Posterior tibial tendon issues

Hi TMS friends,
Curious if anyone has experienced posterior tibial tendon issues like mine.

January 2023
After spending a little over six hours barefoot taking down holiday decorations, I noticed my foot hurt when I tried to go for a walk the next day. That pain stayed with me and I couldn’t go for walks. I eventually saw a podiatrist, who put me in a boot. The MRI of my ankle showed some inflammation around the tendon. Sidenote – this was an incredibly stressful time in my life. Eventually, I was able to walk again after about three months and all was back to normal. I did so some PT also.

May 2024
I had been making sure to wear shoes in the house at all times to keep my arch protected, even though I was never diagnosed with a fallen arch. For a brief moment, I was barefoot and all I did was take a step and feel a snapping sensation in the bottom of my same foot. I knew the same problem had returned. I went back in the boot and it took me another three months to start to be able to walk again. The MRI showed that the tendon was healthy, but there was some inflammation. I got a Cortizone shot, which didn’t do much of anything. I did some PT again. Side note- I was in a pretty high stress state during this time due to a serious decision I had to make about something else and due to family coming to visit.

November 2024
I was barefoot and took a step and was about to stub my toe so I lifted up my big toe to get it out of the way and prevent that from happening. As soon as I did that, I felt the shooting pain that I have now become accustomed to travel up the inside of my calf. Round three with this problem. Haven’t seen the podiatrist yet, but I’m sure it’s the same issue. It’s the same pain in the same place. Back in the same boot again. Side note- was feeling some stress during this time.

I have already been diagnosed with TMS by Dr. Schubiner. However, for whatever reason, I’m having a hard time believing this is classic TMS. The podiatrist hasn’t given me much information. I’m a walker and I need to walk for my mental health. When that is taken away from me for three months at a time, it’s really hard to stay sane. When this happens for stupid reasons, like taking a step or almost stubbing my toe, I don’t understand how I can go on with the rest of my life and not continually have this problem.

This time around, I only spent a week in the boot and slowly tried to resume walking. I definitely felt pain while walking and put the boot back on, but I’m not spending every minute in it.

Thank you in advance for your thoughts and contributions.

 

There. That's the part that matters. All of that stuff about whatever with your foot? That's to distract you from The above, and maybe some other stuff you didn't mention. Sarno said "When it seems to come out of nowhere, Look really close." Really close would be FAMILY, Best Friends, Career, Partner. (or lack of)

That means you have it really good...or bad depending on how you look at it. The more physical it looks the better it serves as a distraction. I had foot pain come out of nowhere...felt like I was walking on bruises...Nails. There was NO WAY it was TMS...
But, just to be sure, I contacted @Cactusflower ....and she called me out in about 4 minutes.

It turned out to be anger at my GF for abandoning me with our Dog. How can I get mad at my sweet loving Puppy? It's not her fault? So, while I was out on Runs (with my dog) I got TMS in the feet. If I had been playing shows it might have been my hands...if I needed to work, it would have been my back. How do I know she was right?

Because when I ran Through the pain, but focused on my anger at my GF? The pain went away fast...like really fast.
It might not have left as fast if I had conditioned it in deeper by maybe, going and getting a diagnosis from a podiatrist? They would have said it was bone spurs, or plantar fasciitis and would have made me stop running and walking ...and that Scare? That might have kept me occupied for months.

TMS is there to Protect us from 'scary' emotions. The more obsessed with it we become, the better the distraction.
Might be a good time to get out Schubiners Book or Sarno (My Fave) and start reviewing where you were with Family, career, partner, $$$, generaL ANXIETY, etc....

 

Whenever you feel the need to write a question in such detail with dates and exact circumstances of remembering minutia, then it’s TMS. This is typical hypervigilance.
PPDT was one of my TMS issues. We even went to San Francisco to see a podiatrist who worked for the Ballet and saw a lot of this “diagnoses”. He was excellent explaining it is not a “real” diagnoses because it happens for many reasons. His dancers who are stressed from overwork, aging dancers whose arches are falling (me) and are experiencing stress about their post dancer identities…and, he suggested many other people who are stressed, depressed (this was a big part of it) and tense.
Sarno was very clear that any type of chronic “diagnoses” of tendons is pretty much TMS.
I suffer a lot of body pains still, but rarely PPDT anymore, when I do it is usually just for mere minutes. It’s an immediate sign for me I’ve just repressed some strong emotion. I laugh at my ankle and then take a second to reflect on what situation triggered me to choose experiencing ankle/foot pain over the sensations of the emotion. (Hint, 99.9% of the time it’s anger).
I am also sensible, I tape an arch cookie to the underside of my shoe insoles, only because of my fallen arches and follow my PT’s basic advice to wear well designed shoes most of the time and for walking distances - but that has a lot to do with my actual age related foot changes. I don’t fear or obsess over it.

@Baseball65 and I are proof this is just TMS.
Your reluctance is just resistance and your brain doing its protective TMS thing. If you have done the work in the past, jump back into it, then continue to employ the work in times with no symptoms, because it helps you deal with stress.

If you have not yet engaged in TMS work then we’re happy to help you get started.

 

Thank you @Cactusflower and @Baseball65 for hour response and thoughts about this situation. I’m trying my hardest to believe it’s TMS but it doesn’t really meet the FIT criteria. I felt that lightning bolt pain shoot up my leg it’s been hanging up at the top near the knee and at the bottom near the ankle. It doesn’t move. It’s not on both sides of the body. It’s constant. It doesn’t go away when I’m having fun. Things like that make me think it’s not. I’m trying to be brave and going for walks and smiling the whole time to convince my brain that I am safe. Telling myself messages that I am. But with the MRI showing inflammation and chronic plantar fasciitis, plus being overweight, it just makes me doubt.

 

I have pain that is constant and does not move in my back and it’s TMS.
TMS is chronic pain, that is psychologically generated, period.
There are no “rules” about it having to move, or be on both sides of the body. I used to get shooting pain in my back due to the tension it was holding.
You will need to open your mind and stop creating rules about things (TMS legalistic personalities tend to do this) and see the reality of your situation.
Begin by reading Dr. Sarno (again), notice your personality traits in his writing. See how yours impact your thinking. Notice how they tend to come into play to smother your emotions. Perhaps journal about them, especially how they tend to keep you holding onto anger and old hurt feelings.

 

May I suggest that your attention to the pain is part of the problem? I had terrible right foot problems about a decade ago, which went when I had an MRI that showed the foot was normal. In March this year, I injured my foot very lightly while out walking a friend's dog and I've spent most of the year in and out of physio for PTT, which has abated and now flared back up again. Tendons heal, and they heal under load. Me lying in bed too afraid to walk to the bathroom is not a psychologically reasonable or normal response to this; my brain is back, hooked and obsessing. Yes, I too have read those questionnaires about 'is your pain TMS?' but your brain is going to manifest TMS pain ways that make us doubt that it is - that's the (wicked) beauty of TMS. As long as you're more obsessed with the pain than finding out what's behind the pain, TMS is winning and worsening. I am convinced that my issues have manifested in a part of my body which my brain is already quite vigilant over - one dog-walk in March, by a healthy 45 year old, shouldn't result in my pain, and taking some decorations down, or the odd jaggy step, shouldn't result in yours.

 

I 100% agree and know that my attention is the fuel for this fire. I don’t know how to turn it off even with a mindbody therapist and a lot of knowledge about this topic. Even with knowing what my repressed emotions are. You’d think I’d be a pro if you knew me. It’s nuts. I just can’t stop thinking about it when I’m walking. Too guarded. Fear is the fuel.

How do you know that tendons heal under load? That’s new info for me. Charlie Merrill did a post on tendons on his IG and didn’t mention anything like that. Just a timeline of 4-6 weeks.

 

Do you happen to have a kind of image in your head of what is happening in your foot?
When I read your post I noticed some visual things that can really stick with you, like the MRI of the inflammation, and the Arch of the foot not being supported.
For me, when my symptoms persist, I mostly subconsciously have a scary image in my head of what's happening or what the spot inside my body looks like. When I bring that to the surface (by asking, what does this look like for me), most of the time this image has some illogic aspect to it, so I know it can't be true. Then I can sometimes change that image through visualising the same spot functioning perfectly (usually with some green color, or light, or stuff like that.)

Your foot arch thing triggered this thought because I solved my foot pain with this method.
I always had the image in my head of my foot collapsing inward, and that was the reason my foot hurt. my physiotherapist told me.
So any time I wore shoes without ankle support I had the expectation, and visualisation that my foot would collapse inward and hurt.
When I started questioning this, I checked out my ankle while walking and came to the realisation that my ankle really wasn't that bad. it was mostly straight. So I started visualising my straight, and strong ankle. This was a major point of recovery for me.

 

There has to be a reason. What do you think the reason is? What would it take to persuade you that Schubiner’s diagnosis is correct? What reason, if any, is there to think you are not in the 85 to 90% of the population that Sarno said are unable to accept a TMS diagnosis?