Sciatca or TMS

Hi I have just joined as I'm at a low point in my life at moment, Im completely worn down with my sciatica symptoms. I have had two MRI's that said I have a small central disc bluge at l4/l5 doctors said its not pressing on any nerves, don't want to go into a long story of my symptoms or I'll be writing all night, .....but to cut it short my symptoms are really bad now with nerve pain in both legs in different parts, mostly my feet buzzing with muscles twitches. All this has consumed me! It's been going on for over a year! I'm a complete expert on disc hernation through all the googling I do! I get pain when doing straight leg test so it must be disc a disc promble I think! I keep going the doctors but they say the MRI say it's a small bulge and shouldn't cause this pain. So I'm woundering can the mind really make me think I have sciatca even to cause symptoms when bending or doing straight leg test? I have anxiety, plus OCD and I'm completely obsessed with all these smytoms in my legs and feet.

 

I used to get that pain with a straight leg too. I also had that buzzing and twitching (fasciculitis). Also, herniated discs don't cause back pain, so a small herniation cannot.

There's a ton more for you to learn, and many things to know, but I can't tell you here.

Make sure you get a nice workup, and then go headlong into your emotions. If you have TMS, you can heal, but it takes courage and hard work. Set ego aside and begin to let the light shine in you.

Steve

 

This obsession will have to go. Eventually, to heal. Anxiety and OCD are TMS-related symptoms that keep you in pain and make the pain worse. I think we all experience them to some extent when faced with unexplained pain, so don't be hard on yourself - your reactions are natural. But at the same time recognize their role in perpetuating or exacerbating your symptoms. Keep track of your emotions and how your body responds to them.

 

Thanks for the reply's!!! )

 

Hi, Bella.
Worrying is an awful waste of time.
I've been at it myself this morning. No reason in the world to be worried more than yesterday
and I wasn't worried at all.
So today I just tell myself I am not going to worry. I am laughing worry away and keeping busy.
Distractions are some of my best ways to drive off worry.

If necessary, make a list of what is causing you to worry. Then see what ones you can or might do something about,
and the others just accept them and do another of my tricks... toss the worry ball to God and let Him deal with it.

Also, think positive, like Scarlett O'Hara did in "Gone with the Wind." Her anti-worry mantra was:
"I'll think about it tomorrow at Tara. After all, tomorrow is another day."

Enjoy today. Live in the present moment. It is the only moment you really can be sure of.
Leave thinking about tomorrow's moments tomorrow.

 

Thanks for the advice Walt! I've been reading all about tms and just bought the book Healing Back Pain, it's very interesting and I love the success stories on this website! I'm hoping my pain is tms as well and starting to think about it differently...... But I'm woundering can tms cause muscle twiching? I get them in my foot along with tinglying and buzzing.

 

You are right Ollin but for some of us it's about impossible to get rid of them.......I've been working on it with no luck so far. Only thing I have been able to do is keep myself off the internet consulting Dr. Google - I do, however, still spend more of my waking hours worrying about my symptoms than anything else.

 

Oh yes, I've been getting them a lot, but these days I don't really notice them, so maybe they're gone. Occasionally I get some shooting pain when I press on a nerve in my foot, but it doesn't last more than a second. Maybe they went because they didn't worry me as much as the pain, or so I hope.

 

I know it's very hard to make yourself not to think about something. I wonder how long have you had your current symptoms, mdh? I've been obsessing a lot about my symptoms in the beginning months, even years. But then once I knew they're TMS, and that they're not getting worse with time, and especially because of doing the psychological inventory of my life, I started obsessing about my other life issues and this focus shifted away from my pain. I don't know if this will be enough for the symptoms to vanish, but obsessing about them made me constantly fearful and miserable, which certainly didn't help. We need to get out of the fight-or-flight mode for anything to start healing.

 

about 5 months.......but strangely enough, they started less than a month after I was told by my Doc that another health issue I was worried about was not a problem and my tests were clear. I elaborated about it in my first posting. It is amazing how one can get so scared of something that doctor hasn't diagnosed you with.

 

Yes, it's fascinating that when our minds are preoccupied with something else (like your potential scary diagnosis) we don't get symptoms until that worry is resolved. I notice this with my pain, that it increases after the stress of something is gone. It seems consistent with the claim of metamedicine, that pain occurs during healing phase, not during the 'injury'. Like muscles worked out in the gym, we feel them the next day. The problem with chronic symptoms is that the healing is never complete, so they persist. For me it is being constantly on a low-level alert for something bad potentially happening. It's been so long that I felt truly SAFE that my mind and nervous system forgot what it's like...

 

Thanks again Ollin!
Mdh157 I'm like you, I think about my symptoms all day......every day. I read this colum the other day about worrying and it mentioned about how to break the cycle, it said only give yourself 10 minutes a day to worry, at the same time every day, I have my time at 4.30. When a worry comes in my head I think no! I will let myself worry about that at 4.30, then sometimes when it gets to 4.30 that worry has passed and I've not wasted my hole morning worrying over it. I do find it quite hard to begin with but I'm hoping it will break my worry cycle.

 

Bella the Worrier, your first step in healing is to see yourself being free of conflict, by changing your current perception. You become what you deeply believe, and part of that is in how you see yourself. So when you change your screen name from Bella the Worrier to Bella the Warrior you've begun to heal. Most people fear their symptoms because they feel as hapless victims of their body. But they don't realize that they themselves are creating the problems in order to help them cope, by the very thoughts they use.

You send signals to your body to react a certain way, and the problems emanate from your personal shadow. CG Jung stated that one of the most obvious markers of the shadow was in its "reactivity." Reactivity is doing the same thing over and over. This is also referred to as "habit" but it's also been defined as insanity when it's expected to yield a different result. The idea is to relate to reactivity, and not from it, just like the idea in meditating is to meditate toward pain and not away from it.

Pain is a habit. Worry is a habit. If you keep feeling the same way every day then you've allowed your shadow to be in charge. At that point your reactions become a dramatization of your shadow. That means that you have a disproportionate response to worry. The over-worry, and over-dramatization is the shadow's presence and control over you.

Reactivity has certain elements:
1) over- reacting (histrionics, disproportionate responses to the sensation of pain, worry, and criticisms, etc)
2) repeating yourself (using the same words to describe things)
3) feedback (from those around you describing you in the same way, and then you reacting or pushing back on them with an over-reaction)
4) shutting off your feelings from the person that just hurt you. (cutting them off from your emotions toward them)
5) zero tolerance for the person who has criticized us (disconnecting)
6) attached to being correct, not listening to others' views (this is seen often in TMS-deniers. They are soooo sure TMS is wrong, and that they are right)

Here's the point. Didn't think I would get to it did ya? Everyone responds in reactivity, Dr. Sarno referred to reactivity in the physical sense as "conditioning." I'm referring to the psychological realm because of your screen name and in how you said you were obsessed with your symptoms. We all loop our thinking, but the point is to recognize it. If you aren't aware that you are being controlled by your shadow then your shadow will continue to control you, and the reactivity continues. When reactivity rules you, you have no sense of identity, the true you. You feel lost at that point. You aren't moving toward the situation but away from it.

When you see yourself reacting in any of the above ways to worry, or pain, STOP! Notice that it's happening to you, and admit it. Name the step that I just outlined, such as, "oh, that's #3, or #6."

Why did I just talk about reactivity? Because your physical symptoms are reactions to your personal relationships. Your body is reporting back to you on the strengths of your relationships to those around you, and more importantly to the relationship with yourself since there's no difference between the two.

Steve

 

Wow thanks Steve going to take on board everything you said! I'm determined to change and get back to enjoying life!!!

 

I like your happy Snoopy. It reminds me of Dr. Sarno. I had never read Snoopy. But I was in so much pain at one pint, and then I found Dr. Sarno and he wrote about Snoopy and TMS. I thought it was cool that he was confident enough to use a cartoon to explain something to a dummy like me. He's the James Bond of doctors.

Now, begin to see yourself as free of worry, and as happy as Snoopy looks. Do you see the dichotomy between your screen name and your Snoopy avatar? They don't match. But that's the notion of a divided mind. I remember someone I was working with last year who said, "Steve, thanks for the help, I'm now going to try to make my inside match my outside." I knew what she meant. She had always put on a false mask to appear as happy and peaceful on the outside, but inside she was full of tumult.

Make your innerds match your outards

 

Thanks again! I'm going to try my best to change my negitive thinking into positive.

 

Bella Snoopy Warrior, try to switch from thinking positive to heading toward your pain. Thinking positive won't do anything, it simply masks negativity. The idea in healing is to head into your shadow not away from it. Does that make sense?

Pain is unresolved conflict. By thinking positive you pretend conflict doesn't exist, so it remains unresolved. With TMS pain there is a past component that remains present. The unconscious doesn't have any concept of time. So all pain is present pain from the past. It will remain that way until you integrate it into your being. Thinking positive means that you aren't integrating it, but rather ignoring it.

When you do integrate your past make sure you do it emotionally (psychologically) and not intellectually. People make a big mistake when they intellectualize pain.

I hope that makes sense. It's difficult to describe quickly.

SteveO

 

You should write a book or two about it.

It is so refreshing to see someone say negative things about positive thinking as it relates to TMS recovery. Thank you.

 

I understand what your saying and it has me thinking about something I've not delt with emotionally that I should. Thanks again for taking the time in trying to help me.

 

Good luck Snoopy Warrior, if you need help you know who to call, SteveBusters. I recently saw some more amazing healings. I'm still a bit shocked, but it continues to prove correct every day. Doubt is the destroyer and confidence is the warrior. Just like you will be soon. From worrier to warrior.