New member

Hello everyone,
My name is Stephen, and i've just joined this site. I stumbled upon it whilst googling hoping to find some answers/ideas to help me with my pain. I do this quite often, especially when my symptoms are bad.
I'm going to keep this pretty short, as i've had two main areas of pain for so long now, if i tried to remember all my treatments and stuff, i'd be here all night. Plus, one of the problems is aggravated by typing.
Obviously i am very early in this process, as i've only just heard of TMS. I have ordered the book Mind body prescription i think its called from amazon, and i hope to have it by the end of the week. I really want to understand the principal behind this approach, as i've long suspected a psychological cause of my symptoms, added to the fact that none of the treatments i've had have touched them. No doubt in future weeks i will have a lot of questions to ask on this site. I've watched a few vids on youtube about it, and i kind of understand it, but for it to work, i realize that i need to TOTALLY understand it.
Well, thats it for now,
Thank you for reading.
Stephen.

 

Welcome to this site, Stephen. You'll find a lot of help both from the people and resources here.

You've made a good start by ordering the Mindbody Prescription by Sarno. There are lots of other books, online programs, and information about TMS-trained doctors and therapists.

Let us know how you're doing.

David.

 

Thank you David, i must admit i'm finding it all a bit overwhelming at the moment, as i'd never heard of TMS until yesterday. There is a lot to take in. One of my conditions i've had for 20 years, the other for about 8 years, so the idea that something could help me get rid of these after so long is in itself hard to comprehend.
Stephen.

 

Hi, Steve. Welcome to the TMS Club. This web site will be a big help to you, with postings from people with various pains who learn that they are caused by their emotions. I had severe back pain but healed after reading Dr. Sarno's Healing Back Pain and taking the Structured Educational Program, free in the subforum of this web site. It led me to discovering repressed emotions from my boyhood that came about when my parents divorced when I was seven.

Here is a recent posting from Kevin who tells that he healed 95 percent from pain after taking the SEProgram. He posted again a few days later that he was 100 percent pain-free.

Kevin healed 95 % from SEP


Welcome to the SEP and to the path of recovery. I am on my final two days of the program and I can say with complete confidence that I am a changed man. I started after 6 months of nasty low-back/butt/leg pain, could hardly walk, stand, etc. was in physical therapy, chiropractor, acupuncture, pain medications, etc.. the usual. My MRI showed 3 disk bulges/herniations touching nerves, so that is what I believe it to be....that is until I read Dr. Sarno and found this site.

I encourage you to really get involved, follow the instructions, do the journaling, take time to read all the suggested readings, and watch the videos. I'd say I'm 95% cured. There is still some very light lingering "annoyance", but I still have some work to do. I've been walking miles with hardly any pain these last few weeks. But even more, if the pain comes on now, it just doesn't bother me like it used to, I sorta just see it, acknowledge it, and go about my business. It took working the program to get to that point, but 6 weeks compared to 6 months is nothing! I made more progress in the first week than I did from two months of PT!!! It's going to challenge you and your "beliefs" in medicine, but you have nothing to lose. We generally wind up here when all else fails.

So give it a shot, especially before considering anything invasive like surgery. If you put the work in, you will get better. Have you read Dr. Sarno yet? I assume you have since you're here, but in case you haven't, definitely readHealing Back Pain. Again, it will challenge everything you've believed about your pain, and backs in general. You'll be encouraged to resume life as normal, i.e. stop ALL "therapies" (PT, chiro, etc.), stop taking medications, and most importantly, stop thinking STRUCTURAL problems are the cause of your pain and shift to psychological as the reason.....again, this can be difficult and takes some time to sink in, so be patient and kind to yourself.

It was a process for me. A few of the bigger moves in my case were: I ripped up and threw out my MRI test results (I found myself obsessively reading over them and comparing them to other results I could find on the web and even here on the TMSwiki site...); I got back to the gym and stopped using a weight belt; and I even cancelled an appointment I had made with aTMS doctorbecause it was more than a month away and it was hindering my recovery (that is, my 100% belief in TMS was lagging because I had this pending appointment, but as soon as I cancelled it, my recovery sped up significantly). Everyone's journey is unique to their situation, but I've found that really committing to the program and brining what I learn from it into my daily life has had profound results. Also, sharing along the way here in these forums has been extremely helpful - there's something about knowing that you're not alone in your TMS recovery that really helps. I encourage you to look through my past posts for some insight into my experience with SEP. Like I said, I'm just now finishing, tomorrow is my final day, and I feel like a changed person. It's amazing. And I feel as though it is something that one carries on with, not just like a one time 6 week thing and that's that...it has helped me to get to know myself and taught me tools to "deal" with my emotions. Learning and accepting TMS is a life changer for sure.

 

Thank you Walt,
Kevin's story is inspiring. Stories like these give one hope. Its early days for me, haven't even received the book yet, and i've had so many false dawns with my problems so naturally i'm still a bit unsure. But i'm determined to give it my all.
Stephen.

 

its hard to believe that so many years of pain can be reversed!

but many do it. see Sarnos full lecture on youtube