Reestablishing Day 1

This may be my first post on any internet forum ever. After heavily resisting the concept of the mind-body connection I found my way to TMS sometime last year or the year before. I sought out multiple private coaches but still found myself resisting both the diagnosis and the mental work needed to overcome it. Although I have consistently come back to the idea, I feel that I have failed to engage with it in an effective way. That is why I am biting the bullet and making this post and committing to do the structured educational program.

I graduated from high school with an active involvement in athletics and a habit of visiting the gym up to 6 days a week. As a skinny guy, I had always had the idea of bulking up front and center and tended to self-deprecate. After receiving a BA in economics, I moved home with my parents with little idea of what to do next. During the next year and a half, I found my way to programming and determined to move to Germany to pursue a different path. In the run up to my move, I had a surgery on my wrist to remove a ganglion cyst. Before electing to have the surgery, I had noticed a pain under my left shoulder blade I assumed had come from weightlifting. I decided it was a good time for a break and therefore a good time for the surgery (as I wanted to regain my ability to play tennis without compression on the nerves in the wrist). After a poor surgery in which the wound opened up and I went on antibiotics for several months, I returned to the gym to find the pain in my shoulder blade had not gone away.

From there, I started to spiral. Not only was my traditional stress-relieving activity (fitness) starting to feel inaccessible, but my whole life was at a crossroads. Looking back 5 years later, I can only imagine my oversensitive mind went into a full panic and locked into a viscous cycle of physical distraction. My most intense symptoms have been the development of crippling back and neck pain, stemming from the original point under my left shoulder blade. I have had many ups and downs, explored many paths both mental and physcial, but find myself stuck. It can be easy to tell yourself it has all been for nothing.

What I struggle with the most at the moment is fully embracing TMS as the cause of my symptoms and dismissing the arresting thoughts of serious illness or enduring incapacity. I worry about my resolve to stick with this program and to persevere with the exercises. I have always found mental strength through my physical fitness. Losing both my ability to move comfortably and my belief that I knew how to move in the first place (fitness empowers and destroys confidence if you are oversensitive and self-deprecating like me) has been devastating. I have pivoted toward a sedentary lifestyle and settled for a less-than-fulfilling daily experience steeped in pain and doubt. Now is Day 1 of never again.

 

Hi @breaksForAches

Don’t stress on removing all your doubt immediately. Start doing the work and just see where it will take you!
Being resistant to the work is not your fault, there is no blame. It’s just your brain continuing to protect you from digging into the entire genesis of your pain. Go slow, if these lessons seem long, break one up into two days, but stick with it.
While you do this work you are training your brain to notice your internal world..it’s important to balance being too regimented about it and making no excuses about getting it done.
Congratulate yourself for making the commitment!!