Strategies for getting support from skeptical family for TMS approach?

[BaxterBean]

hi - Having recently gone through a really severe flare-up of TMS back pain, I'm reinvigorating and expanding my TMS management strategies (including joining this Forum!) and feel confident that this approach will bring me to a good place. Unfortunately, my husband is pretty skeptical of the whole idea and keeps pushing me to pursue mainstream approaches. I understand where he's coming from. First, he's an engineer sort so his training and tendency is to "think physical/mechanical". Secondly, he just had to watch me go through absolutely horrible and scary levels of pain, when he felt helpless to do anything - I know that was awful for him and he doesn't want me (or him) to have to go through that again.

My question is: Has anyone found any effective strategies for communicating with skeptical partners, family members or friends about the TMS diagnosis? I know my husband won't take the time to read one of the seminal books (Sarno, Schubiner, etc) so I've thought about giving him a brief "Cliff Notes" version but not sure that will do the job. I'm at an early stage in my recovery and concerned that forceful skepticism from him could derail my progress.

 

[Cactusflower]

My strategy was to simply explain that the mind and body are one and not separate as science used to think. That was it.
I then stopped talking about ALL symptoms. It was very difficult with my mother in particular who did not at all understand and was actually totally fearful of the TMS concept because the idea of it would make her think about her own emotions.
I did not ask my husband to read any books, study any material etc. at all however, over time he himself has put much of the work into practice as he's seen me do it for myself. He just does it in his own way and I leave him to it.
If you think your husband or anyone else will derail your progress you need to step back and take a look to gain a better understanding of the work. Other people may influence your triggers but they are YOUR triggers. This is the work you do: you learn to become less reactionary to those triggers. The reaction is what influences your nervous system and thoughts. When you learn to respond to the trigger (which is kind of an immediate knee jerk reaction which is natural) which means a few seconds after it happens you can be gentle with the fact it happens and (you will over time) learn to manage your thoughts around it most of the time. Usually the thoughts are fear thoughts to the sensation or experiencing the emotion. This concept is still a lot for someone at the beginning so don't sweat it - this happens over time, and if you do the work, it kind of happens naturally.
Basically your triggers have NOTHING at all to do with other people, and you'll have to learn this and teach your brain this over time. As you do the work you most likely will experience the situation where things people say or do are annoying, aggravating, and even contribute to anger, rage an resentment. You can't avoid this - you can FEEL these emotions and you can learn to create boundaries for yourself which you then work on maintaining with others through open communication.

You don't talk about your symptoms (I do, in short and basic non-detailed manner on rare occasions with my husband, and my PT but always consider my stress/anxiety in the equation) and you ask that your significant others don't ask about it either. My husband STILL asks almost daily "how are you feeling" and I know it is always about symptoms (which is annoying, so I feel that annoyance) and then respond by saying things like "I'm doing OK today" or "I'll get by" (on particularly rough days it might be "I'm feeling it!") or "GOOD!, thank-you" ... How are you feeling and if he answers things like "Stiff after my run" I will ask him if he was able to "get into the zone " (his form of meditation while running) or if things are going OK for him otherwise (hinting at emotions or stress). Basically I fake it until I make it and very casually teach my husband about the mind/body connection in a way that would resonate with him.

My husband is a technical problem solver who's career involves overthinking minutia. He's also works at a high level in his company overseeing other offices and people in charge of their departments. So I deal with him constantly thinking he has to be in charge, is always right (this is a HUGE trigger for me), and did not like to talk about emotions (he wasn't raised to get into those kinds of feelings) - so boundary making was the most effective way to manage my own feelings around the situation. Sometimes he makes me really angry: I feel it and I tell him I'm angry. Sometimes I just gently leave the situation (even if I am angry, because it's my boundary to keep, not mine to force him to keep). Over time we just don't talk about it much.

Last night I did explain I am having those moving symptoms (and some that stick around for awhile) and just to please go with the flow. I remind him that there is nothing he can do, nothing he can control and I'm fine - I just feel things.

 

[Adam Coloretti (coach)]

hi - Having recently gone through a really severe flare-up of TMS back pain, I'm reinvigorating and expanding my TMS management strategies (including joining this Forum!) and feel confident that this approach will bring me to a good place. Unfortunately, my husband is pretty skeptical of the whole idea and keeps pushing me to pursue mainstream approaches. I understand where he's coming from. First, he's an engineer sort so his training and tendency is to "think physical/mechanical". Secondly, he just had to watch me go through absolutely horrible and scary levels of pain, when he felt helpless to do anything - I know that was awful for him and he doesn't want me (or him) to have to go through that again.

My question is: Has anyone found any effective strategies for communicating with skeptical partners, family members or friends about the TMS diagnosis? I know my husband won't take the time to read one of the seminal books (Sarno, Schubiner, etc) so I've thought about giving him a brief "Cliff Notes" version but not sure that will do the job. I'm at an early stage in my recovery and concerned that forceful skepticism from him could derail my progress.

It's tough! I agree with CactusFlower in that often you can only do what you can do - and it will be like banging your head against the wall trying to get some people onside with this sort of work. It's nice to have for sure, but you don't necessarily need those around you to be on board to recover.

The thing is (and I have an analytical brain as well) that once you understand this work it actually makes a lot of logical sense. Dr Sarno puts it as such too, so if your husband could even just read The Mindbody Prescription as an example (which is a very easy read - he doesn't even need to read the parts in the middle that discuss specific body parts, just the beginning and the end), I'd be surprised if it didn't make logical sense to him.

You could challenge him logically and ask him whether he believes stress can cause a headache. 99% of people would say yes. You could then clearly show that emotions cause physiological changes by referencing crying or blushing. If the body is capable of reacting to such stimulus in the short term, then why would it not be able to do so chronically? It makes more logical sense than not that it would be able to happen chronically if it can happen in the short term. If someone is in a chronic state of stress, then naturally it can be chronic as the fuel that led to it happening acutely (the stress) has never been turned off. Stress has been scientifically proven beyond a shadow of a doubt too to cause inflammation - it's illogical to be of the belief that stress can't cause illness based on the research (all medical professionals agree, they just struggle to believe that something is 100% caused by it).

As it relates to pain/other symptoms and them being felt in an area of the body that has no structural issue (e.g. you have a bulging disc but it's not causing the pain, how could that be he might ask). I'd ask him to explain phantom limb pain (assuming he believes in that) without that explanation confirming that the brain can send pain in the absence of tissue damage (the limb isn't even there!).

Whether he reacts to that or just gets defensive that's another matter, but we only think TMS isn't logical because we've been told otherwise by the medical model and haven't bothered to actually think about it thoroughly ourselves. Once we do, it's pretty hard to argue against at least the possibility of it occurring (whether the individual has it or not)

 

[BloodMoon]

It's tough! I agree with CactusFlower in that often you can only do what you can do - and it will be like banging your head against the wall trying to get some people onside with this sort of work. It's nice to have for sure, but you don't necessarily need those around you to be on board to recover.

Totally agree with Adam — it's tough, but you don't need everyone on board to heal. You can only do what you can do, and banging your head against the wall won't help!

Your husband might click more with Alan Gordon's take: chronic pain from the brain's learned neuroplastic overprotection — mistaking safe sensations for threats. That's less "Freudian" than Sarno's idea of buried emotions causing symptoms to keep rage suppressed (for survival).

Check out the Boulder Back Pain Study — Gordon's Pain Reprocessing Therapy slashed pain by ~66% for many, with brain changes on fMRI! mytmsjourney link Good for skeptics, although skeptics, of course, are liable to criticise and pull anything apart. (I reckon repressed and suppressed emotions and neuroplastic over protection can play a role both at the same time, but imo best to keep it simple, at least at first.)

Love this UK NHS booklet too — straightforward "hardware/software" analogy for when your brain says "no" to stress. No emphasis on buried emotions. It's by Prof. Michael Hyland (recovered from ME/CFS himself) and Anthony Davies (20+ years treating fibromyalgia). NHS link

I get the concern about skepticism derailing you — most of us have been there. But TMS/mind-body recovery often means setting boundaries, not people-pleasing. It's your body, your mind, your path. If loved ones push and expect you to take more meds, risk surgery/injections (or whatever) yet they won't even read a TMS/mind-body book... well, that says it all really. Stay strong — you've got this!

 

[Adam Coloretti (coach)]

Your husband might click more with Alan Gordon's take: chronic pain from the brain's learned neuroplastic overprotection — mistaking safe sensations for threats. That's less "Freudian" than Sarno's idea of buried emotions causing symptoms to keep rage suppressed (for survival).

Check out the Boulder Back Pain Study — Gordon's Pain Reprocessing Therapy slashed pain by ~66% for many, with brain changes on fMRI! mytmsjourney link Good for skeptics, although skeptics, of course, are liable to criticise and pull anything apart. (I reckon repressed and suppressed emotions and neuroplastic over protection can play a role both at the same time, but imo best to keep it simple, at least at first.)

Spot on!