Testimony to baby steps

[Diana-M]

Hi everyone,

Been off the forum for a few weeks and I’m starting to get into the groove of mentally pretending I don’t have TMS (which is kind of a trick, because I can’t really do anything normally at the moment.) But… I can live life with a hearty degree of hope and optimism, now. Which is a far cry from a year ago.

I’m making infinitesimally small forward progress—mainly through carefully balancing safe baby steps against pushing myself a little bit each day. I’m able to find the sweet spot (usually) that doesn’t trigger more pain.

I’m up to 45 cumulative minutes of exercise per day, from being a total couch potato a year ago.

I’m also productive. Yay! I clean things and sort things as I’m able. (We’re getting our house in order.) I do a lot of cooking prep while seated at the kitchen table. And I look for new good recipes, which we really needed. Once I started feeling more useful, life got a whole lot better.

I discovered that I really like meditating to Gregorian chant. Who knew?! My entire nervous system is slowly quieting. Meditation is key for self-soothing, in my opinion. You just have to slow your big ole crazy engine down.

My journey is unfolding. I’m trying to take things as they come. Expectations can kill you. Every time I set an arbitrary deadline in my mind for achieving some next step, I feel stressed. It’s unrealistic. It’s best to just accept life for what it is and keep adding very small steps toward my goals. That way I can sneak under the radar of my over-protective brain.

It’s good to have an over-arching philosophy to life that lends some kind of meaning to your suffering and growth. For me, that’s helped a lot.

After a brutal and unusually cold winter where I live, spring has arrived overnight, it seems. Now I can get outside on my deck and commune with nature! This will be a big boost.

Thanks to everyone on this forum. I’ve learned SO much from you!

To those who are afraid and tired. You are going to make it. If you don’t give up, there’s always hope.

 

[Rabscuttle]

Yay Diana! been looking forward to an update from you. So many pieces of this resonate with me, thank you for sharing.

 

[Diana-M]

Yay Diana! been looking forward to an update from you. So many pieces of this resonate with me, thank you for sharing.

That’s great, Rabscuttle! Are you making progress?

 

[Rabscuttle]

That’s great, Rabscuttle! Are you making progress?

I'm doing really well. Everything trending in the right direction. I still have some low moments. I actually hit a real bad rock bottom early January and have since made the most progress, more-so in 2 months than the past year. Spiritual based Meditation has helped me so much, I needed something to counter the nihilism that infected my life for so long. All symptoms are lowering, many are gone, flares don’t last nearly as long, I still have moments of doubt but snap out way quicker. Still working on cementing the big mental shifts of being kinder to myself, consistent positive self talk, I still find issue with getting stuck in routine and losing sight of how far I’ve come in a year. Like when I resume an activity there’s so much positivity and uplifting but once it becomes the norm I stop building myself up. As a whole I’m a much better friend to myself but it’s going to take a bit of time for my brain and nervous system to fully trust me again. 30 years of dysfunction isn’t being undone in a year, as much as I wish otherwise.

wishing for your continued success, you deserve it.

 

[Diana-M]

We are definitely on the same growth curve. I feel everything you said. Still hit some major lows, but very short-lived. Still struggling to love myself. Sometimes I think when I finally learn to do that, I’ll be better! I’m cheering for you! so glad to hear you’re making progress!

 

[Rusty Red]

Big hugs, friend, glad to see you!

 

[Mani]

It’s impossible to lose with dedication like yours. Keep us posted

 

[Cactusflower]

I absolutely relate to what you wrote, @Diana-M
Your over-arching philosophy is essential when one experiences a myriad of challenges, especially with times of increased or changed symptoms. I have decided that words like "relapse" etc. are just to negative and indicate backwards movement over growth patterns we simply were not expecting.
I'm in the middle of one of those growth periods but am able to deal with multiple things that used to add more challenge to the "growth" Lol (increase or change symptoms). Graded exposure can really work wonders in so many areas of our life...and nothing like then piling them all on at once to see how much faith I have in the fact that these are periods of growth and not simply what we often call "triggers". In essence, I have a LOT of external stressors right now, but there are only so many balls one can juggle. Learning to balance how I feel and respond to all of these factors has made a huge difference in how my body feels about them.

 

[Diana-M]

Learning to balance how I feel and respond to all of these factors has made a huge difference in how my body feels about them.

You are the master at this, Cactus! Thank you so much for showing us all the way. Good luck with your recent “growth” phase. Slowly we become tempered steel.

 

[Joulegirl]

It's sooooo good to hear from you! I'm glad you are heading in a positive direction! Keep up the good work and keep living life!