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New here and trying to escape pain, obsession and despair

J

Jimmy Todd

Peer Supporter
Hi. I'm fifty seven, and I've always been active. Last year I went through, and continue to deal with, life changing events and consistent stress. A week after these events began I started having chronic pains I've never had in the past in my abs, back, neck, knees and glutes in addition to gastritis. I was was already taking medication for anxiety to which I seemed to be having side effects. The doctor gave me more and I begsin having nauseau and back pain got so bad I ended up in the ER. They gave me more medicine, I got even sicker abd wound up back in the ER. They misdiagmosed me and said I had intesuppsetion and recommended surgery. Subsequent doctors said that was wrong. The Cat Scans and xrays showed nothing except
con stipation and a cyst on my pancreas. I did have a colonoscopy and an MRI on my pancreas to screen for cancer,which I worried about for months. A nurse suggested all the meds they gave me were too much and making me sick. It turns out she was right. I've been to doctors, PT, accupuncture and go to the gym an average of five days a week. The doctors didn't find anything more serious than what required some PT. The MRI on my pancreas showed it was just a cyst, but also mild degeneration of the lower spine. I went to a pain management dr in December because I was still having pain. He noticed it showed a bulging disc, but said it was common and nothing about which to worry. He said most of my pains are from GI inflammation. It's been a crazy year because I'm obsessive about every pain, catastrophize about them and feel a sense of dispair. In the midst of this my mom, who had been seriously ill, died. Yesterday, my lower back became sore and heat is not working as it usually does. Every time I conquer one pain anothee one seems to arise out of nowhere. I feel like someone has a voodoo doll of me. I'm starting this program because I'm trying to escape this abyss of pain, obsession and despair. I think I may have TMS because all this started when these stressful events ocurred, and I fit the criteria in Alan Gordon's book The Way Out. I'll gratefully take any encouragement or advice and happily help anyone else if I can.
 
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Keep reading books on TMS. I recommend Sarno's books, but there are many others. And read Success Stories on this Forum, as they will keep you motivated and instill hope. Lastly, try one of the free daily structured programs available on this site. Since you read Alan Gordon's book you might want to try his program that has a link at the top of the page.

Recovery is possible. You are in the right place.
 
So great that you found your way here Jimmy! You're in the finest of company with so many others who have been where you are and share their wisdom generously.
Many of us are still trudging through the muck. Oh wait, i think that's just called life. Maintaining a decent, if wry, sense of humour most definitely helps!
Starting this program...do you mean the SEP? Great! Perfect place to start. May I just say go easy with it all and be kind to yourself as it's challenging...if you're doing it right ;)
Welcome!
 
Jimmy Todd said:
Thank you both so much for your words of encouragement. They are so greatly appreciated:)
Doing the program right is tricky. My obsessive,catastrophizing thoughts are a challenge to tame.
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Yeah it's a trap ;) doing it right...cue the obessive perfectionist hehehe!
@Baseball65 shared a great technique for obsessive thoughts... I think it's called the stop technique. Maybe have a search?
Claire Weekes audios or her book Help and Healing for Your Nerves?
 
Thank you,@ahri11 :) I will search for the stop technique.
I think the hardest part is getting my subconscious to accept the Mind-Body connection and not catastrophize
 
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https://www.tmswiki.org/forum/threads/could-tms-cause-ocd.20133/ (Could TMS cause OCD?)

I just posted this link because it wasn't on my own thread. I had to search ; Stop Therapy OCD. We actually discussed in on a few different threads.

From reading your brief Bio, I have had a similar experience to yours, though mine ended around '99 when I started using these techniques.
Jimmy Todd said:
Every time I conquer one pain anothee one seems to arise out of nowhere.
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Yep. There is a way out.
 
Thank you, @Baseball65!

Is the TMS program basically "thought replacement," in that if I have a pain I don't look react to it with catastrophizing thoughts, but rather tell myself that this pain is TMS and not to get worked up over it?
One of the ways I have coped with anxiety and depression is through exercise, which as been extremely helpful. When the pains started it interfered with my exercise, which increased my anxiety adding to this loop. I still exercise, but PT and doctors have given me so many stretches and warms up to do for the various pains, that I now spend an hour doing those. Those aren't necessarily bad, but I'd like to get back to a lot of the HIIT exercises that made me feel so good in the past.
 
Jimmy Todd said:
Thank you, @Baseball65!

Is the TMS program basically "thought replacement," in that if I have a pain I don't look react to it with catastrophic thoughts, but rather tell myself that this pain is TMS and not to get worked up over it?
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Alan Gordon's program is more similar to what you describe with how you are approaching things.

The SEP (you can go look at it and read some of it for yourself) is more similar (but yet, more involved) than Dr. Sarno's advice towards pain. It asks you to look at your stressors outside of your symptoms - because TMS thoughts and anxieties are generally more prevalent in your life than simply around symptoms and to think psychologically. To learn to feel and lean into the full breadth of your emotions and to notice how there will be patterns to things in your life that create "triggers" which spike your nervous system - through your thoughts and emotions about yourself within those patterns. You do this via journaling, and getting some insight into how your mind works. What has influenced you in your life and how you feel about that. The SEP will take you through these steps and much more. It also deals with mindset, personality traits and recognizing that your anxiety, stress and fear is most likely much more prevalent in your life that simply around your symptoms

Dr. Sarno suggests you both do the emotional work and get back to your regular life activities (for some of us that happens faster than others, but that's the end goal).
 
Jimmy Todd said:
Thank you, @Cactusflower.
This is helping me, as are the other responses. Today is a bit of challenge, as I feel as if I'm going crazy. I do appreciate the responses.
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You are challenging your per-concieved notions, things you thought were your beliefs, and the idea that things might not be how you previously perceived them. You are questioning what you consciously thought was truth...but you are here, and the reality is, you've been questioning it for awhile.
Treat yourself with kindness and compassion. These kinds of days will pass. The truth is that you are fine. Perfectly fine. You have some skills to learn that will only enhance your well being and help you recognize the fine, and well person you are.
 
Jimmy Todd said:
Is the TMS program basically "thought replacement,"
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No. I am sure some of that happens over time, But I'd say it's 'thought disinterest'.

"trying to escape pain, obsession and despair"...when you begin to learn that ALL of those are just going on between your ears, you start to lose interest in what your thoughts are...Complete inversion from every other therapy. I don't want new thoughts. I want to be free from thinking so I can be in the moment and alive.
New thoughts would be like being transferred from one penitentiary to another. I'd say by and large most of my thoughts impede my experience...even worse than words.

When I reach the point where I am no longer interested in what I have to offer me...than I am totally free, open and the pain goes away.
 
Thank you, @Cactusflower ! That was an awesome post to read first thing in the morning:)
@Baseball65, I'm intrigued by your definition. It makes a lot of sense, to get to the point where you are no longer interested in what your mind is telling you. That's a great goal.
 
As I begin my second week of the program I am becoming more mindful of my reactions to the pain and what is going on when it occurs. Saturday and Sunday I went from right scapular pain, to left scapular/tricep pain, to my left knee, then to my midback and now back to my left knee. The midback is particularly sensitive for me because that was the original pain that started me on this spiral. This morning I was feeling the midback again, kept telling myself that this is TMS and not to obsess or catastrophize. That discomfort became less of an issue and then the left knee was asking for my attention.

I am focusing on getting my mind to believe this is TMS and not to catastrophize. I'm trying:)
 
It's weird how one pain goes and another appears. My back pain is not something I am obsessing over so a soreness on top of my foot has come out of nowhere, and I have the urge to obsess and catastrophize about it. It's as if the mind knows I'm fighting this and is coming up with new strategies.
 
Jimmy Todd said:
It's weird how one pain goes and another appears. My back pain is not something I am obsessing over so a soreness on top of my foot has come out of nowhere, and I have the urge to obsess and catastrophize about it. It's as if the mind knows I'm fighting this and is coming up with new strategies.
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This is a GREAT sign! My TMS did (and occasionally still does) like to surprise me. Yes, your mind will try and keep you in a loop, but you are much stronger than that loop - you are so strong, you've endured the pain of TMS for some time, and you can endure the creativeness of your brain. Notice your habits of obsession, and catastrophic thinking, notice the creative processes of the body but most of all, notice how you are feeling emotionally. Look past the anxiety and into what is really going on, just for a second, a few times today.

This can happen quite a bit during the journey. Don't fall for the shtick!
 
Thank you, @Cactusflower:) I am looking at my emotions now more and trying to give them the attention instead of the pain. My TMS must know one fear I have is being helpless and abandoned so since I wouldn't obsess over my back, which stopped bothering me, it went to my foot and then back to my knee.
 
So.. for the pains I had last week, I used the program. The good news is that what would make me obsess and catastrophize did not and the pains subsided. My brain must be ready for battle because a couple of years ago I had tendonitis in my right forearm. I obsesses over that at the time. Well, it came back and seemingly out of nowhere because I was doing stuff as part of my workout my trainer gave me at the time to heal it and prevent it(wrist curls, stretches). Also, it popped up in my left arm. This is a challenge because it freaks me out, but I am using the program and the book Unlearn Your Pain to address it.

Coincidentally, I noticed I had a resistance to journaling when I started, and this affects my writing because it is sore when I write. Is a part of my mind manifesting this pain as a distraction to keep me from delving into stuff that comes up when I journal?

I am keeping in mind what @Cactusflower wrote that this is a great sign of my mind keeping me in this loop:)

I am icing the arm, but is that sending my brain the wrong signals?

I am so grateful to all the responses I have received because they really help:)
 
Jimmy Todd said:
Coincidentally, I noticed I had a resistance to journaling when I started, and this affects my writing because it is sore when I write. Is a part of my mind manifesting this pain as a distraction to keep me from delving into stuff that comes up when I journal?
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You betcha - this is 100% classic distraction/repression activity. Your brain senses stress when you think about journaling, and it responds the only way it knows how - which is to keep you in pain so that you stop whatever you're doing that is causing the stress response. It does this because the only thing it understands is from the primitive wilderness world where it evolved millenia ago, which is that stress only occurs if your life is being threatened.

Your job is to rationally talk back to your brain with patience and kindness, and assure it that you are quite safe.

Jimmy Todd said:
I am icing the arm, but is that sending my brain the wrong signals?
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"Before Sarno" I worked with an MD trained in cranio-sacral therapy, which is kind of a woo-woo laying on of hands thing. But he did teach me a valuable self-healing technique, which is to gently put my hand on the area of pain, and visualize the pain moving away and out of my body. In my case it was the A-O joint in the cervical (neck) vertebra which kept "going out" (it would, too - my husband could feel the lump when it happened, and it caused days of neck pain along with headaches). The MD suggested I could gently stroke my hand (not massage!) in the direction that the joint needed to go (back towards the center) while I did the visualization. I tried it at home the next time the joint went "out" and was causing pain, and it totally worked. I woke up the next day with no pain and no lump on my neck. I discovered Dr. Sarno shortly after, and never again had days of neck pain and headaches. I would say that there might be three times since 2011 when I've sensed tenderness and a bit of a lump in the area, and I've employed that method each time and it quickly went away each time.

Ice is for acute injury and does nothing for chronic pain. It's comforting, but if you don't mind taking an ibuprofen now and again, I feel like that's a better way to take the edge off of a chronic pain flare or setback, because you can assume that the pain will abate, allowing you to quickly return to what you were doing (journaling, perhaps!) instead of wasting time babysitting and obsessing over your ice pack.

The key is to remember that neither ice nor ibuprofen is a cure - it is a temporary tool - again, to take the edge off. Your long-term goal is to convince your fearful brain that you don't need the distraction to begin with. This gets easier and quicker with time and practice.
 
Thank you @JanAtheCPA :)
I did my workout yesterday which involved chin-ups and bench presses. I told my trainer about the arm pain before I started. He said it looks more like muscle tightness since it waan't in the elbows. I did the stretches he recommended, and that night and this morning gelt much better. I was thinking about what he said about the elbows, and now I'm starting to feel it in my elbow. My goal is not to obsess over that and not let doubts take hold:)
Interestingly, in addition to a very stressful text I had to send, I remembered/dreamed last night about a memory from my youth that was degrading and anger inducing.
 
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