Day 8 My TMS treatment

[HPJM]

I found Sarno's book by complete chance. I googled something like 'is western medicine a failure' and found a forum post discussing Sarno's 'Healing Back Pain'. I downloaded the 'Mindbody Prescription' for my kindle, since I've never really had significant back pain, but had other pains.

I read it, then re-read it several times, making notes, making lists of my childhood experiences, my personality, and my current pressures. However, I found it hard to come up with a structured program, which isn't really mentioned in the book, so I looked around on the internet and found TMSwiki. I'm very grateful for the Structured Educational Program here.

"Are you having success at recognizing the emotions connected to your pain? If you have, how do these emotions make you feel? If not, what do you think is preventing you from doing this?"

I still have a lot of work to do with my emotional awareness. The tricky part for me is allowing myself to not only notice but feel the emotion: I had a bad habit of pushing them under the surface. But I'm improving, and I normally feel a release near my chest area and a lightness when I express them well.

A lot of the emotions are buried from years ago. I was bullied for quite a long time at school, and at the time I pushed the uncomfortable feelings under. There is a lot of anger, fear, sadness. These are strong feelings and so I think part of my problem with emotional recognition is being willing to accept the feelings are there and dealing with them.

 

[Walt Oleksy (RIP 2021)]

Hi, HP JM. Your report shows that you are doing the SEP very conscientiously by trying hard to feel the emotions that cause your TMS pain.
It isn't easy to relive those past memories. I had to do it and discovered a lot if not all of my repressed emotions had to do with feelings of insecurity when my parents divorced when I was seven. They reunited a year later but even that left me with doubts about the future. TMS journaling helped me to forgive them and also to realize that everyone lives with insecurities of one kind or another. The thing is to stay positive and in the moment, not to worry about the future. That isn't easy in these dreadful economic times, but that's my focus, with a positive feeling about the future.

Whatever agonies you relive about your past, feeling them helps to put them to rest and to go on with the future.

I found it helpful to write about my childhood and realize that it was not all insecurity but also a lot of fun. And since then, I've had a lot of fun and a wonderful and productive life as a writer, rich with family and friends. And dogs.

You are very fortunate that you learned about Dr. Sarno, TMS, and this web site. You are among very caring and helpful new friends.