Morning Pain in Bed

I'm not sure what people mean when they talk about "processing" events. It seems to mean that one must remember every stressful, anger inducing event that occurred in childhood. I was able to get rid of my TMS without doing this. I had fibromyalgia for 20 years and migraines for over 50 years and a whole lot of other symptoms over the years, and it all left after I did the journaling in Unlearn Your Pain. Yes, the journaling prompts brought up childhood issues and I was able to tie these to current personality traits, emotions, thoughts and behavior. Making those connections and acknowledging this truth and my emotions is what freed me of TMS.

I have an ACE score of 6, and had a very difficult and traumatic childhood. I was able to get rid of my TMS through self-help techniques. This is not to imply that my childhood trauma doesn't still impact my life. It does, mostly in my relationships, and I continue to work on it by drawing connections between my unconscious and conscious. But I'm free of TMS.

I'm not trying to imply that because I got rid of TMS without therapy, that everyone should be able to do it. I just want to put out there that it is possible, even for those of us who are survivors of terrible childhoods.

 

Wow, Ellen. This is great info, from someone with a similar background. It gives me hope. I have Schubiner’s book and did some of the journaling a couple years ago. I think I’ll dig it out and revisit. I’m hearing from some people they didn't journal and got better. Others didn’t get therapy and got better. I don’t regret the therapy I’ve had, even if it doesn’t get rid of my TMS. But I would love to find out what will. I know I need more patience.

 

I don’t know what other people mean. But for me, it means recognize the impact this info has had on your perception of your life. Grieving the info and expressing the anger. And then just letting it all soak in and make sense and then love yourself through it. It definitely takes a lot of time and energy. It has changed my feelings about myself—in a good way. It has relieved a lot of guilt and shame that never belonged to me.

 

Processing events is allowing them to be felt in the body and mind without pushing them away. To allow them (just as Diana-M states). We often begin to feel an emotion and then shut it down without realizing it. I do this all the time. So you may THINK (operative word) that you have experienced an emotion when you haven't allowed yourself to actually physically feel (operative word) the emotions within the body and without attaching any judgement to them. It's often described as having "coffee with your emotions", or "Sitting With" them (or an event or memory which is attached to emotions) you want to simply experience them without judging yourself within them.

 

This is such a great description! And I venture to guess that most, if not all, TMSers have the ability to instantly bypass emotions and feeling them in the body.