Dealing with migraines in real time

Hi all!

For context I had TMS previously that manifested as elbow and wrist pain. I was unable to type for almost a year. I read The Mindbody Prescription and it addressed it within a few days, with symptoms cut by 70% literally day 1. It's been 4 years since the last time I had to deal with anything RSI related.

I've been dealing with chronic migraines for the last year and finally realized that they were following the TMS pattern. I did some journaling, found a source of clear rage, and the pain resolved. Had a great couple of days where I would feel the symptoms, realize they were just sensations, and not an impending migraine, and would move on. Day 4 I got overwhelmed and resorted to a triptan and slept for 11 hours. Day 5 (yesterday) I found a source of terror when I felt a migraine coming on, and it settled out.

Today my head is throbbing and I've got nothing. I know it's TMS in the sense that I can make the pain migrate if I carefully focus on it. But I can't find an emotional break through that gets it to resolve. Telling myself that it's TMS is not fixing it either. I'm not catastrophizing, and I'm not babying it, but my head does feel mighty uncomfortable at the moment even if it is TMS.

I think I was a little spoiled with my RSI resolving so quickly, so I don't have a bank of information on how to manage effectively and continue treating the TMS while still feeling discomfort, especially when it's manifesting as a migraine. I'm going to bust out book again, and I've started journaling (just got The Mindbody Workbook this morning), but I was hoping I might get some wisdom on making it through TMS that manifests as migraines.

I'm guessing no massage, cold caps, headache pills, etc until I'm able to consistently resolve it on my own? Just read and re-read the book, journal, and exercise even if I have the head pain feeling?

Thanks for your help!

 

Continuing to think out loud, I wonder how much of this is now just training myself to not interpret real sensations as pain. There's a big change in barometric pressure happening right now. I can feel it. But it doesn't have to be discomfort. It's just a sensation that I'm experiencing. I did have to go through this with my hands, where I would notice they would feel like they were burning, but it was actually just me noticing my skin moving over my muscles as a I typed, and interpreting that sensation as burning.

Maybe I just have to gut through getting a bunch of reps of "this is not real pain, I am not changing what I am doing with my life in response to it"?

 

My experience with migraines and TMS was limited only to the 'aural' type (i.e. visual) but once I made the determination and belief that they were TMS equivalents, they petered out in a few months. Boy when I got that first one it definitely got my attention - nothing like having blind spots in your vision to get your attention!

Later when I started to get them, I just leaned into it said to myself "bring it on migraine" and they would basically stop developing at that point and peter out. Maybe you can try that approach too? I mean, get really aggressive, use foul language with yourself if you think that will work, and just challenge it to come on. What that basically does is tell your TMS brain that you aren't afraid of this symptom and it may as well not even try.

If it still comes on then, try to keep a light heart about it and be confident it will work next time. The main thing is not to obsess over it and give it the power that TMS brain wants it to have. Good luck.

 

I had frequent migraines for over 50 years before I got rid of them using TMS techniques. One thing I learned in the process was that I had conditioned myself to believe that an increase in barometric pressure would cause a migraine. To break the conditioned response I had to change my belief. I researched the connection between barometric pressure and migraines and learned that there is no logical reason for an increase in barometric pressure to cause a migraine. So whenever I felt the initial signs of a migraine coming on (I had to catch it early), I would tell myself there was no logical, rational reason for a migraine to come on. I would tell my brain to KNOCK IT OFF, just STOP. Then I would forget about it, and the next time I checked in on it, the migraine was gone.

It sounds like magic, but it worked. Sounds similar to what you are doing in talking to your brain. Keep going with it, do it early in the process and continue your workbook, and they should resolve eventually.

 

We've all been there. I have. What I have learned from doing this so long, is that by the time I need a symptom I already "Did" It. That is , I allowed myself to pretend to be a nice guy and missed the RAGE inducing thing that is now mildly buried. I have to excavate my recent History BASED on what I learned so far, and see what reeks of being a situation I have slept through before.

This is presuming you had a life altering healing experience when you went through the work the first time. If you didn't have that ?

Like you said, you didn't develop any skills to fend it off. That's OK. In fact, it might indicate your not as F'd up as most people with chronic pain histories. By just a read through and belief, you got better...that is true Faith healing.

Meanwhile. Migraines. I had them my whole life. I never knew they were 'migraines' until I read what that meant. I would get the visual shimmers, start to see the broken glass, and then It would feel like an ice pick in my eye and I would even puke a lot of the time....especially if I had eaten recently.
Reading Sarno, and understanding the Suppressed Rage cause of Pain and other tickles, I look back and I was always under immense pressure when they happened....Rage inducing.

Well Sarno having had those gave us the 'therapy' in his own text "Whenever I get the shimmers preceding a migraine, I stop and think What I might be angry about that hasn't come to my awareness....sometimes I don't figure it out, but the symptoms cease anyways"
He said the same thing about Acid stomach.

Any of these new Gurus who doubt the original Ischemia model, might want to take note that Migraines are caused by the Main arteries and Veins being compressed and most of the medications (Like Caffeine) are vaso-dilators.

It's always gonna be about ANGER and Rage. It doesn't matter how positive the connotation of your current life circumstance appears. It's there. When you find it, the symptoms stop. When you find it often and start thinking different fron the inside out, you'll stop GETTING episodes.

As Sarno said "I don't treat Pain....We stop new pain from happening. Todays Brutal Honesty is prevention against tomorrow's episode."....Ok, I paraphrased, but that is what he said, minus my coloring.

 

This! I never usually say it on here because from past experience people leap in and exclaim 'that theory has now been debunked!' but personally I do more than think that in TMS one of the ways the brain causes symptoms is through ischemia. Suffering from so called severe 'fibromyalgia' it made sense to me that that was why my muscles hurt so badly... a little bit of oxygen deprivation = a hell of a lot of pain! This theory was the main reason I believed Dr Sarno, without it I would almost certainly have carried on going down the physical cause route, maybe for years.

 

I appreciate the all of the replies, yall. It's very helpful. I'll likely continue to comment in here as a sort of "dear diary" in conjunction with my journaling. Something about writing knowing that it's going to have eyes reading it that aren't just mine brings a bit of clarity.

Yesterday was good. No "rebound" migraine. Instead I started getting the beginning of a "tension headache" beginning in my jaw and temple on the left side. This is good. I haven't had them in a LONG time, and it's too much of a coincidence that they show up after I start making real efforts to see the migraines for what they are. I was genuinely pretty stoked about it. It did get worse throughout the day, but still very manageable and I was able to keep my head about it being due to job stress.

I was woken up this morning at about 5AM by a dream that ended with my wife and I and our daughter seconds away from our plane crashing. The same side of my face was very tense and throbbing. It took me a while of thinking through "there must be something here" to realize that I actually got some pretty scary news yesterday. We found out yesterday that my wife possibly has a clot that's going to need blood thinners. She's only 2 weeks out from her due date for our second kid. She's getting an ultrasound today to confirm, but it introduces the possibility of serious hemorrhage.

I'd told her to let me know any help she needs, and that we've got this, and then had to get back to work and helping with our current toddler and didn't really think about it all during the rest of the day. I'm realizing that it was sitting in my subconscious. My wife's first pregnancy was a miscarriage. It wasn't easy. While we're not dealing with a miscarriage risk here, if I sit with the feelings, I really don't want to deal with any pregnancy complications, or a PE/DVT, and I really don't want a dead kid or wife. It feels melodramatic to say that, or even think it, but that's what there.

I don't know that I would have faced this head on if there's wasn't a headache to deal with. And I'm wondering if maybe a better approach for myself with these is asking "what are you trying to tell me" rather than fighting them.

 

That is so weird. I was just gonna make a post about the value of dreams. I have gotten in the habit of rolling over in bed and speaking them into a recorder before I even turn a light on, or move around a bunch. It is Amazing how much insight into TMS we can get out of them!

Remember, Sarno uses a lot of the basic Freudian Model... when we sleep is when we go "quietly and safely insane".
All of the very simple mechanics that we CANNOT see from the point of view of our ego, or the 'Adult' become crystal clear in a good scary dream. It's symbolic of course, but we don't need a PhD to figure out the symbolism.

"Dreaming of a plane crash often signifies a feeling of being out of control, overwhelmed, or experiencing anxiety about potential failure or major changes in life" -Google AI

Most of the dream sites have the common ones catalogued. I am sure they are based on anecdotal evidence, but most of us are largely the same. I guessed that was what that means without the google bot.

I had a Very vivid dream that I got down on tape last night. I was in a fight with my Son and we decided not to speak or interact with each other anymore. Than, I watched him playing Baseball and was proud of him, but we still didn't speak to each other. I was Hurt in the dream.

In the 'real' world, we are working together on a Project and he has been really cold to me. Cold enough that I don't want to be there sometimes, but I don't have any other gigs lined up (I am a construction worker)....I used to work year round and support myself, but since I went to work for him I stopped finding my own gigs.
He is also getting married this month. There is probably a lot of unconscious anger about aging and losing my 'babies' (ridiculous) and him depending on me (vanity/ego). I also had to lay out a lot of cash to buy a new suit, find a babysitter for my dog....all mild discomforts I would blow off, but TMS doesn't blow off anything!

I awoke from the dream with Both hands tingling and numb. My hands have been the focus of any new crap lately. Haven't bothered me for weeks, but I was alone working with my son the other day, and they 'woke up'. (LOL)

In My experience, as long as I stay focused on the fear, anger, uncomfortable feelings, I do NOT get TMS symptoms by day. I don't need to talk about them, Just focus on them. Be aware that that stuff is going on 'down there' Where I have no access consciously. Our avoidance of fears is what the TMS is for...when we take over it's job, it loses it's purpose and goes away

 

Childbirth is so powerful and so much within it is outside of our control. It's super stressful even without complications, and even moreso with some extra issues!
A migraine is a fantastic distraction from such a situation! Looks clear as day to me that this is TMS and that the distraction from the worry + rage perhaps at not being able to control the situation are combining to give you a hell of a headache. AKA a major case of anticipatory anxiety + anger manifesting as pain. I am very familiar with this. You can work through this! Hang in there!

 

Holy cow, I may have missed this fact on the first pass but absolutely you are in prime TMS danger zone. There are alot of things there you can unpack:

- Fear for your wife
- Fear for your new child
- Fear for the changing dynamic in your family, including your existing child
- Fear of not measuring up as a father
- etc

 

@peytonr

I’m not surprised at all that your subconscious brain is giving you some TMS. Your brain is feeling nervous for you, and as @Baseball65 said, “no doubt, very angry.” I’d be thinking “why me?! Why us?! Why can’t things just go our way and be easy?” And no doubt, you are trying to be strong for your wife. That’s a lot going on.

Sending warm thoughts for a safe easy delivery for your wife and new baby and for your migraines to go away soon. ❤️