Day 18 Prevalent emotions

Take a look at your journal entries. What emotions are most prevalent?

I would say fear and anxiety. Fear of everything. Of being bullied, about loved ones, of not being liked, of my future, of not being in control. And fear is one of my main TMS symptoms. I’ve suffered from other anxieties like social anxiety and OCD in the past, and have had anxiety of one sort or another since I was young. So that is my biggest challenge.

I’ve realised that my hayfever, normally terrible, has diminished to the point of almost disappearing this summer. Nothing else has changed apart from my knowledge of TMS, and one or two of my family who didn’t have it before have even started developing hayfever.

 

Hi HPJM,
I am wondering if you had read from Dr. Schubiner or others that anxiety and OCD are pain equivalents? If not, it may be helpful to alter your understanding of those conditions. When I read about pain equivalents, it helped me understand a lot of things I had not previously realized. I personally view fear as a separate animal. I would see fear as an emotion that fuels TMS, but the anxiety and OCD in the same class as pain and other TMS symptoms. In other words, anxiety and OCD are used just like pain to distract you from your emotions. Give this some thought and let me know if it helps. Good luck! Sunny

 

It's a subtle distinction, HP - and some years ago we had a lot of discussion about anxiety and TMS - which came first, is anxiety TMS, etc - but I think these days we pretty much agree, as Sunny said, that anxiety, along with OCD, are TMS equivalents.

So if we're looking for emotions, are we looking at fear? Sure - I'm willing to buy that fear is an emotion. A really shallow one. I don't look at fear anymore, I move right on past it and go deeper, because I believe that fear is used to cover up the real stuff, the deep stuff.

For example, before I discovered Dr. Sarno, at age 60, I was in really bad shape, with a ton of anxiety and fear taking hold of my life. One huge fear was of getting old and decrepit and my physical and neuro symptoms were contributing to a sense of despair. I started reading The Divided Mind, got through the first four chapters by Dr. Sarno, and knew that I had full-blown TMS. But I wasn't sure where my rage was - I didn't have any obvious past history of abuse or trauma or dysfunction to point to. In a subsequent chapter by another doctor, I read that fear of getting old was (no surprise) a stand-in for the fear of dying - but that the true, deep emotion is actually rage at getting old and having to face death. And there it was. I felt it immediately, I knew that I did have rage - anger and rage at the unfairness of a universe that gives us life and awareness and then makes us get old and decrepit, with the full knowledge and awareness of death.

What you want to do is look at your fears and explore what they are covering up. For instance, you might examine what is in your past that resulted in you being bullied? Are you angry about that? If you're not, why not? Shouldn't you be? Isn't there someone who should have protected you, or taught you, or done something to help you? That's just an example of how to go deeper and ask yourself questions that are beyond the obvious fear itself.

That's what we're talking about here. You have to be totally honest, take the plunge, and go deep.

Best of luck, HP - sounds like you're making progress, that's good news about your hay fever (I had the same experience) and an interesting observation about your family! Keep posting and keep us posted.

Jan

 

Thanks Sunny, I've had anxiety for so long this often slips my mind.

 

Thanks for this reply Jan. You are right, there might be something deeper. As I said to Sunny, I've had fear for so long it feels like the fear is deep and the fear causes other fears. But there is in all likelihood some rage behind the fear.

 

I sat F--- to fear and breathe deeply and tell myself "I an do anything I set my mind to do." And "Nothing really bad is going to happen."

Fear is a bogey man that doesn't exist. Laugh at fear and it will go away. Distract yourself with things that make you feel good or happy.

 

Jan,

Once you discovered the realization - rage at aging & death - was that enough? Did it stop your pain? Or did you have to go deeper yet and resolve those feelings?

My pain started after a stressful time of life - my two daughters got married a month apart - right after the weddings, I suddenly had plantar fasciitis. My youngest, a boy, began his senior soccer season by breaking his foot - which broke my heart (and I knew at the time was an over-reaction, but it's how I felt). During December, all of a sudden - frozen shoulder, but the foot is not so bad. In the spring, we had to put my 15 year old lab to sleep. We got a new puppy. The shoulder got better, but the foot pain returned with vengeance. All of a sudden, in the spring as we were preparing for our son's graduation - my husband decides we should sell our house of 22 years and buy a new one....never mind that I can't walk, there's a lot to do with graduation...blah, blah, blah. The following December (yes, I tend to get stressed with the busyness of Christmas!) I was driving and remember this thought clearly "hey, no more foot pain, it's finally over! But, I think I pulled my hamstring....". Well that hamstring pull turned into severe lower back and sciatic pain. I was facing an empty nest and my health, generally always very good, was rapidly declining. Never mind all the time & money I was spending on both traditional and non-traditional medicine to find relief. I recognize, and think I have dealt with the anger, sadness & frustration of the events I've described. However, my pain, while improved, is still present - and I know the fear of it makes it worse - but I can't figure out how to eliminate it! Like you, other than that period of time, I can't come up with obvious past history of trauma, abuse, etc. Honestly, I feel my life has been pretty charmed. So, your post caught my eye.

I would appreciate any thoughts you (or anyone else!) have - Thank you!!!

 

Hi LindaStu and others watching this thread,

I really like the question you asked Jan - was her realization of rage enough to stop the pain? Or, did she need to go deeper or do something else to resolve the issue and pain. I can access strong emotions, connect them to life events, etc., but I am not always sure where to take it once I do. Of course, I can just sit with emotion, feel, watch it, dialogue with it, etc. But, sometimes it seems like the feelings I access just get stuck as opposed to getting resolved. For example, I might access some anger I didn't even know I had, and then just feel angry for a few days. That often feels like being stuck on an emotion, although maybe the point of feeling is to just feel it as long as it takes. I'd really like to know what others do to actually release strong emotions once you succeed in accessing them. Thanks in advance for sharing! Sunny

 

I don't worry about either releasing or resolving my emotions, because I don't think that's necessary, and I think that Dr. Sarno basically says the same thing.

Remember, the pain (or other symptom) is caused by your brain using its power to create any physical sensation as a distraction, because it thinks that you will die or something terrible will happen if you become conscious of a negative emotion. This is a very primitive mechanism that had something to do with survival in a primitive world, but it doesn't work in today's world. Physiologically we are still very primitive beings, so this is the mechanism we have to work with, as nonsensical as it is.

The goal in this work is to become conscious of the negative emotions so that your brain gives up trying to repress them. It's the repression that's giving you pain - not the emotions themselves. Let me say that again: it's the repression that is causing the symptoms, not the emotions.

Accepting the emotions, in all their ugliness, and acknowledging that you are a perfectly fine human being even with those emotions, is the real key to recovery. That's why we so often bring up the need for self-acceptance and self-love, because we are so good at beating ourselves up, and that is a big roadblock to recovery.

All kinds of emotions can be repressed: they don't have to be old ones, and they don't even have to be very deep. I keep referring to my post on the Success Stories subforum, because it's the best example I have, of how some new and not very earth-shattering emotions were repressed just enough, over a short period of time, to cause a really painful and scary TMS incident. And I was able to completely banish it in less than 30 minutes, using the techniques I developed by doing this work. I can assure you that three years prior, that incident would have gone on for hours and left me fragile the entire next day.

The power within your own brain is absolutely phenomenal, but the hard part is finding the switch so that you can change your mind about what is going on.

TMS is here to stay because it's part of the human psyche, but some of us suffer more than others. A few people will recover completely and it will never bother them again. But most of us who land here need to find a completely different way of living with TMS, and figure out what works for us in order to deal with our symptoms when they reappear, or when new ones appear. Because as long as you are alive and residing in this imperfect world with all of the other imperfect people that you have to live with, they will, as both of you have already noted!

~Jan

 

PS - I never answered LindaStu's particular question, which is Yes - as I recall, a huge % of my symptoms disappeared or were significantly diminished the immediately after I read The Divided Mind in September 2011. Just about four years ago. I kept
doing the work" (the SEP, more books, my favorites are listed on my profile page) and I would say that most of the time I'm at about 90% compared to the physical and mental disaster I had become in 2011, "Before Sarno".

I may never reach 100% for the reasons I just wrote above, but I don't really care. I consider 90% to be a success.

 

Jan,
Thank you so much for your thoughtful response. I looked at your success story, and really liked your "Knowledge, Belief & Faith" statements. I appreciate your sharing information and encouragement! I actually first read your post late Friday evening, and have had a really good weekend - When I finish the SEP, I'll be looking again at the other resources you used! Thanks again for all you do on here to help others.

 

Hi, LindaStu. I am trying to come to peace with aging and death too. I'm 85 so it is about time to give some thought to "the end game."
God has blessed me all my life with good health, loving family, friends, and dogs. I can only pray for a peaceful end. But I would still like to see my 100th birthday! As Woody Allen said, "I don't mind dying. I just don't want to be there when it happens."

To take no chances, I'm going to take out a 10-year subscription to TV Guide.

 

Thanks, Walt! You make me laugh, which we both know, is wonderful medicine!!!

 

Thanks, LindaStu. If I didn't laugh, I'd be a wreck. I

 

darn computer, runs away with itself.

I really love the blooper videos on Youtube of the Carol Burnett show. I get a lot of laughs from them.