Day 1 A Return to Normalcy

Hello board.

My experience with chronic upper-back and neck tension date back three years. It came on suddenly and furiously, with two sleepless nights and a lot of frustration. I suppose I connected the pain to a whiplash injury I sustained playing basketball a year prior, compounded by years of poor posture and imbalanced musculature.

My pain was never so bad that I went to see a doctor, but I love self-experimentation, and thus adopted a paleo diet, began a serious lifting regime (starting strength), and even began doing yoga. While I believe that all of these things have increased the quality of life (and I still do them to this day), and effectively reduced my upper-back tension, I still had neck pain and it didn't seem to be going away.

Finally, about a month ago, I stumbled across Dr. Sarno's The Divided Mind and devoured it over a weekend. Like many of you, I saw my road to recovery clarify before me, and I drank the kool-aid without the least hesitation. In three years of self-experimentation, I had covered every physical angle I could imagine, but I realized that I grossly underestimated the psychological dimension in my rehabilitation.

I'm relatively young, 28, open-minded and not at all fearful of physical activity. In the month since reading the book, I am now currently pain-free for seven days, but my symptoms have shifted to slight anxiety and some gentle (non-visible) internal tremor. This is the first time I have experienced anxiety in my life, though I am not fearful. I am aware that this is simply the Symptom Imperative at work, and that I am indeed on the road to TMS recovery.

I am fortunate in that I have suffered no major traumas in my life. I believe my TMS to be a result of a combination of suppressed and repressed emotions, stemming from a natural tendency to placate and put others' emotions before my own. In truth, I consider myself to be an extreme empath, but I very rarely express my own feelings.

I am excited to go through this process with you all.

 

Stannis,
It is a pleasure to have you join us. Congratulations on being pain free! I look forward to reading more of your posts in the future..