Pelvic pain after bowel movements. Is it TMS?

Hi.

Since 7 years I wake up feeling pretty good, but once I have a bowel movement, after 10 minutes it starts a burning sensation in my perineum that sometimes irradiates to my penis and buttocks.

The sensation is never the same. Sometimes is burning, sometimes is pain, sometimes just a discomfort etc.

In the rare days when I don’t have a BM I’ve almost zero symptoms, just a bit of discomfort.

The official “diagnosis” is Chronic Prostatitis or CPPS or Pelvic Floor Dysfunction or Pudendal Neuralgia. A bunch of terms to give a name to something doctors can’t explain…

Over the past 7 years I did every test possible and been visited by countless of doctors and specialist.

Nothing was found that could explain clearly my symptoms. Except in 2020 a proctologist diagnosed me mucosal rectal prolapse and congested hemorrhoids that can explain the burning, but in 2017 I was visited by two proctologists and they didn’t find nothing, but the symptoms were the same.

The most plausible explanation is that my pelvic floor muscles go into spasm irritating the nerves creating these bad sensations.

As many of us with permanent pain, I developed depression and anxiety.

I’m from Italy (apologies in advance for bad grammar). 43 years old male.

It all started back in 2016 with burning in my penis urethra after an ejaculation. It was after masturbation, hence no risk of infection after sex.

During that time I moved to a temporary house because exactly one year before (March 3, 2015) I discovered my wife cheating on me, which was a real trauma for me and leaving me completely devastated and full of anxiety and panic attacks. So it was during the “anniversary” of the cheating discover.

Obviously I was coming from a full year with plenty of stress, anxiety and total refuse for the end of my marriage. Back then I lost almost 12kg, didn’t sleep and was in a permanent anxiety state.

I think my emotional status during that time played a crucial part in creating my chronic pain.

Anyone here have the same symptoms?

Do you think it’s TMS?

Thank you

 

Prudential Neuralgia is a very common symptom in TMS. If your doctor can find no physical reason to have these symptoms, then it is often TMS.

Have you read a book by Dr. Sarno? That is important, so you can understand how and why people have TMS and also how to help yourself.
TMS often begins with traumatic events and because of our personalities.

There are some success stories in the Success forum for this symptom!

 

I know that it’s totally psychosomatic. I read all the Sarno’s book (I’m finishing “the divided mind”). But now that the proctologist diagnosed me the prolapse and suggest surgery my mind tend to think “maybe with surgery everything will fix”.

But on the other end, in the last 10 months I was symptoms free (despite a couple of flare ups) and in that period I was in love and really happy with a new girlfriend. And the prolapse was still there. And then, when I started to feel that our relationship was starting to have issues and I started to fell her more distant emotionally, everything came back with vengeance.

My root cause I think it’s the desperate need of love, feel taken care of a woman and the sense of security due to the lack of love and caring I had as a child.

I’ll try to journal and I’m going to a psychologist.

There’s anything I can do more?

 

The free programs at tmswiki.org page (scroll down page) are good to introduce you to many TMS skills. Choose only one, and begin but follow it to the end. They continue Sarno’s work.
I think you might like the Structured Educational Program since you already have some excellent insights. Another suggestion is learning to love and accept yourself just as you are.
It may sound silly but love is the antidote to fear and anger. I use meditations from Insite Timer (it’s free), but many people just sit and meditate without voice guidance.
Meditation is optional, but finding things that are comforting and relaxing for you can help; for some folks it’s a run, or the gym. For others it’s art or music. Whatever works for you.

 

Hi, It seems like you have a learned response. Have you tried reprocessing this? When you do not need to have a bowel movement just visualize yourself needing to and the action of walking to the bathroom and so forth. Notice what happens in your body?

 

I'll try it

 

Hi! Stumbled upon this post just now. I have the EXACT same thing. And my experiences with the doctors are very similar to yours. The symptoms are identical. And I think we've even developed the condition at the exact same age.

The only differences are: I have many additional symptoms (backpain, wrist pain, shoulder pain, headaches, gostrointestinal issues etc.) and I can't really identify the event that caused it. My mom was diagnosed with a serious condition at that time but we managed to fight it and she's fine now. That's about the only somewhat traumatic thing I can think of apart from the fact that I have extremely TMS-prone personality and stress over pretty much everything. My relationship isn't issues-free but I felt pretty good about it at that time (and I still do though admittedly we have our share of problems).

I got exactly the same diagnoses. First it was prostatitis, which was later changed to coccygodynia nad pelvic floor dysfunction. I've visited countless therapists, to no avail. There's definitely some pattern there but it's hard to grasp. Stress makes the symptoms worse. Being overwhelmed. Feeling too much responsibility. Feeling terrible after failing in anything, even some trivial matters. Running helps. And some light excercises. And doing things for fun (though it's difficult in my case because when I have fun, I blame myself for not being productive and wasting time).

Your post is the closest decsription to what I have among hundreds I've read on the forum. That said, a few members wrote about a similar thing.

 

I’m not alone then did you manage to have some relief during these years? In my experience I had pretty long relief periods when I was taking Cymbalta 60mg and Lyrica (75 in the morning, 150 in the evening). Every time I stopped the meds thinking I was cured, the symptoms came back.

In situations without stress and pressure I usually have zero symptoms, hence the mind plays a big role in it.

 

Two different doctors gave me prescription for pregabalin and they all seem to agree I should be taking it. I haven't though. It's been sitting in a drawer of my desk for many months now and I'm still trying everything to cure this without the use of pyschiatric drugs. I have very bad experiences with side effects of such drugs from earlier in life.

That's why I'm trying the TMS approach. Initially, there's been some progress. The pain lessened by about 25% shortly after I started reading the books and the forum and accepted the TMS diagnosis. But since then - nothing. I feel unable to push it any further. No amount of journalling, meditation, talking to my brain etc. helps. I'm starting psychotherapy now so here's hoping this will help further.

My pattern looked like this: initial pains (very strong) for about 2-3 months -> pain slowly subsides -> pain comes and goes, there are "good weeks" and "bad" weeks -> after about a year the pain becomes chronic - it's there all the time but explodes after every bowel movement.

 

Funny thing is, the pain got way worse during my vacation trip which was supposed to relax me and make me forget about the pain. :|

 

Bowel movements are the real problem. Is impossible to avoid them, hence the gradual exposure is not possible.

I’ve almost no pain in the morning, but after BM everything explode. It depends also on the stool consistency. It’s a real mistery

 

It is. And I think only the correct psychological approach will help. I'm trying to change things in my life. I'm doing less things someone expects of me and more things that I feel good about. I've recently declined some promisisng job opportunities simply because I don't want to overburden myself or work on something that's not fun. Also, I've recnely discovered I might be autistic so this is what I can be thankful for - the suffering let me explore myself the way nothing else would.

As for the bowel movements, I think my body became so afraid of them and the resulting pain that it decided to avoid them as much as possible. I'm now defecating only twice a week, while my norm was about twice as often.

 

Great! Let me know how it goes.
Laura