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When TMS comes back after many years do you just focus on the issues that brought it back again or go back to your original issues?
- Thread starter amkeire32
- Start date
Adam Coloretti (coach)
Well known member
I think it depends on how much progress you feel as if you made on the original issues. From your last post, it seems like there's some doubt as to whether or not this is TMS, so even just acknowledging the stress that brought it back can help your belief and lead you away from a structural explanation 
The thing is, in Dr Sarno's TMS model, symptoms are considered to act as a distraction from repressed emotions, particularly anger. So, the issues you're consciously aware of from the past or present may not actually be what your symptoms are distracting you from. Because of that, I think it's difficult for you to know—and for anyone else, for that matter—to know and give you a straightforward answer to your question.
What I can say though is that something I found really useful for discovering what was going on with me was doing some stream-of-consciousness journalling. In case you've not come across it before, it's simply writing down whatever comes into your head without worrying about grammar, spelling, or whether it even makes sense. I found it helpful to do it first thing in the morning for anywhere from 10 to 30 minutes. If you stick with it for a while, you're likely to notice recurring themes, which you can then choose to explore more deeply.
The other thing is that what your brain may be trying to keep you from feeling could be your true emotional response to the little things in life. Sometimes we tell ourselves we're happy with something—or that we should be happy with it—because our rational mind says it's "no big deal". But, in reality, it might feel like a very big deal to us, or to our inner child (who would like to perhaps throw a tantrum about it).
Something else to consider is that it may not all be about anger this time. It could instead, or as well, involve your brain not feeling safe, learned responses, or predictive processing. A book I found really helpful on those ideas is The Pain Reprocessing Therapy Workbook by Vanessa Blackstone.
What I can say though is that something I found really useful for discovering what was going on with me was doing some stream-of-consciousness journalling. In case you've not come across it before, it's simply writing down whatever comes into your head without worrying about grammar, spelling, or whether it even makes sense. I found it helpful to do it first thing in the morning for anywhere from 10 to 30 minutes. If you stick with it for a while, you're likely to notice recurring themes, which you can then choose to explore more deeply.
The other thing is that what your brain may be trying to keep you from feeling could be your true emotional response to the little things in life. Sometimes we tell ourselves we're happy with something—or that we should be happy with it—because our rational mind says it's "no big deal". But, in reality, it might feel like a very big deal to us, or to our inner child (who would like to perhaps throw a tantrum about it).
Something else to consider is that it may not all be about anger this time. It could instead, or as well, involve your brain not feeling safe, learned responses, or predictive processing. A book I found really helpful on those ideas is The Pain Reprocessing Therapy Workbook by Vanessa Blackstone.
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Cactusflower
Beloved Grand Eagle
I once spoke to someone who put the stress of chronic symptoms (and their recurrence) as this: picture your brain as a bucket. Every day, drip by drip your brain (and your mind) fills with stress. Everyone's bucket also has a hole that can open up at will. Notice I say "AT WILL" this is very important. Many people's bucket fills, but it also opens drip by drip out the bottom. The bottom drip isn't necessarily regular, and it doesn't have to be. As long as that bucket stays below the maximum fill line, and occasionally (or even regularly) that bottom opens to dribble out some drops, you have maintained some sort of homeostasis. But when that stress meets your maximum fill line or even goes a bit above it, we usually begin to get some sort of signal. It doesn't have to start with chronic pain, but our bodies send us messages and we often have thoughts, even fleeting that something is a bit off. It's our attunement to these messages of brain or body that helps us reel things back and get some perspective. However I think most of us try and sweep these feelings under our internal mat. That might have a lot to do with our personality traits: we don't want to admit these messages are there because we can handle things "perfectly" or we tend to attend to anything or everyone else outside of ourselves instead of to our own needs. Things sneak up on us.
I absolutely believe it's that combination of things that @BloodMoon suggests, and then heaped onto that, is @Adam Coloretti (coach) 's wise observation.
Our internal dialogue, our ability to choose to react or respond to situations, and our internal observations and also utilizing the skills we learned from Dr. Sarno put into regular practice.
Many people are devotees of Sarno, but I think we only know him from is books and that might be a limiting aspect of his actual "prescription" to real-life clients. Sarno's ultimate "commandment" is to get back to normal life. However, many of us with TMS were not taught or didn't learn some of the skills that help with that "normal life" to maintain a better equillibrium and internal balance. We let that bucket reach it's maximum fill line without even noticing. Sarno teaches us (some) of the skills to open the bottom cap and let the stress dribble out - eg. journaling, but we now know there are other methods that help, and I think many of his patients who had recurrent intermittent symtoms (many of whom reported they would call him, get a pep talk and resume their "prescriptions" and feel better) learned to keep empoloying the stratagies he taught them through their life. Eg. journaling simply became incorporated into their normal life - once a week, every few days, when they could observe or feel a stress build up. They kept honing their internal awareness to KNOW when the stress was building up, they learned some stress management by advocating for their needs and meeting those needs regularly Eg. quiet, solitary walks in nature, meditation, taking breaks during the day and asking themselves how they feel emotionally, and all kinds of other things that help open the cap of their stress bucket.
It's not a perfect method to never feel another build up of stress or have more chronic symptoms - that was never promised. Sarno teaches us a way to deal with it, with more confidence through knowledge of how to deal with an episode when it happens.
I absolutely believe it's that combination of things that @BloodMoon suggests, and then heaped onto that, is @Adam Coloretti (coach) 's wise observation.
Our internal dialogue, our ability to choose to react or respond to situations, and our internal observations and also utilizing the skills we learned from Dr. Sarno put into regular practice.
Many people are devotees of Sarno, but I think we only know him from is books and that might be a limiting aspect of his actual "prescription" to real-life clients. Sarno's ultimate "commandment"
is to get back to normal life. However, many of us with TMS were not taught or didn't learn some of the skills that help with that "normal life" to maintain a better equillibrium and internal balance. We let that bucket reach it's maximum fill line without even noticing. Sarno teaches us (some) of the skills to open the bottom cap and let the stress dribble out - eg. journaling, but we now know there are other methods that help, and I think many of his patients who had recurrent intermittent symtoms (many of whom reported they would call him, get a pep talk and resume their "prescriptions" and feel better) learned to keep empoloying the stratagies he taught them through their life. Eg. journaling simply became incorporated into their normal life - once a week, every few days, when they could observe or feel a stress build up. They kept honing their internal awareness to KNOW when the stress was building up, they learned some stress management by advocating for their needs and meeting those needs regularly Eg. quiet, solitary walks in nature, meditation, taking breaks during the day and asking themselves how they feel emotionally, and all kinds of other things that help open the cap of their stress bucket. It's not a perfect method to never feel another build up of stress or have more chronic symptoms - that was never promised. Sarno teaches us a way to deal with it, with more confidence through knowledge of how to deal with an episode when it happens.
Thank you for your insightful post. I absolutely from now on will be much more aware of expressing my feelings through journaling and being totally honest about what I write. This is something I have been half doing occasionally and I noticed now looking back I was not being truthful even to myself and somehow made it all sound better than it was.
I had heard it being described in terms of a bucket filling up with stress and overflowing before, but never with the bucket having a bottom cap covering a drainage hole - what a brilliant analogy! - one that will definitely stay with me. Glad you posted it up - thanks!
I was suggesting to @amkeire32 in another thread to consider self-soothing as a technique, which of course is something Dr Sarno briefly mentioned in one of his books. And in relation to this, I love the image I now have of self-soothing making the bucket's cap shift and the stress dribble out through the hole.
Just in case someone reading this posting hasn't seen what Dr Sarno said about self-soothing potentially balancing out rage and is interested, here it is (from the MindBody Prescription):
"Suppose, however, there is another element in the equation; that it is not simply the quantity of rage that brings on symptoms, but the presence or absence of counterbalancing soothing factors. Theoretically, these pleasant elements in a person’s life would modify the threat posed by the rage and make symptoms unnecessary. One can carry this to the point of absurdity, but I believe something like it goes on and that the occurrence of symptoms reflects too much rage and not enough counteracting soothing elements in one’s life."
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Cactusflower
Beloved Grand Eagle
@BloodMoon
What I found initially confusing about Sarno is that his most powerful statements were often made in the briefest of comments!
What I found initially confusing about Sarno is that his most powerful statements were often made in the briefest of comments!