on the emotional issues. I will think about my emotions and feel my emotions throughout the day. I will not judge, criticize or fear my emotions. I will not run from my emotional issues but face everyone of them. I will feel my emotions fully and cry if I need to. Then I will release the emotion and get my mind and thoughts back to my life and living in the present, in flow.
11. I am in control of all of this. This is how I recover.
12. I will be thinking PSYCHOLOGICALLY AT ALL TIMES. This means I will keep my thoughts on psychological issues like happiness, fear and anger -- traits and triggers, conditioning and journaling. The science behind mind-body/tms healing, etc.... This way I will not feed my thoughts to the body -- that is a trick of tms. Tms will always try to get me to focus on the body caused by the pain until I break its show and flair. When I get my attention off psychical symptoms and on emotional issues and psychological issues then I will not feed the fear of the physical issues anymore thus making the tms of no effect. This will in return, give us the cure.

 

Dear Overcoming,

Please know you are not alone. I was also diagnosed with PTTD by a "foot specialist" (aka greedy surgeon). He scared me and alarmed me, telling me I needed surgery and that "you won't recover without surgery." That made my PTTD worse. Then I found Dr. Sarno, Dr. Schubiner, and the TMS wiki - lucky me! Surgery would have definitely been painful, with no promise of a cure. I am a lot, lot, lot, lot, etc., better after rejecting what the surgeon told me and embarking on the TMS journey. I'm also largely "outcome independent" (you will learn about that) - i.e., most of the time, I just say "who cares" to absurd pains that come and go. Please start the SEP and start learning, at a gentle pace, and treat yourself kindly. No need to "jump back in with both feet." Be reasonable, gradually take on your symptoms as you feel ready. You are embarking on a wonderful, life changing journey!

Please let me know if I can help in any way! Sunny

 

Yes, Welcome, OCMA!

As we like to say about doing the Structured Ed Program, you've got nothing to lose but your pain. And a few bucks here and there as you come across all of the great book and audio/video recommendations that folks have. As you progress, you will be amazed at just how many resources there are which are devoted to the subject of the mind-body connection. The really great thing is that there are many ways to do this work, and we are all different - so feel free to find what works for you.

I agree with Walt that you will want to read at least one book by Dr. Sarno, but I want to mention that he has written two books since Healing Back Pain. In The Mind Body Prescription he takes his original theories and expands them to many other conditions, including what he calls "TMS Equivalents" which are all of the non-pain conditions like digestive and neuro. He also suggests that anxiety and depression are equivalents, which is pretty radical - and yet many of us here have come to agree that they are, indeed, forms of distraction created by our brains in order to repress dangerous emotions.

The book I read which got me started was The Divided Mind, in which Dr. Sarno presents a somewhat condensed overview of his theories in four chapters, and then turns the next six chapters over to five MDs and a therapist who discuss other aspects of mind-body conditions.

The Divided Mind changed my outlook and my experience overnight, and I never looked back. I actually downloaded it from my local library for the initial read. Then I bought a real copy, but I lent that out so many times that I had to buy the e-book for myself.

Good luck, and keep us posted!

~Jan

PS - great advice, as always, from Sunny!

 

I have the opposite problem, I have been diagnosed with peroneal tendonitis. My MRI was completely normal and the doctors tell me that I have a nerve entrapped in a muscle, nothing showed up on my MRI. How can they diagnose that. I know how you feel. Keep reading Dr. Sarno's books. This is TMS. Treat yourself kindly. Think pyschologically. Watch the success stories on you tube or read the Thank You doctor Sarno letters. I'm going through the same thing. Fear and anxiety can make this worse. Look at all the people who have recovered, you will and I will.

Be well

Toni