Day 10 Story so Far

Morning everyone.

I'll tell the highlights of my TMS journey so far:

Major symptoms are brain fog and fatigue. In that these are the ones causing the most distraction and fear.

Sub symptoms are skin issues on legs, mouth ulcers, potentially a dairy/peanut/oat intolerence (am slowly testing this one!) And various other bits n bobs.

Since reading Sarno's book, and subsequently finding this educational program, life has gotten... Interesting!

Initially the intellectual acceptance of the diagnosis, but not quite believing it was possible. My uncle is a wise and experienced and amazing GP. Back when I used to self medicate and self treat my symptoms, he wouldn't disparage my attempts, but he wouldn't leave them in challenged either. So I sometimes picture him, and what he would say if he knew I fully accepted this diagnoses.

I had a chat with him last night actually. Told him I had read Sarno's book, and we had both read an article in the BMJ on long covid recovery that Schubiner had posted somewhere here weeks before. His response was not what I expected (but knowing him, perhaps I should have!): He said the first thing he determines with patients is what their beliefs are around their symptoms. Then he works with that, acceoting that if the mind is on side and belief in the treatment is present, the battle is mostly won. He believes there is a psychological element to all disease.

This was perhaps somewhat of a watershed moment for me. The other watershed(s) in my accepting the diagnoses have been:

1. The knowledge that TMS takes the form of whatever is vogue
2. Knowledge that TMS hits where it hurts most. In the past I have had low back and shoulder pain whilst living in a ski resort, anxiety and racing pulse whilst doing creative music writing, problems with fatigue and fog when I've been obsessed with having energy, wrist issues when playing guitar, sexual issues whilst being a red blooded young man, insomnia throughiut most of my life...etc
3) multiple moments of gathering evidence that my symptoms are not structural: getting flu symptoms for 24 hours (usually they last 1-2 weeks with me as I worry and treat myself like a petal), realising that fog lifts and fatigue/insomnia do too if I go out and enjoy life with friends or family, and loads of other examples.
4. Pushing my fears. I halved my dose of SSRI the night before a big day at work. Soemthing I have known in my gut I want to do for a while but kept finding excuses/fears not too. I ate things containing dairy and nuts. I stayed up late if I felt like it. I went out walking or to see friends when I felt exhausted. Did exercise. Over exerted myself at work.

For the most part... I've not felt any worse than before, sometimes even a bit better, sometimes much better.

I'm not in the clear yet, however much j wish I was. That's the area of mindfulness for me: patience. Who knows how long this takes. I am coming off SSRI's, re introducing foods I've not eaten for a long time, and reprogramming my neural pathways. I suppose that's a fair bit for the body to handle.

One question I have is: with the intolerences... What if I'm just getting used to them, and they're still causing issues but in a low level, chronic way, without me realising because I get used to it? That seemed to be what happened with dairy. I guess there's no way of me really knowing if that's TMS or structural...