Feeling defeated today

I am having urinary frequency associated with insomnia that came on about two months ago after a stressful time.

I had a great day yesterday. I had an appointment with my new psychotherapist on Wednesday and it felt like my urinary frequency symptoms vanished during the session. I felt like, this is definitely TMS. I was able to sleep through the whole night with no meds and felt great. I was optimistic yesterday. I exercised. I saw my PCP and told her I was doing better. I thought maybe I had turned a corner.

Then in the evening, I had to attend a minor social event. It wasn't even a big deal but I got super anxious leading to the event and my symptoms came back x100. When I got home, I had a drink, but that did nothing to calm me down.

I tried to do all the right things when I got into bed. I told myself it didn't matter if I slept or not. I listened to an audio book. I listened to brown noise. I got out of bed and did other activities to take my mind off it.

But now it's morning and I have slept for about one hour, if that. I went from feeling super optimistic to feeling disgusted and broken.

I know I have to stop caring and shrug off my symptoms and the insomnia. But I feel like if I could do that easily, I wouldn't have TMS in the first place.

I'm just feeling so dejected today... I'm posting this almost in tears.

 

Poor @Nightowl ! Big hug! I have been here so many times. It’s just overwhelming. Sad and hard. I truly feel for you. I still go through this all the time.

Think of getting better from TMS as always: Two steps forward one step back. Don’t ever expect it to just get better and stay better. As far as I know it doesn’t happen that way for anybody. Even people that have book cures.

You have to look at it like this: You had a good day, so that shows that you can have good days. More good days are coming— But you don’t know when.

You are on a quest. The quest is to find out everything you need to know to help your brain let go of this TMS. It’s going to involve a lot of study, exploration, Time, Patience, Trial and error. You name it.

You say, but how can I live if I can’t sleep? That’s a scary thing and a legitimate worry. As maddening as it is to hear— The less you worry about it the better off you’ll be.

Practice some meditation and deep breathing. Soothe yourself as much as you can in anyway you can. Pamper yourself with little things today. Try super hard not to feel sorry for yourself— That’s the absolute Worst thing you can do. It’s a form of victimization. The reason I know is, it’s the mistake I make all the time. Try hard to fight it by doing something that moves you forward… anything. Something that makes you feel like you’ve accomplished something nice for yourself. Journaling is a nice thing you can do for yourself. Or maybe clean out a drawer that you’ve procrastinated on. Something you can be proud of. It will give you the sensation that life moves forward.

One Day at a time. One foot in front of the other. You’ll get out of this —I promise. But it definitely won’t be as easy as you were hoping for. But that’s OK. You can do it! ❤️

 

Thank you for your beautiful response, Diana. It made me feel better. Sometimes it feels more like it's one step forward and two steps back, but that kind of attitude is only hurting me.

After reading your post, I booked a massage for tomorrow. I also just found a mind body counselor who was highly recommended to supplement my psychotherapy. I also bought a book about sleep that someone on this forum recommended. I'm trying super hard not to get down about all this. I have many hobbies that I love, but I was so depressed when I made this post, I couldn't contemplate it, but now I might try.

 

Your symptoms managed to calm down during your session. Great. This means they can go away for good.

I encourage you to practice not panicking when your symptoms ramp up again. Why? You’re essentially telling your brain that there’s something wrong every time you panic. So of course it will keep itself wrapped around you because it’s scaring you.

Anytime they ramp up, so what? I’ll go read my book or continue doing whatever I was doing.

Teach your brain you are okay. There’s nothing wrong. It’s a false signal. You’re completely fine. It’s like teaching a child. Eventually they’ll get it.

Of course teaching your brain will take SOME time so don’t get discouraged if you’re completely symptom free one day and it ramps back up again another day.

 

Thank you. I did a journaling session now and that seemed to help a bit too.

I hear you with not panicking! I'm so frustrating with myself. I keep yelling at my brain to stop panicking, but it doesn't listen. In fact, trying not to panic sometimes makes me panic worse! Do you have any tips along those lines?

 

Slow and steady. It's a process. What do you enjoy doing? Reading calms me down. Sometimes if I'm panicking I'll take a step outside in the grass barefoot to ground myself. The cold grass does something. Even a walk, focusing on what's ahead of me. Or I'll make a lavender honey tea to soothe myself. This is a journey. Sometimes yelling at our brain can be counterintuitive, too, so keep that in mind. Please check out Claire Weekes'. She has audios that are also soothing. Sometimes we just need a gentle voice to calm us.

 

it just takes time. Time will calm you down.

Yay!!! Fantastic!!!

 

I’m about to take a long walk, so I’m hoping that will help. I also love to read, although I’m having trouble focusing on my book lately.

 

This is called the fear of fear. You are sensing the physicality of fear -the sensations of it in your body and it acts like a symptom in your mind so it triggers more fear (I don’t know if I made that clear). Then you think “panic”. Yelling is something people might do when they panic. I was taught respond vs react.
Reacting is the yelling, the panic, the anger and frustration.
Responding is taking a breath and letting it out. It’s acknowledging for a second you are afraid, and taking another breath. Then it’s recognizing that’s all fear thoughts and as Claire Weekes instructs, the best way to deal with unwanted thoughts is to let them float on by like clouds in the sky. (Advice I need today because I’m in a new and creative flare, and a lot going on tomorrow that I was self-pressuring myself about).

I’ve been having a hard time sleeping. I meditate in bed before, sleep several hours and wake up.

My EMDR therapist had me create a safe space in my mind. Your favorite place real or imaginary and go there when you feel unsafe, panicky or anger like this type at yourself. I often soon drift back off to sleep…

 

Fear of fear makes total sense.

I need to be more consistent about meditating. My psychotherapist noted that it can actually get me panicky (true) so I shouldn't do it before bed, but rather at a more safe time. I'm curious to hear how and when others meditate?

My problem is that I recognize all the awful things my brain is doing, I know I need to stop, but I simply can't seem to. And the harder I try, the worse it is. I think it's like you said, I just need to get better at taking a breath and letting it out.

 

Maybe try meditating in the morning? Upon waking?

I notice my brain is a lot more quiet in the mornings and I pick up information/knowledge quicker.

 

A few things I learned from @TG957 - one is that meditation often takes about an hour. 45 minutes of which your brain is whirling about and you just consistently bring it back to center and focus on the breath (or whatever works for you. At one time it was my bare toe feeling air on it...that's all that would work and didn't freak me out)... the other 10-15 minutes your brain can actually get in the zone. The trick is sticking around for the first 45. I meditated this AM and I use guided meditations most of the time (or at least music), it was about 45 minutes and I got into the zone and listening quickly...but 10 minutes in my ear itched, my nose itched, my....you get it. Distraction city. I kept with it and could follow along the last 10 minutes...except for the last 3 when my mind started speeding up again because it was over and I was going through a list of what to do today

The other thing I learned is what I need in meditation. I need to follow along to a voice, I need guidance for at least the first 45 minutes. I like it simple: I do not like someone giving a speech during my meditation. That's not meditation! Yoga Nidra type meditation are my favorites.

I have no set time for meditation. Whenever I feel like it, it gets done. I've broken all my old rules of when to do things and worry about some kind of schedule for anything TMS related.

 

Oh my gosh, I'm so impressed you do it for an hour. I paid for a subscription to the Calm app, and they have a 30 day beginner meditation "course," which I'm going to try to do consistently. I think most of them are about 10 minutes. I'll have to work my way up after that.

I actually think the best thing I did for myself today was having a long cry. I felt a lot better after that.

 

Sometimes a good long cry is such a relief.