Symptoms from resuming exercise. Physical or TMS? (Or something else?)

Curious to know if others experience an increase in symptoms/discomfort after exercise?

I know why TMS symptoms occur and that they are a mind-body connection but I'm wondering about these post-exercise symptoms and what might be the cause(s).

I generally feel them after riding the exercise bike, jogging, or rigorous yard work.

Thanks!

 

Hi @Rybad80
I have had numerous bouts of TMS over many years. I have always experienced an increase of symptoms from exercising. I think it’s a prime way for your TMS brain to scare you into thinking something is really wrong and to discourage you from living a happy life. At one point I overcame pain that I felt while taking walks by just persisting. Over time, the pain diminished and went away.

 

Dr. Sarno in The Divided Mind:

“One of the prime characteristics of TMS is that the pattern of symptoms will develop as a result of Pavlovian conditioning. People will experience the kind of symptoms they have learned to expect to experience, just as Pavlov’s dogs learned to associate the presentation of food with the ringing of a bell. Elizabeth von R had pain associated with standing and walking, though there was nothing neurologically wrong with her. Another patient with similar pain will say that it is sitting that brings on the pain, while walking relieves it. Experience with large numbers of patients in our clinic makes it clear that these are programmed responses having no relationship to anything beyond what the patient is conditioned to expect.” (The italicization is Sarno’s; the underlining is mine.)
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What you get is what you expect, so change what you expect. It is a simple and as difficult as that. It takes commitment.

 

Well, that’s saying a lot! Yes: Very difficult, in fact. But I would very much like to achieve this capability, as my life is currently hijacked by a bunch of conditioned responses.

 

YES!

Lately I have been doing more and more physically. I get more symptoms. The funny thing is, they are only lasting a day or two. I think my brain simply adjusts to the new expectations and the symptoms ease up. I might lay low for a day or two - still exercising but not doing anything super aggravating, sort of the normal thing one might do when they've felt they over did it at the gym - a little less intensity for a day or two, and then get back to that increased intensity. I have noticed this really working for me, and it's breaking conditioned responses.

I refuse to be in fear or frustration when the symptoms increase. Instead I rejoice in my ability to have actually done the things that make them increase and my ability to just keep moving on and not worry about this increase. I'm just teaching my brain that it's all OK, and fine because there is nothing wrong. It might try and prove to me there IS something wrong, but I am disproving it.

However, at the same time I am moving and doing more, I do the TMS work and recognize how my thoughts, emotions, (and subconcious emotions) are the genesis of the TMS, not the actual exercise.

 

So hopeful! Love this!!!