Anxiety about my health

I am so glad I found this forum. I started to practice mind body (TMS) method about a month ago. It helped me from being bed bound to being active again. I suffered from long Covid for almost 2 years and most of my symptoms were gone or reduced in level just after 2 weeks of doing TMS. However, my anxiety is still there and persistent more than ever. If there was no trigger, I felt my stomach churning sometimes but I learned to be ok with it because it is clearly TMS. However, if there were real circumstances that caused me stress even a little, my anxiety would be up to the roof. I would be obsessed with the issues even though everyone around me kept telling me it was not a problem.

I had jaw clicking when I ate but it only happened once in a blue moon when I chewed hard foods. I did notice the clicking sounds became more often after Covid but at that time I had more other serious issues to worry than this. After I did TMS therapy, it became so much better that I can even eat hard food without problem. However, last few days, I ate crunchy chips and my jaw got locked. It eventually got opened but it really scared me. My anxiety went up and some of my long covid symptoms went back briefly for a day. I was ok the next day but I made a mistake of searching about my jaw symptom and realised I had TMJ. Together with this realisation, I started to have more clicking sound when chewing and some pain which radiate from right to the left side of the jaw where I did not even have the clicking sound. Now I can hardly control my anxiety.

my questions are:
1. I think I still have the trauma with long Covid that was really a nightmare for me. My brain does enjoy keeping me in flight mode by creating heightened anxiety especially when it relates to health problem. What should I do to release this trauma?
2. do you think my TMJ is TMS? I have the feeling it is a manifestation of TMS but I would like a bit of confidence in this belief. I couldn‘t afford dentist for now and from what I read, most medical treatments are not effective.

Thank you for your help.

 

Hi @euroka and welcome:
Anxiety is a TMS equivalent, keep doing your tms mind/body activities. You seem to have a good grasp on where you are at.
The fixation with your jaw is simply another form of diversion away from the cruix of the problem: feeling your emotions and salt-acceptance. It keeps you preoccupied, it certainly was able to spike your anxiety. Open your mind a bit and consider jaw clicking might be from tension. No big deal then right?
Giving a name to a symptom calling it “tmj” gives it power over you. You experienced this when your symptoms spiked but you were able to self regulate and they settled. That is amazing progress! Congratulate yourself!
Keep going! New symptoms and returning symptoms are called the symptom imperative ( anxiety can be one of them), common when doing this work. You’ve had great success, this work is hard, it can take time.

 

@euroka I am amazed your long covid disappeared after just two weeks! What amazing progress. It sounds like your jaw pain might be coming up just at the tail end of that? And thereby giving you something new to focus on. I totally understand the trauma of long covid, it is horrific. I have been doing mindbody for about 5 months now, so I’m super impressed with your quick progress do you have any tips?

 

Thank you for your kind advice Catusflower. You reminded me of how far I have gone. Being a perfectionist, my habit is to focus on what went wrong rather than what went right. That also caused my TMS, i think. A month ago, I was still lying in bed thinking I was dying. It is really amazing how this work has changed my life and I think I am able to overcome this hurdle too.

 

I‘m amazed how fast I recovered as well. I was 50% better just listening to the interview where Dr Howard Schubiner explained about mind body syndrome. It resonated so much with my symptoms. I guessed the key to my quick recovery is to understand that the brain creates my symptoms and I have no structural issues which are proved by all my medical results.
Another thing is mindfulness and affirmation. I watched my body all the time and catches when it started to tense up which was a sign that it was in flight or fight mode. I just told myself that I am safe and relaxed the tension in my body.
I hope that helps.

 

@euroka that's brilliant! I am glad things are working so well for you. I am also nearly there now I think. I struggled with the belief aspect a lot as I had read so much long covid research by the time I found the TMS world, so there was a lot of unlearning or understanding to do.. it was confusing!
Hope you recover soon from the jaw pain.