Day 1 Reluctant to share but excited to recover

Hi,
I have absolutely no doubt of the power of my mind to afflict my body and senses. As a lifelong sufferer of PTSD, the evidence of this in my life has been abundantly clear. I have even nearly died a few times over the last 49 years from what I recognize as psychogenic illnesses. The mind can pull off some astounding bodily feats, even if you are not a guru!

I recently "graduated" from therapy and psych meds, feeling free of most PTSD symptoms after a lot of hard work. I still have emotional work to do, but I guess I had kind of given up on the last little bit and was moving on with my life.....then I started getting pain and mysterious bouts of illness. I did get cleared (well, almost done with the tests now) by a doctor and realized that I was essentially in a slow-motion panic attack that made a mountain of illness out of a few minor issues. I was probably subconsciously using some of it to avoid the remaining emotional work I needed to do, and cope with the fear of all the changes the last year has brought.

I bought some Sarno books (on the way), subscribed to Curable, started to get clear with myself through JournalSpeak (read N.Sachs' book too) and renewed my meditation practice. I have stopped looking for validation in the medical world, and wish I had never gone down that road due to my new institutional stigmatization with a Fibromyalgia diagnosis. I am going to try to do this SEP as well, though I feel vulnerable and am not enthusiastic about sharing my story online all that much.

I feel a lot more empowered and less afraid after working with all these resources over the past week. I did finally realize the original symptom that started the cascade was cubital tunnel syndrome, and was able to fix it in only a couple of days with some simple exercises. The rest of my symptoms I recognize as fear piling on once the original symptom caused my doctor to declare she was sure it was psoriatic arthritis and refer me to rheumatology. The wait list for rheum appointments was about a year, and in that year I got sicker and sicker, and the mountain of symptoms got huge....an emotional cycle I am sure of now. I do have pretty awful-looking spinal arthritis, but I know from long experience that my pain depends on how busy I am - distraction makes me feel just fine, so I don't need to feel the pain ever at all if I have good mental hygiene! I have a strenuous volunteer job that I love, and I intend to keep doing it regardless of what an X-ray says.

I still have some mild physical symptoms after the first week of pursuing this as TMS, but I am hoping to continue to get better over time as I work to calm down further. Luckily, I have a great support system and a very nice low-pressure lifestyle that gives me room to grow and feel better. Thank you for this web site. I truly believe the answer to my current ills is psycho-social, so I am going to try to do all of it including posting here.

Here I go.

 

I should also mention that in the past week working on my TMS, my psoriasis has significantly reduced! I wasn't expecting that, and didn't consider my current level of psoriasis an issue (no discomfort), but wow!

 

Hi fishy, and Welcome,

This seems to be an important insight, part of your work to make sense of why you have symptoms. Congratulations on finding this work, and engaging it with so much gusto lately. Wishing you success on your journey.

Andy

 

Awesome! Remember that early success if you have doubts later. It's a great tool to keep you motivated. Good luck with the program!