Reading The Divided Mind and Feeling Sick

Hi everyone,

Reading The Divided Mind (fantastic book) I realised what I thought was anxiety all these years was repressed anger. I made a whole list of times I was anxious and it was actually times I was angry, felt inferior, couldn't speak up, it was not fright.

Today my TMS pain is worse. The more I write down the events and emotions and people I'm angry at the pain is intense. The book said to expect that but my question is what do I do? I have rage towards people. People who I don't even have contact with anymore but I am MAD AS HELL AT. I feel like driving to their house and hurting them. I Wouldn't, but it's that kind of energy.

How do I get rid of this? Like I said the pain is worse. I've been crying and hitting things (not people!) and is that it?? Why do I still have the pain then? I also feel absolutely exhausted. It's like my body is saying stop writing, stop thinking, you're too tired for this, but I suspect it's just another attempt by my body to distract me from the repressed memories.

But now that I've identified what made me angry and what limits my life today because I've lost so much confidence and I'm in pain... What do I do?

Thanks for reading

 

Hi Sloane

I so can relate to this and after all this time I had hoped to get past this cycle of rumination and rage myself. I went through a stage where I thought I had cracked it but then wham, life happened and I reverted back to my old ways. It can't be said enough that hanging on to this crap is like ingesting poison, hoping the other person will die.

I haven't read that particular Sarno book but from his other ones he does say that our pain comes from repressed rage. The anger that we feel day to day is just the tip of a very tall volcano. To unearth those primitive feelings would be equivalent to the volcano erupting, leaving death and destruction in it's wake. Because it isn't civilised or legal, we don't go around pulverising others so we suppress those feelings and urges which in turn creates pain. Recognising and acknowledging that you, no we, have these feelings is the first step to letting them go. Yes, it does create more pain because we are dragging ourselves back and forth over and over the same rut.

How do we break the cycle? I personally have found that guided meditation helps as well as pulling my focus away from evil thoughts and pain to an activity that I enjoy. If the pain gets excruciating, I take a pain reliever and then go do what I can.

What have you lost confidence in - yourself, your ability to heal? We all have the capacity to heal from TMS. It just takes some of us much longer than others. It doesn't mean we will never get better, always be stuck. I would suggest that you don't try too hard to heal. Perhaps limit your time to read, journal and contemplate it all and get back to living the life you want to live. If that's an impossibility for now for any reason, visualise that life in your mind.

 

Thank you so much for your reply, it really helps me cope with this.

Since making the post, it's gotten better over the past few days. I've learned that recognising I have rage doesn't mean go and express it. Its becoming aware of it as you said and letting it go. I no longer feel it's just festering in the background. The book filled in the gaps for me, because i didn't think I got angry often but when I DO get angry it's explosive. It's always something the other person doesn't see coming because the rage is not proportional to the event that triggered it. The "last straw."

I have had severe anxiety and realized the anxiety was triggered by anger i couldn't express. Something as simple as saying yes when I wanted to say no and the anger came from the feeling I was being pressured.

My symptoms aren't just pain- it's fatigue, odd pressure in the chest, head, things I am still half-convinced are undiagnosed and I still drive myself crazy thinking I need more tests and that creates even more tension. The symptom switching drives me insane, it's so exhausting. Yesterday was jaw pain, today I have chest pressure. Even as I type this out the chest pressure is worsening because I just remembered its there!

What has helped with that is when I get a sensation I write down my thoughts and feelings to get them OUT and also to acknowledge there's emotions the sensation is masking. Then I make a cosncious effort to relax, be nice to myself, do something enjoyable, watch a comedy.

I haven't ignored my feelings that way--- I've admitted the thoughts and feelings to myself when I write it out and I feel like it's not getting bottled up. Previously I would just start having a panic attack. There was no stopping to consider the facts: I am depressed and worried about life. It's made so much difference to admit that to myself. I don't pressure myself to write long essays or anything--- one line acknowledging the thoughts I'm having has been enough to help the symptoms.

Sometimes writing it out HAS really intensified the sensation but I see it as my body just really trying to protect me from going there. But I go there and feel better for it.

This whole thing has taught me it's OK to say no and put my needs first when something doesn't feel right. I never really believed that before.

Thanks again, I appreciate it

 

You get it! Well written, if you're not a writer you could be one.