I used to post on here years ago when my arm and hand pain was at its worst. I can't find that account. I had read all of Dr. John Sarno's books. That alone didn't get rid of my pain. Then I went down the rabbit hole of trying to figure out what emotions was I repressing and wasn't letting myself feel. It all brought my pain levels to a manageable level but I would never say I was a success story and I always worried it would get worse.
One thing that really struck me as odd was the fact that some people got better just by reading Dr. Sarno's books and others needed to delve into their emotions. That made no sense to me.
A few years ago I read a book called You Are Not Your Pain which uses mindfulness meditation to alleviate suffering from pain. I know of another TMS author who uses this as one of his methods but I liked that this book focused on that. Most books on meditation don't really address pain. There is pain and then there is suffering. This book invites you to question the idea that you have to suffer if you are experiencing pain. The feeling of pain and the suffering from that pain are two different things. I actually used the principles in this book to deal with the pain of childbirth.
In addition I found another good book called Chronic Pain Rehabilitation by Dr. Evan Parks. It reminds me so much of Dr. Sarno's books. To me the best part of the book is that it talks about how pain becomes a habit caused by the brain. If you experience pain in your back your brain is now on hyper alert and interprets any kind of back movement as a threat. The book explains the process of what your brain is doing in detail, how it decides to keep the feeling of pain going to protect, not your mind from experiencing difficult emotions, but from what it now views as a dangerous movement such as typing on a keyboard for too long. You have to get past the idea that pain is unbearable at any level in order to break that pain habit.
I still experience pain but it doesn't bother me much right now so I don't feel the need to do anything about it. It's not limiting. I'm so grateful for coming across the books of Dr. Sarno and I feel like these 2 books that I mentioned answered questions that I had.
One thing that really struck me as odd was the fact that some people got better just by reading Dr. Sarno's books and others needed to delve into their emotions. That made no sense to me.
A few years ago I read a book called You Are Not Your Pain which uses mindfulness meditation to alleviate suffering from pain. I know of another TMS author who uses this as one of his methods but I liked that this book focused on that. Most books on meditation don't really address pain. There is pain and then there is suffering. This book invites you to question the idea that you have to suffer if you are experiencing pain. The feeling of pain and the suffering from that pain are two different things. I actually used the principles in this book to deal with the pain of childbirth.
In addition I found another good book called Chronic Pain Rehabilitation by Dr. Evan Parks. It reminds me so much of Dr. Sarno's books. To me the best part of the book is that it talks about how pain becomes a habit caused by the brain. If you experience pain in your back your brain is now on hyper alert and interprets any kind of back movement as a threat. The book explains the process of what your brain is doing in detail, how it decides to keep the feeling of pain going to protect, not your mind from experiencing difficult emotions, but from what it now views as a dangerous movement such as typing on a keyboard for too long. You have to get past the idea that pain is unbearable at any level in order to break that pain habit.
I still experience pain but it doesn't bother me much right now so I don't feel the need to do anything about it. It's not limiting. I'm so grateful for coming across the books of Dr. Sarno and I feel like these 2 books that I mentioned answered questions that I had.
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