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Thread:
Amber M. TMS pain and preoccupation
Answer
It sounds like you have made tremendous progress in a very short amount of time. In only a month, you have reclaimed your life. You have rejected the fear, you are running again, working out and have stopped much of the pain dead in it’s tracks. That is quite an accomplishment and deserves celebration!

TMS can be very sneaky. Sometimes, in working towards recovery we implement the same strategies that helped create the symptoms. As I read your question, I could feel the weight of this tremendous pressure you are putting on yourself to get 100% better, and to get 100% better NOW. In addition, you are desperately searching for this one magic repressed emotion that might cure it all. That.is.a.lot.of.pressure.

90% of our emotions are subconscious. You may never know if your hypothesis is correct or which subconscious emotion is the culprit. That is ok. Breathe. Be kind to yourself. Take the pressure off. You don’t have to be perfect in recovery. It took a long time for you to learn this pain and it is ok if it takes some time for you to unlearn it. Assuming you have ruled out structural causes for your pain, you will continue your progress towards the finish line.

It sounds as if the motion of bending forward is still getting a lot of attention. It seems to still hold the power of preoccupation over you, as you track the pain, test for it, worry if it will go away or wonder which particular repressed emotion may be causing it. That is a lot of activity to keep your brain very busy and thus reinforce the pain. Assuming it is indeed TMS, once you take away the preoccupation, the pain will lose it’s fuel source and fade away. I suggest, re-reading this article by Alan Gordon on breaking the pain cycle and start noticing how hard your brain is working to distract and preoccupy you.

http://www.tmswiki.org/ppd/Breaking_the_Pain_Cycle,_by_Alan_Gordon,_LCSW

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