TMS Flare

[Grateful17]

Just wanted some advice. Since learning 3 months ago that I have TMS, some of my symptoms have gotten better and I began exercising 3 to 4 days per week. I am thrilled to be doing that. I am working once a week with a TMS therapist and I really like our sessions.

We uncovered something BIG in our last session a few days ago and now I am in a TMS pain Flare. Maybe an Extinction Burst ????? I know it will pass and that I need to practice True Indifference. I will keep my plans to attend a Birthday Party for my sister Saturday.

If I skip my routine exercises tomorrow, is this playing into the TMS ?? or is it OK to lay off exercise while the pain is much higher than it usually is.

 

[mike2014]

Just wanted some advice. Since learning 3 months ago that I have TMS, some of my symptoms have gotten better and I began exercising 3 to 4 days per week. I am thrilled to be doing that. I am working once a week with a TMS therapist and I really like our sessions.

We uncovered something BIG in our last session a few days ago and now I am in a TMS pain Flare. Maybe an Extinction Burst ????? I know it will pass and that I need to practice True Indifference. I will keep my plans to attend a Birthday Party for my sister Saturday.

If I skip my routine exercises tomorrow, is this playing into the TMS ?? or is it OK to lay off exercise while the pain is much higher than it usually is.

It seems like you've uncovered some important truths. I saw Andrew Millers answer to this very question on YouTube - he said it's okay to take time away. TMS healing is a process and involves being kind, caring and attending to one's needs, not to add new stressors.

 

[Grateful17]

Mike, I think I remember seeing something about this from Andrew Miller too. Since I know that the lower back pain is NOT structural at all, this makes me feel better about things. I am positive that this increase in TMS pain is from the Process work I was doing with the TMS therapist. Because the exact thing happened when I did some Faster EFT (tapping) sessions a few months ago. All of my pain and other TMS equivalents increased for a short time and then got much better. FEFT has really helped me overall.

 

[mike2014]

Oh the symptom imperative at play, that's very common. I'm sure when you think psychologically and challenge the pain, the intensity will diminish. You are doing a fabulous job so far, I'm surprised you have taken on so much; feft, pp etc. As long as you aren't overwhelmed, keep at it

 

[Eve]

hi grateful
I am also doing the faster EFT since 4 months and I absolutely love it and I am sooo glad that I found this method, because it not only helps me to release my anxiety and worries, but I use it as an alternative to writing. Sometimes I write or sometimes I tap. Or I tap if I am stuck with a negative feeling after the writing session. But it is indeed a wonderful thing and I have done some sessions on my own in the beginning and I could have the pain completely gone or get worse as well. I have had both these experiences. Unfortenately the FM pain is still there and I had a huge painful dip this week. It can indeed be because you touched something important, but I also believe, in my case, that it's because I am increasing my activities and my brain gives me a hard time every time when I have had some good days and then out of the blue, I have to stay in bed because everything hurts. I have read that many people feel extra pain after having worked out, it could be because the muscles, which are already sore because of the oxygen deprivation, are having to endure more physical stress, causing more pain, Working out causes pain or stiffness for regular people without TMS so it would be reasonable to assume that for people with TMS, the intensity gets higher as well. Or could it be a trick by the mind? I don't know, but anyway, don't look for the reason why you have it. If you do not bother about it, it just passes after some days. Goodluck

 

[Grateful17]

Hi Eve.
So nice to meet you. I am so happy to hear that FEFT is helping you too. I was astonished when I tried FasterEFT at home for the first time and it took my pain/fibro away. Instantly just like that. I was shocked, happy, and all things in-between. Of course it only lasted about 2 minutes, but I had been in constant 24 hour per day pain for 7 years, so any amount of relief was welcome.
It also made me realize that my pain WAS emotionally rooted and not because of some horrible inflammatory or viral/bacterial/chemical/structural issue. I had known that I had mind body issues before finding FEFT, but not having TMS knowledge, I also still thought that I had structural, and or viral issues causing all of the pain. It was because of FEFT that TMS came into my life.

My sweet FEFT practitioner told me to read Steve-O's book TGPD........and my mind was BLOWN. My TMS pain got so PISSED OFF. Much of the time I was reading the book, my pain increased and some of my other TMS equivalents increased too. Then it all got better. I began exercising and really practicing TRUE INDIFFERENCE. I must say that those 8 sessions that I did with my Faster EFT practitioner were worth their weight in gold. We went to the deepest, darkest, past traumas that happened to me and WOW. It calmed down my overall TMS symptoms and helped my ANS (autonomic nervous system) to be less reactive in the fight/flight/freeze mode. Those sessions even helped with my food allergies.

I like that FEFT has you tap on only 5 spots and those areas on your body are directly tied to your FIGHT/FLIGHT/FREEZE mechanism, so you are not only telling the brain to calm down, you are interrupting the symptoms being sent to the body. You are changing that neural network in your brain with a COMPETING STIMULUS.

And after FEFT my sleep got much better along with my dreams. My dreams changed from stressful ones to being much more joyful and happy. My subconscious and ANS quit waking me up at 3 to 5 am with Adrenaline surges. My TMS has a very specific pattern that it follows. It always gets mad at first. IT always increases my symptoms at first when I step in and try to change it, and then it calms down and my symptoms will improve. We all have a certain Psycho-cybernetic Mechanism (our self barometers). The brain still thinks it needs to protect us and that what it is doing is correct, so when we try to change it........we can sometimes get increased symptoms temporarily.

I figured this is what happened to me recently. In fact, the increased pain I was in yesterday when I started this post is already BETTER.!!!

Something that really helped me last night was to pick up my book The Presence Process and re read Week 4 of the lesson. The conscious response for this week is "I FEEL UNCONDITIONALLY." The Presence Process invites us to respond to our experiences of pain and discomfort by listening to them instead of running from or attacking them. We are asked to consider the possibility that Any experience of pain and discomfort is purposeful-that it's occurring intentionally.

In other words, when pain and discomfort arise, it's because they are required. They are valid because they are forms of communication that have a necessary and valuable function.
This insight invites us to alter our perception of pain and discomfort. We now entertain the possibility that pain and discomfort are our friends, not our enemies, and that they have come to assist us, not hurt us. The way they assist us is by focusing our attention on a specific aspect of our physical, mental, and emotional experience.

Consider this possibility: One of the most uncomfortable aspects of our pain and discomfort may well be our resistance to them.
When we choose to be with our pain and discomfort unconditionally this approach gradually transforms our relationship with pain and discomfort. Instead of treating these occurrences like an invading enemy, we approach them like a mother gently comforting a distraught child with her unconditional Presence. This releases within us energetically integrative capacities instead of the armor and weaponry of war. (end book quotes)

So I tried this approach last night and it worked.

 

[Eve]

Nice to meet you too! I also found TMS via my FEFT practioner. She recommended it for all painsufferers to read on her website and she is a sweetheart on top of being very capable. I only had 3 sessions in the meantime, once a month, because even though it's worth the price of gold, it also costs as much as gold I found a link of FEFT on Youtube from Dr. Eric Robins talking about this and I immediately felt I had to check it out. I remember when I started tapping on myself for the very first time, I could feel blood pumping through my vains and relaxing all my muscles in areas which felt tight for 8 years! That was truly amazing and I was immediately convinced of the mind/body link after that and that FEFT really could work for me as well. After two weeks of tapping on myself, I felt a huge weight lifted off my shoulders emotionaly speaking, resulting in indeed, still more muscle relaxation. I had never felt so light before, but indeed, the pain crept in quite quickly after some minutes. In the beginning I tapped on myself for 4 hours a day but had to stop because it became obsessive. Yep, I'm a perfectionist and an overachiever... I thought that the more I tapped on myself, the quicker the pain would go, but instead it became frustrating, so now I tap when I have unconfortable feelings inside of me. I guess I have watched almost all of the video's on youtube and was amazed at how some people with FM claimed to be free from pain after only 6 weeks... They are very lucky to have this kind of quick healing I suppose..
I also do a "soften & flow" meditation just like your presence process, I have learned that through the Gupta program, specializing on CFS/FM sufferers. It's only now, knowing about TMS, that I can see pain as a messenger. TMS knowledge has been the missing piece in my recovery. I never understood the message behind the pain, but now I see why I needed the pain so many years ago. The best way to see this, is indeed seeing the pain as your friend and an opportunity towards re-inventing yourself.

 

[Walt Oleksy (RIP 2021)]

Hi, Grateful 17. I think you're doing real well . I like Eve's advice, especially the last line of her post. TMS not only heals us but gives us a new self-awareness that helps in so many ways. Pain can come and go and be less or more intense as we try to discover its emotional causes. I like tapping, too.
There are some wonderful tapping videos on Youtube.

 

[Grateful17]

Thanks for the responses and guidance Walt and Eve. I appreciated your input. I am so proud of myself. Now if and when the Pain increases to that extreme again, I will not only know exactly how to handle the situation, I will have more confidence to overcome it. I know my brain and the conditioned responses are learning a lesson too, that we are SAFE.

Eve, you and I have so much in common. I too, have used Gupta's tools to help me. I also use Annie Hoppers Dynamic Neural Retraining System (DNRS) to keep my recovery moving forward. We are so fortunate that we have a Box full of Tools to recover with. I just use what seems right in the moment and take what I like from the different modalities to heal.
Because I fit the mold of TMS so precisely, I know this is why I am finally moving forward again. I match every Personality Characteristic of TMS, My symptoms match, The timing of my illness began after a 5 year stressful period that was full of one trauma after another. And then finally, the TMS exploded about 10 days after I took an early retirement. BINGO.....all makes so much sense now.

I had smaller symptoms on and off my whole life that would self resolve. So TMS was flying under the radar and when things got too bad in 2006, my mind had to protect me in the best way it knew how.

 

[Eve]

We are indeed very much alike! Even our timeframes match more or less. We are indeed fortunate to have so many tools available. What i am also doing are TRE exercises. This stands for trauma and tension release excercises in which the body starts trembling to shake off the stress and giving deep relaxation in the muscles and giving a message to the ANS that we are safe. I like it too. It is the deepest relaxation feeling I have ever felt. Look it up on youtube if you are interested. I am very excited to share with you our journey towards recovery! Feel free to pm me if you would like a talk.

 

[Grateful17]

EVE,,,,,,LOL
TRE is one more thing we have in common. Our minds think alike. I am going to start TRE too. I know all about it and have Dr. Bercelli's new book SHAKE IT OFF.
Here is my dilemma with trying TRE. I have 2 friends that did it and TOO MUCH was released causing symptoms they could not self regulate and it overwhelmed and scared them both. So Dr. Eric Robins speaks of some of us needing to go slow.
I will PM you. Yes, I would love to talk about TRE.
Gotta run to lunch but will PM you shortly.
HUGS
Sissy Williams

 

[Eve]

Look forward to hearing from you. My day is running at its end. Im from Belgium. Enjoy your day!