Day 1 My story- I know it’s TMS

When I was a child I was neglected and emotionally and physically abused by my alcoholic parents. Consequently, it’s not a surprise that my TMS started early.

Leg aches

As a very young child, I often woke up in the night with “Charlie horses,”’or very painful leg cramps. I also had night terrors often. Once walking home from elementary school at about age 7, I had a sharp pain on the bottom of my foot and I couldn’t walk on it. I hopped all the way home on the other foot. This is a vivid memory. Although I don’t remember telling my parents or going to a doctor, it never happened again.

Depression

In middle school and high school I was severely depressed. This depression continued into my adult life, but subsided when I began taking anti-depressants in my mid-30s (placebo effect). I still take them.

IBS

In college, I had IBS (diarrhea) chronically. I had severe stress to achieve. The IBS left when I left college.

Neck aches

I ended up getting married young and having 3 sons in rapid succession. It was an abusive marriage that I ended up having to leave. I got neck aches during this time. Doctors gave me muscle relaxers.

Foot tingling and sciatica

At age 35, my estranged father came to visit me. That same exact day, a mysterious tingling began on the bottom of my right foot and I had pain in my right buttock. This has persisted ever since, to greater or lesser degrees.

When this all began, I went to several doctors, had several MRIs all with no findings or diagnoses. I went to an orthopedic surgeon who wanted to operate on some anomaly he found in my neck. I didn’t follow his advice because I asked him if it would fix my tingling foot. He said no. I didn’t have any neck ache at the time and it didn’t make sense to me, so I declined the surgery.

Conditioned responses

As time went on, I lived with my foot and butt pain. But I had a bunch of weird symptoms and conditioned responses. They were always surrounded by stress at work, fear of losing my job, or in doing something fun that would make me happy—as if to convince me my life will never be good.

Once, my legs collapsed while trying to roller skate. I loved it and was good at it. On a field trip with the kids, my legs just wouldn’t work once I put the skates on. It happened another time when I was sledding with them. If a flew in a plane, I would get a severe back ache while riding on the plane. I love to fly. It would leave when I got off the plane. This went on for years, then finally one day it was gone. I had forgotten about it.

I like to walk for exercise and whenever I would slack off and not walk for awhile my symptoms would act up for a week or so then go away as I resumed walking. Any other random exercise- like in a gym, the same thing. It would act up. But if I kept at it, it would go away.

Carpel tunnel and allergies

At times all through the years, I would get achy wrists and I would wear Ave bandages or carpal tunnel wrist bands and it would go away. I also developed allergies to wheat, perfumes and red dye in clothing.

Anxiety and panic attacks

Flash forward to age 42. I am remarried undergoing some shocking difficulties in what I had thought was a good relationship. One day during this time period, I was driving down the highway to work and I had a full blown panic attack. My first ever. I thought I was having a heart attack. I plummeted into a 3-year era of severe anxiety issues. At one point I couldn’t leave the house. I thought my life was over. I was miserable and on the brink of panic attacks daily. I continued to have them but also began meditating daily, building up to 30 min. morning and evening. I did this religiously for a year and the panic began to subside. But it didn’t totally leave. I read a lot about healing from anxiety, learned about how important deep breathing is and learned some distraction techniques to use to ward off an attack.

At the time of the first panic attack, I worked from home but circumstances changed and I was forced to get a job outside the home. I was terrified. It took all I had to drive there each day. During the first week of the job I was eating lunch with my new boss and a coworker and I had a full blown panic attack at the table with them and just faked like nothing was wrong. It helped to turn the corner on my anxiety because it was a scenario I dreaded having happen. It happened and I lived through it. After that, when an attack would be mounting, I would say, “Go ahead. Have an attack. Who cares?”That attitude helped to make my panic attacks go away. I didn’t know about TMS yet or how to fight it, but it worked.

Back aches

Other TMS symptoms appeared and left through the years—usually related to horrible stress at work or relationship issues. I had back aches, and I had to sleep on the floor sometimes to make the pain subside. I thought it was my mattress being too soft. I got a new bed and it went away.

Prolonged coughs

I developed a cough that lasted 6 months after I had the swine flu. My primary doc ordered x-rays and found nothing; sent me to a pulmonologist who found nothing. It went away after that.

Another time I had a lingering cough for 4 months while employed by a boss who flirted inappropriately and also yelled at all the employees. I was given codeine cough medicine by my doctor. It went away when I left that job.

Again, I developed a cough and this time went to an allergist. I was in tremendous stress at work. The allergist said I had asthma and gave me 3 medications. I felt horrible on the meds and stopped taking them. Got laid off from that job and it went away. Never came back.

Tingling hands

Now let’s go to 2017. I’m in my 50s. Another stressful job. Really an unreasonable amount of work. I was working 10 hour days. My hands began tingling and it scared me. I found out about TMS and Dr. Sarno at this time. I began doing the journaling and reading his books. I also left that job. And my hands stopped tingling.

Feet and leg problems

During the pandemic, I entered my 60s. I was terrified of getting COVID. I began to get nightly night terrors. I had a lot of stress from other issues too.

During that time I started walking outside and developed very stiff achy knees. I had never had this before. I also got what felt like rocks in my shoes. Aches on the bottom of my feet. At the same time, I developed weak legs, nerve pain and numbness. Later, my hands became tingly again. COVID ended, but not my symptoms. I was doing Sarno TMS work like crazy—to no avail.

So, I began some very hard core psychotherapy. I’ve been in this therapy for 3 years. Very deep work.

Hands curling, balance problems

In December of 2023 I got COVID for the first time. It hit me pretty hard and I was bedridden for a week and coughed for 2 months afterward. During that time my hands began to curl of their own accord. My leg symptoms intensified to the point I don’t have the balance and strength to walk unassisted. I started using a cane, then a walker.

Breakthrough

Here’s my biggest recent breakthrough. Last Sept. my husband and I went on vacation. There was a little swimming pool across the street. My husband helped me to the pool and I almost locked up completely while walking there. Literally, my legs wouldn’t go. They were burning and cramping. But I made it and got in the pool through sheer determination.

My legs felt weird and tingly in the water and it scared me. But I decided I would have fun anyway. The next day I did it again. That night I had the least amount of symptoms I’ve had in years. It gave me hope.

Working on healing

I am convinced I have TMS but I still need a doctor to rule out other things. I dread this process because I don’t trust doctors. I am working hard on healing through the wiki classes, reading books, meditating, journaling and following advice from TMS leaders. I’m determined to heal.

 

As a fellow lifelong TMSer I just wanted to toss out one piece of unsolicited advice. Be very selective about any doctors you choose. You might even wait until you've done the SEP or studied up a lot and made some good solid 'connections'

I am a construction worker. I build, remodel and repair homes. Someone might call me over and say 'Hey...what should I fix on my home' and i might give them a laundry list of things that need updating or repair... but if they said 'Hey...what HAS to be fixed or repaired in my home' that is a very different list. Sometimes the honest answer is 'NOTHING'...I have yet to meet a Doctor who doesn't have something to prescribe or another specialty to go and see...mercifully I am financially unable to look into those things and 'Blessed are the poor'

Many of the things that doctors 'find' are normal and NOT pain causing.. I have been diagnosed with numerous of them. One of the most common comments new people might say is something like 'But the doctor found a torn _______' or 'The doctor found a damaged______'..... 'I have arthritis of the______'

Most of the things they find are essentially cosmetic and part of aging...

Most of us feel the same way. I have gotten in the habit of virtually never going for any pain and only half of 'real' things like covid and colds...

Welcome and good luck on your journey, though you won't need it because this isn't about luck...it's about learning.

 

@Baseball65 Thanks for your advice! I’m so glad to have found the wiki and I really appreciate the great wisdom coming from people like you.