Chizzy
Peer Supporter
Hello, I have been following many people stories on this forum for quite some time now, but I never really had the urge and desire to post my experiences until now. I learned about TMS from Ezer who I came in contact with on the Pudendal Hope website. I'm thankful I do not visit that site anymore because to me it feels like people go there to give up /die.... My story, like many of yours, is very long so please be patient . In April 2014 I was on a bicycle ride in Coronado California and around mile 30 I felt a sharp burning pain in the left side of my pelvis and hip. This pain was not completely unbearable, but it did hurt like hell. Within a couple days the pain was in my entire pelvis and centered in my testicles. It always felt like I had to pee, and the pain got worse when I was sitting down. Two extremely stressful things were going on in my life at the time. My first child was born in March of 2014, and I was starting a new job as a Human Resources Analyst in April of 2014. Like Sarno says, I was in the responsibility stages of my life when this pain occurred. After one year of the pain being all over my pelvis, the pain solely concentrated on the inner left side of my groin behind my left testicle. That's where the pain still lives today, and it feels like a constant stinging and burning sensation (when its there). After the first year of being in constant pain, the pain now comes and goes. I can be in pain for five days, or I can be in pain for five minutes, and have no pain for a week. My flare-ups consistently come and go, where I have absolutely no pain for decent amounts of time, and then I might be in a flare up for 8 weeks straight. It is really quite odd. Here were the things I was diagnosed with to begin with:
- prostatitis, bacterial and non-bacterial. After being on medication for several months, I did not get better and I thought I was losing my mind so I stopped the medication.
- the diagnosis was changed to Interstitial cystitis as my pain never got better. They treated that with multiple bladder injections through a catheter, fun...
- CT scan of my pelvis said everything looked perfectly healthy.
- after about 150 doctor's appointments I started seeing a physical therapist in December of 2015. This is how I found out about the pudendal nerve, which led me to The Pudendal Hope website, more fun...
- diagnosed by dr. Sheldon Jordan in the spring of 2016 with pudendal neuralgia. He wanted to do nerve blocks, but through research, I made the decision to learn from others mistakes and not go the nerve block route. Still believe to this day one of the best decisions I ever made. To me Dr. Jordan seemed like he was making it up as he went along, very strange visit....
My childhood was very rough. I was recently diagnosed with complex PTSD and I am working with a trauma team at sharp for the next 12 weeks in an intense outpatient program. I could talk about my childhood for weeks, but here is what you need to know:
- I was mentally, emotionally, physically, and sexually abused throughout the ages of 4 and 18 years old (sexual abuse took place between 4 and 10).
- I was abandoned by my family multiple times as a child.
- I started using meth and alcohol at 13 years old. From 13 to 22 years old I was heavily addicted to drugs, and I was incarcerated off and on during that nine year period.
- since I was a child I have always had anxiety, mood swings, rage, shame, pain, thoughts of not being good enough and other emotional /mental symptoms. These are all causes of the environment I was subjected to. This is why I started self-medicating at 13 years old.
- on March 21st 2006 I got sober, and I celebrated 10 years sober on March 21st 2016. I worked very hard to get myself out of the life of a convict /addict into a healthy member of society with a great job in Human Resources.
During my doctor's visits starting with the first ones in April and May of 2014 they tried to feed me every narcotic in the book for my pain. Obviously, I've declined because I know that I will abuse anything that makes me feel different (I proved this point to myself later in my suffering). In the spring of 2016 I was feeling hopeless. By this time I had heard of the mind-body syndrome (thank you Ezer), but I wasn't sold yet. In May of 2016 my wife and her father stopped talking because of something that happened during her childhood. This caused major anxiety and my pain became crippling. I could no longer face it alone so I decided to get my medical marijuana card. On May 27th 2016 I started using marijuana and the first day my anxiety was so bad that I thought the pain was going to kill me. But after that first day between May 28th and October 16th kof 2016) I was pain-free. I stopped smoking weed on October 16 2016 because it became my life, as I knew it would, because I'm a recovering drug addict. As soon as I stopped smoking weed my pain came back and it was there for a couple weeks, even though I was in Hawaii on vacation when I quit. Like usual the symptoms would come and go, be gone for weeks then be back for weeks. After close to an 8-week flare up that started in January of 2017 I relapsed again on weed on March 15th 2017. The pain was gone immediately, and gone for the most part until I stoped using weed on June 15th 2017. Over the last 3 plus weeks, I would say I've been in pain half the time but it's manageable. When my pain comes on I begin to doubt the TMS, and it drives me into a frenzy. I haven't really done any of the TMS work other than trying to feel my emotions. I feel like when I'm able to feel my emotions and not think about them my pain goes away. After 15 years of no medication (SSRI's), I have agreed to take Celexa to try to help with some of the severe symptoms that I've had since childhood. Nightmares, constant anxiety, nausea in the morning, cold sweats, a gripping fear inside of me that feels like I'm going to be thrown away if I make a mistake. I am worried because the Celexa is making me feel a little bit Hollow. I'm not really feeling any emotion anymore and I really don't know what to do. On the flip side I do feel like the Celexa is helping me not get worked up about things so much, but I'm still glued to Google (anxiety) which I know is a terrible thing to do when TMSing. Here are some other experiences during my lifetime that I've been able to pinpoint that I think are other symptoms of my TMS:
- 4th Grade I started a new school (again) and I had severe pain in my quads and hamstrings. It was so bad that I couldn't run, and it hurt to walk. This lasted a couple weeks. My mom says it was growing pains, doubt it....
- I played Little League for several years, and the kids on my team were bullies, this made me nervous every season. I would get plantar fasciitis on both feet throughout baseball season during my little league years.
- when I was getting incarcerated, I had the worst IBS. This lasted several years. Basically, if I did not have access to a bathroom, and when you're incarcerated sometimes it's hours before you have access to a bathroom, I would instantly have diarrhea. This lasted several years. You guys do not want to know the stories that took place because of this disorder....
There is honestly so much more that I could talk about, I feel like I'm only scratching the surface here when it comes to my life and what I've been through. I have two children now, both of them are perfectly healthy and very happy. But something about the responsibility gives me fear and self-doubt. I know a lot of this is because of my PTSD from childhood, but I really want to tackle the pain, because I feel the pain controls my days and nights when it's there.
Does this sound like TMS? Does anyone have any advice for me? Should I stay on the Celexa? I am very happy that I'm finally reaching out, and I really need some advice. Thank you so much for your support.
- prostatitis, bacterial and non-bacterial. After being on medication for several months, I did not get better and I thought I was losing my mind so I stopped the medication.
- the diagnosis was changed to Interstitial cystitis as my pain never got better. They treated that with multiple bladder injections through a catheter, fun...
- CT scan of my pelvis said everything looked perfectly healthy.
- after about 150 doctor's appointments I started seeing a physical therapist in December of 2015. This is how I found out about the pudendal nerve, which led me to The Pudendal Hope website, more fun...
- diagnosed by dr. Sheldon Jordan in the spring of 2016 with pudendal neuralgia. He wanted to do nerve blocks, but through research, I made the decision to learn from others mistakes and not go the nerve block route. Still believe to this day one of the best decisions I ever made. To me Dr. Jordan seemed like he was making it up as he went along, very strange visit....
My childhood was very rough. I was recently diagnosed with complex PTSD and I am working with a trauma team at sharp for the next 12 weeks in an intense outpatient program. I could talk about my childhood for weeks, but here is what you need to know:
- I was mentally, emotionally, physically, and sexually abused throughout the ages of 4 and 18 years old (sexual abuse took place between 4 and 10).
- I was abandoned by my family multiple times as a child.
- I started using meth and alcohol at 13 years old. From 13 to 22 years old I was heavily addicted to drugs, and I was incarcerated off and on during that nine year period.
- since I was a child I have always had anxiety, mood swings, rage, shame, pain, thoughts of not being good enough and other emotional /mental symptoms. These are all causes of the environment I was subjected to. This is why I started self-medicating at 13 years old.
- on March 21st 2006 I got sober, and I celebrated 10 years sober on March 21st 2016. I worked very hard to get myself out of the life of a convict /addict into a healthy member of society with a great job in Human Resources.
During my doctor's visits starting with the first ones in April and May of 2014 they tried to feed me every narcotic in the book for my pain. Obviously, I've declined because I know that I will abuse anything that makes me feel different (I proved this point to myself later in my suffering). In the spring of 2016 I was feeling hopeless. By this time I had heard of the mind-body syndrome (thank you Ezer), but I wasn't sold yet. In May of 2016 my wife and her father stopped talking because of something that happened during her childhood. This caused major anxiety and my pain became crippling. I could no longer face it alone so I decided to get my medical marijuana card. On May 27th 2016 I started using marijuana and the first day my anxiety was so bad that I thought the pain was going to kill me. But after that first day between May 28th and October 16th kof 2016) I was pain-free. I stopped smoking weed on October 16 2016 because it became my life, as I knew it would, because I'm a recovering drug addict. As soon as I stopped smoking weed my pain came back and it was there for a couple weeks, even though I was in Hawaii on vacation when I quit. Like usual the symptoms would come and go, be gone for weeks then be back for weeks. After close to an 8-week flare up that started in January of 2017 I relapsed again on weed on March 15th 2017. The pain was gone immediately, and gone for the most part until I stoped using weed on June 15th 2017. Over the last 3 plus weeks, I would say I've been in pain half the time but it's manageable. When my pain comes on I begin to doubt the TMS, and it drives me into a frenzy. I haven't really done any of the TMS work other than trying to feel my emotions. I feel like when I'm able to feel my emotions and not think about them my pain goes away. After 15 years of no medication (SSRI's), I have agreed to take Celexa to try to help with some of the severe symptoms that I've had since childhood. Nightmares, constant anxiety, nausea in the morning, cold sweats, a gripping fear inside of me that feels like I'm going to be thrown away if I make a mistake. I am worried because the Celexa is making me feel a little bit Hollow. I'm not really feeling any emotion anymore and I really don't know what to do. On the flip side I do feel like the Celexa is helping me not get worked up about things so much, but I'm still glued to Google (anxiety) which I know is a terrible thing to do when TMSing. Here are some other experiences during my lifetime that I've been able to pinpoint that I think are other symptoms of my TMS:
- 4th Grade I started a new school (again) and I had severe pain in my quads and hamstrings. It was so bad that I couldn't run, and it hurt to walk. This lasted a couple weeks. My mom says it was growing pains, doubt it....
- I played Little League for several years, and the kids on my team were bullies, this made me nervous every season. I would get plantar fasciitis on both feet throughout baseball season during my little league years.
- when I was getting incarcerated, I had the worst IBS. This lasted several years. Basically, if I did not have access to a bathroom, and when you're incarcerated sometimes it's hours before you have access to a bathroom, I would instantly have diarrhea. This lasted several years. You guys do not want to know the stories that took place because of this disorder....
There is honestly so much more that I could talk about, I feel like I'm only scratching the surface here when it comes to my life and what I've been through. I have two children now, both of them are perfectly healthy and very happy. But something about the responsibility gives me fear and self-doubt. I know a lot of this is because of my PTSD from childhood, but I really want to tackle the pain, because I feel the pain controls my days and nights when it's there.
Does this sound like TMS? Does anyone have any advice for me? Should I stay on the Celexa? I am very happy that I'm finally reaching out, and I really need some advice. Thank you so much for your support.
