Pelvic pain 90% better and continues to improve

Hi all!

I kind of disappeared here about a month or so ago, but realized that I'm now at a spot where I could post a success story (or a 'it's pretty much gone now, 90% better' success story).

After first learning about TMS in early October, I came here fairly skeptical and somewhat convinced that my case was different, and maybe I'd never get better. At the beginning of October, I spent much of my day, curled up in the fetal position, severely depressed and in pain. And now I'm here, living my life like normal.

I'm happy to report that my pain is about 90% gone now. Most of my days are pain free, and the days that the pain is there, it's pretty fleeting and a slight annoyance at worst.

The more I let go of the fear of pain, acknowledge it (but shift my focus from it), the more it's receded away. It's less than 1/4 bad now as it was a month ago, and a month ago, it was about 1/4 as bad as when I first started in October. Before, I was afraid of sitting on a seat without a cushion. Now, I've gone on a 20 mile bike ride on a fairly hard seat with no problems.


The pain only really shows up when I think about it (I can feel a slight twinge right now - it's sneaky!), or when I'm extraordinarily stressed, and I know how to take care of it once it does. With time and letting myself feel my emotions, it recedes away again. Even if I have a serious flare, I know I can beat this now.

I hope my story can help give some hope to others struggling with TMS, and especially pelvic pain TMS. Just a few months ago, I was desperately searching the forum for posts about pelvic pain, and found some encouraging stories on here that really helped me.

Most other forums - particular those for prostatitis and pudendal nerve entrapment - are very dark places. The one thing that gave me hope starting out was how positive everyone was on this forum, and reading about the successes of others. It convinced me there is light at the end of the tunnel (and now I'm finally there!)

I'm truly thankful for this forum. You all saved my life, and I'm serious about that statement. For those of you who devote your time to helping spread the word about TMS and help others like me, you have my immense gratitude.

 

Hi c90danwaiel,

I am so happy with your report. I am glad this forum and our encouragement was helpful! And your encouragement and story are now here to carry on, adding positivity and truth help the myriad of mis-diagnosed folks who manage to find Dr. Sarno's work.

This seems so positive and clear. You know how TMS works in you, and you have the skills and the attitude to work with it, and not be frightened by it. Bravo! In my experience, just doing your process, gently, is the best approach. I hope you don't worry about the remaining pain. Your activity and your skilled response keeps "educating" the deeper parts of you with the message that "there is no need for these symptoms." When you truly don't care if the symptoms are there or not, then there is no need for them.

Andy B

 

Congratulations. Your story is inspiring! Do you mind sharing how you are able to NOT think about the pain.

 

Thank you! I feel like one of the huge milestones was when I got over the fear of the pain and just started living my life like normal again. I definitely have no fear of remaining pain. My mental reaction now is more like, "Well, this is annoying", and then I get back to what I was originally doing. Then it just fades away.

 

Right - that's a great question! It's more easier said than done. I'd say I started out by shifting my focus away from the pain. It was certainly on my mental radar, because it was there, and it hurt! But, every time my mind started focusing on the pain, I'd shift my focus to something else.

It took a lot of time, and I felt like I was rewiring my brain in a way, but with time, I was spending more and more time not thinking about pain. I hit a period where I was spending most of my day not focused on the pain, and still feeling it. But with time, the pain itself started to fade.

One day, I woke up and pain wasn't the first thing I thought of the morning and the last thing I thought about when I went to sleep. I kept at it, and eventually, I had my first pain free day. And then I've had days where I haven't even thought about that I don't feel pain anymore. I just live my life. When I do think about it, it seems rather surreal. The fact that my brain could've generated so much pain and suffering without an underlying physical cause is still hard to wrap my head around.

 

Wonderful explanation!! This would be instructive for anyone. I might suggest you cut and paste this description and make a new post titled something like "Learning to Ignore Pain with Good Results!"

 

I've very nearly hit a year on this forum, and thought I'd post here to mark my progress. I'm doing great! It's been nearly 10 months since my first post on this thread last December, when my pain had decreased by 90%. Now it's practically gone.

I did have a flareup in April, which I've heard is to be expected, and it lasted about a week. Managed to maintain my outcome independence and it went away. I ended up on the other end of things with even more confidence and haven't had a flareup since! I'm now strangely grateful for it, since I think it inoculated me against future flareups.

When I had my pain, it lasted about 5 months before I came across this forum and started getting better. Now I'm going on about 10 months virtually pain free. I've lapped it twice, and have every bit of confidence I'll keep doing so.

Extremely grateful for having found this forum, and glad to see so many people come here and improve, especially folks with pelvic pain issues.

 

If you dont mind me asking a few questions. Im new to this concept. Just diving into it. One issue is my mind has associated this pelvic pain with orgasm. Did you guys have the same issue? If so, how did you mentally get passed that?

 

I didn't have that particular association (apart from one week when I thought I had prostatitis and had heard that could be a trigger; had pain after once, but then didn't the next time and realized it must not be a consistent trigger).

I know some other people have had that consistent association though. I'd say the way to best move past that might be what works for other conditioned responses: don't shy away from inducing the trigger and stay outcome dependent. That worked for getting me back on my bicyc

 

Hi Joe: I had this problem for a long time. I had painful orgasm and learned that it was part of my TMS, a conditioned response. The way you get over this is to eliminate the fear of the activity by not avoiding it and using Alan's concept of outcome independence. (Just as Dan mentioned above.)

 

Congratulations on being pain free. I have not been on this forum in well over a month. For the last 5 weeks I have been completely pain free. Then 4 days ago a flare up started, after a nasty argument with my mom who I really no longer talk to anymore. I also saw GI doctor that day who petformed an internal exam but everything is fine. I have been running 12 to 15 miles a week and lifting weights. Another new thing that I did over the last few days is started a new pre workout that helps induce muscle strength and growth. There is no way this could have caused the flair right? I start worrying about little changes that I make possibly causing flare ups for some odd reason. Thoughts?

 

Thank you. You are all great people. I will keep you all posted. I have every bit of mind in me to know this will be done. Thanks peeps. Thank you Chris for showing what is possible.