Muscle stiffness and strain makes it impossible

[Ania]

How to deal with muscle stiffness and strain (low back)? It makes resuming normal activities impossible.
I slowly resumed running already - as this I can do without bending my waist - so I just can ignore back pain and run as my legs are fine.
But doing whatever that requires bending my waist (like gardening) is not possible. I can ignore pain, but as my back muscles are getting strain it is physically impossible to bend.
I know that it is TMS, and this is caused due to fear of getting hurt and perpetuated pain pathways but it makes me stuck. How to overcome this?

 

[JanAtheCPA]

As Dr Sarno said, an important part of accepting the TMS diagnosis is that you have to be willing to resume your normal activities. That doesn't mean that you just jump in and try to do everything at once! Take it slowly, do it with self-love, and also visualize that there is nothing wrong with your back muscles. Keep breathing, breathe deeply, and visualize your back muscles loosening up and enjoying your normal activities.

If you don't trust your ability to do this, you could work with a personal trainer, who would teach you how to use your back in ways that are designed to use all of your muscles effectively and achieve a lot more than you think you can do. Some people might say this is going against Dr. Sarno, but I've been working with a personal trainer for years now, and at age 68 I can deadlift 50 lbs. I know 50 ain't much (there are some female bodybuilders at the gym doing way more) but I think it's pretty good considering my hatred of exercise most of my life, plus the fact that low back pain was one of my many symptoms "before Sarno".

 

[Baseball65]

Whenever my back was stiff and I was CONFIDENT about the diagnosis and knew I only had the symptom left to 'refute' I always did a lot of push-ups. Gets a lot of blood moving around and is a big middle finger to TMS.

@ JanAtheCPA Sarno only stopped using them because some people weren't 'getting it' and were having placebo responses to the better PT's. I'm fairly certain you are 'getting it' (LOL) and I think that's a great idea. BTW.... 50 lbs is a lot more than some of my peers can lift so Cheers!