• Alan has completed the new Pain Recovery Program. To read or share it, use this updated link: https://www.tmswiki.org/forum/painrecovery/
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New and excited to learn

S

Suzeej616

New Member
Hi everyone! Thank you so much for creating this page to help eachother! You are wonderful and I am looking forward to the day that I can help someone! I am open to any ways you connect with eachother. Is it only on here? Do we email or call eachother?? I just read Dr. Sarnos books and am excited to get started towards a pain free life! I have some questions though for you (the experts) :) Can it work after 3 back surgeries, lots of scar tissue, 24/7 pain for 12 years now and lots of pain meds? If there IS hope for me...what do you do or say to retrain your brain? I work full time but have been off for 3weeks due to a breakdown from high blood pressure, stress, pain and just life being too much to handle as a single woman. Can it be done when your days are filled with a job? Thank you so much for reading this and helping!
 
A good place to start is by following the exercises given in the Structured Education Program (SEP) available from the list of topics on the left-hand side of the first page in the TMS Wiki. You can also log onto the chat group that meets online each Saturday (check for the exact time in your local time zone). I found listening to Dr. Howard Schubiner's video lectures, which are available on YouTube if you do a search, provide a pretty good summary of TMS theory. The Wiki also has quite a few videos too. There are just so many resources available to you here I don't think I can list them all! I'm sure there will be others chiming in with more specific advice. And to answer your question about whether you can reprogram your conditioned pain pathways? Of course you can! Sounds as though you've already been checked out for any pre-existing medical conditions. So, if what you have is really TMS, those back operations were basically useless surgical procedures that did nothing to undo your TMS programming. If it really is TMS, what you have to do to reverse it is to start thinking differently about your pain and not go looking for physical causes such as a herniated disk or a so-called 'pinched nerve'. As a necessary first step toward your recovery you have to start thinking psychological, rather than physical; that is, recognizing the existence of unconscious emotions that are causing your TMS symptoms. It's not so important that you identify what those emotions are and what caused them exactly, but you must get an intuitive handle on the way the process of repression is working in you and making mischief by causing TMS pain.
 
Thank you MorComm for your thoughts and ideas! I will be sure to check out the SEP! Now is scar tissue the same as chronic pain that can disappear? Or does it stay due to surgeries? Also, thank you for the suggestions but do you, or does anyone) have certain affirmations they say 20 times a day or I can tape them around the house?
 
Hi Suzee and Welcome to the Peer Network,

In addition to what MorComm said, you may also want to check out the Webinar this Saturday with TMS practitioner Peter Zafirides. It will be a great way to learn more about TMS and how to recover. There is a list of Dr. Sarno's Daily Reminders on the page, So You Think You Might Have TMS. Reading that page is a great place to start out, along with going through the SEP. Also check out some of the threads about affirmations.

If you have any questions at all feel free to ask.

Forest
 
Now is scar tissue the same as chronic pain that can disappear?
Click to expand...

I believe that if you look into it further that there is no necessary correlation between "scar tissue" and lower lumbar pain (although some will tell you there is, especially, if, after back surgery, the patient's pain persists.) People have heart surgery and abdominal surgery all the time and no one ever suggests that they have persistent pain afterwards in those areas due to "scar tissue". I think the idea behind this (mis) diagnosis is that the scar tissue that formed after the operation is now placing the same pressure on the nerves between L3/L4/L5/S1/S2 that the bulging or herniated disks used to do pre-surgery. Well, some (but certainly not all) back surgeons would question whether that is anatomically possible. Dr. Sarno and Dr. Sopher would both retort that it's impossible for soft scar tissue to impinge on soft nerve tissue and produce pain in the first place. As Dr. Sarno points out, if a nerve is compressed for over three days, although there may be some pain to begin with, after that time this will result is nerve numbness. I'm certainly not a qualified MD, but I would suggest tentatively, of course, that there is no relation whatsoever between the scar tissue from you three back operations, Suzee, and your continuing pain symptoms even though some people might say there is. In answer to your question, then, you can get rid of your pain even after the buildup of scar tissue in the lower lumbar region due to your surgeries simply because scar tissue per se does not result in pain. Of course, there may be something else involved, but it certainly isn't due to scar tissue.
 
Suzee, there is ABSOLUTELY HOPE that you can be pain-free. Keep reading so the new information sinks in!
 
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