You will be able to play again

 I know how much you're hurting right now. It seems like there is no end in sight, but I can tell you that it will pass. You are very close to turning a corner in your life. The light will come back. Do not give up on healing.

You won’t believe this but 10 months from now you are going to change. You will listen to a podcast which will change your life. You are about to learn about something called TMS, or PPD. Then you'll get the chance to work with an author of the PPD textbook.

Think of everything you have been through in your life. Think how much pain you have suffered by others’ actions. Where do you think that pain goes? Where does the frustration and anger actually go when you let it build up? Into your body, into your muscles and tendons in the form of tension which causes you the pain. Your body right now is trying to fool you into thinking there is something wrong with you so that you do not deal with your emotional pain from everything you have been through.

Do not give up.

You are about to discover the most amazing thing, you are a highly sensitive person. This is where your super powers come from.  

Your time is coming. Do not fear this any more. You are stronger than you know and you can do anything you want to. It is time to get excited. Excited that the end is in sight. Excited that this is not the way your life is going to be forever.

You will be able to play with the girls again. You won't be as grumpy and you will get back to training in the gym. Everything will fall into place. Just give it time and trust your thoughts.

'I'm hoping to change roles in my career'

You won’t believe this. I met a lady called Mags Clark-Smith, who helps to resolve chronic pain. 

With her help I discovered that basically, I was holding on to so much and I was in pain due to the unexpressed emotions. It’s true I never really understood how to express my emotions. I always appeared to be in a good mood. I was driven by this learned behaviour, by my energy, my motivation and my joie de vivre.

I have learned so much through this process with Mags. I have completed ten sessions and am now completing five more. The work wasn’t easy, I will admit, however so very worthwhile.  I have experienced a weight lifted off my shoulders, a feeling of lightness, my mood has improved, I am not as sad anymore and I have really developed a greater sense of self awareness. 

Being a ‘people pleaser’ I often seek external validation. I am now aware of this and make an effort to turn inside and listen to within, then trust my judgement.  I now recognise that internal validation rates a lot higher than external validation. My gut and I are now best friends and I no longer wrestle with my conscience. 

I was definitely spinning too many plates and my cup was empty. I have learned to take those plates down, one by one and neatly stack them. Refill my cup and heal fully. I still create “to-do lists” but now I include myself! What will I do that will make me happy? I prioritise and make sure that I am doing things for myself now. I enjoy my walks, my strengthening exercises, my meditation. 

Mags asked me to write a number of unsent letters. These letters were really helpful and the fowler my language was the more impactful it was. Burning them afterwards was a great exercise and helped to expel all my anger. 

I do still get a little anxious, but I am working on that.  Now, I am hoping to change roles in my career, and I am using this year to gain as much professional knowledge as possible. It really helps that I can think more clearly and that I am calmer. My fear is reducing!

Take care and remember I love you. 

Love, your future self.

You have finally broken free

You have just returned home from Oxygen and you had a blast, but the entire time you were there you were in pain. You felt it in your left hip all the time and you drank to make yourself feel better. You have been going to physio and doing copious amounts of stretching and strengthening work, but nothing is working.

I’m here to tell you that you have finally broken free. You are living in a way that was unimaginable to you back then. It turns out the pain you have been a victim of is your body’s last ditch attempt to get your attention. You haven’t felt safe in a long time. You knew something was off; that life was hard; that being around people was difficult. I can tell you that all those feelings, sensations, and pain are related.

You have met the love of your life and you have two beautiful, healthy, happy children. In the years after that concert, you put up an enormous fight: training; persevering; battling; and ultimately learning to live with pain, anxiety, bitterness, regret, and resentment. You tried so hard to keep it all in. You fought tooth and nail to live your life the way you wanted to live it.

Just this last week, you brought both your children on their first holiday! It was tough as they were so small, but you still had so much fun! In the days that followed you drove up to Dublin to see another concert. You’ve stood up strong in your work and demanded better teammates because that’s what you deserve. The list goes on! This is what you are capable of. This is the life you deserve. This is the life you are living.

You’re working with a specialist in chronic pain who has enlightened you to the interconnected-ness of the struggle and strife you fought against for 11 years. You are now getting closer and closer to being your true self. Everything you found hard before is now easier. You still have pain but you see it as a signal, you listen to it, you examine it, you learn from it. Same with anxiety, it makes you question your surroundings, your company, your actions. These sensations and emotions serve a purpose and you are learning everyday what that means for you. Ultimately all of this means less pain!

You are still on a journey but it’s a good one. You are blazing a trail with Mags’ help. That painful chapter of your life is over, this new one is just beginning.

'I believe I can live to my full potential'

I am writing to let you know how things will change for you. At the moment the pain is almost unimaginable and you would give anything for it to stop, even for 30 minutes so you could just sleep. You've been stuck in a hotel room on the floor for three days and you can’t even get up to get something to eat. You know this pain is TMS, and it is quite literally curling you up into a ball under the weight of it.

You are now beginning to consciously realise something that you already knew - the TMS hasn't gone away, you've only been patching up the ship, and at some point you will have to change your tactics and confront the issue. You go to a professional - her name is Mags Clark-Smith - who you judge to specialise in exactly the issues you are having. It's a difficult step to take because you feel like you could be fuelling the issue by giving it more attention, but you also can't go in living in this fear which is crippling you. 

The process begins by finding out you are a sensitive person, and that this is not average. You find out most people are not like you, to your surprise! And that sensitivity and emotional awareness is a double-edged sword; it's a huge part of the reason you're in this mess, however it's also the route out of the situation and into a better life in the future. You will begin to spend a lot of time thinking deeply about the thoughts and beliefs that you had as a child. This is part of the process of giving a voice to the inner child and beginning to break the seal on the thoughts and feelings that you had to repress as a child. You will realise that the values you thought were important were quite extreme in terms of responsibility.

You will begin to unpack those beliefs by finding different ways to voice your inner child; writing unsent letters to key childhood characters, talking to Mags and relating the lessons learnt into your current life. Even now we are currently in the middle of a process. It's difficult to know how far along the road we are - I suspect it's not even half way yet. But I am now far enough through that I can begin to believe that I can free myself from TMS/PPD and go on to live to my full potential for myself, and for those around me. 

"Your back no longer defines you"

Your back no longer defines you. It is not the first thing you think about – you might not even think about it at all on a given day. People still ask you about it and you have to stop and think before you answer, meaning it is no longer at the forefront of your mind. You are now more comfortable with who you are – less uptight and more content.

I never thought I would spend any time, never mind so much time, ‘helping myself’ – not in a million years! It hasn’t been easy but it has definitely been worth it. If six months ago I had had a glimpse of my Audible library from now, I would have thought I had been hacked!

“You will one day stop feeling helpless”

You will one day stop feeling helpless and learn to understand how valuable you are in your job. I know you think now that you only have your job because you’ve been there so long, but you will learn to re-frame work in your mind, and you have become such an integral, valued part of the team. You have the strength to get through it. This will come from within you. It is in your power to control your behaviours.

You will rediscover your strengths, and be able to say them out loud, and you will enjoying challenging things and standing up for what you believe in. That feisty part of you will rise again and you will feel passionate about what you do. You will learn to place work in the context of the other aspects of your life, and understand how important it is to you. The biggest change in future will be how you feel. You will feel calmer, in control, and not as downtrodden, helpless or alone.

You will regain all of your energy for life. The person lying on the bed with alpen in the dark will have zest for life, and will feel very content. Life will still pose challenges but you will be in a better place to tackle them. You will feel in control. These changes will be deep inside you, and you will direct them.

“I promise you’ll come out a happier, stronger and pain-free person”

It might be hard to convince you, and a really hard thing to believe that an approach with the mind can help the body. But trust me, there is a connection. Although you’ve been diagnosed with a physical illness “fibromyalgia” by your rheumatologist and you’ve seen countless doctors that blame this part of your body and that part of your body, at this stage you’re probably convinced that the pain you’re experiencing is only of a physical origin. The pain is real. You are definitely not imagining it. Your muscles are aching, you can’t stand for long and a simple walk in the park is brutal sometimes.

But what if I told you that through a mind body approach I’ve achieved a massive 40% pain relief in my upper back and I’m well on my way to making a full recovery with my legs too? Think about the pain in your upper back for a second, it’s the part of your body that’s been killing you for nearly two years, and it has stopped you from simply sitting at your dinner table and sending your friend a text. You’ve spent close to €2,000 on osteopath visits that you know barely achieve any lasting relief past a day. How about you give the mind body approach a real go? If you think about the pain itself, why would someone like yourself with such a healthy body suddenly develop a chronic pain condition? There is nothing serious that’s shown up in any blood tests, MRI scans, X-rays or even high-tech bone density DEXA scans to say there is anything wrong with you! You are as healthy as you could get so don’t let pain get in the way of moving on with your life.

I now know that it is really significant that the two biggest pains you’re dealing with now started at emotionally turbulent times in your life. Remember that and please don’t forget it. The crazy student election went hand in hand with your leg pain and your terrible relationship with someone else kicked off your back pain. If there was a real physical injury the pain wouldn’t have come on at these points! And I know You like to say that the leg pain came on after a fall off your bike but most people don’t develop unilateral leg pain after a simple fall off their bike. Our bodies are far more resilient than that and most walk away from it unscathed and barely affected. If the pain was truly physical you wouldn’t be able to go and dance for hours on end at the club with your mates, or stand for ages in your bedroom trying on your favourite clothes. I’m not putting any blame on you here but I want to tell you that the pain has meaning. Its telling you that there are key things in your life you need to address. Things that your subconscious would rather bury and lock away because it’s too painful to deal with at the time.

It might sound a bit far off but we now know that emotions and illness do really go hand in hand and all you have to do is buy a book by Gabor Maté to convince yourself of that or look at your own history. Let me ask you about the relationship with your Mum, the pain in your upper back started when you two were fighting so have you ever thought that the burning pain you are experiencing now is because of unresolved anger and emotions related to that event? And it’s totally ok to be angry, but holding it in is the worst thing you can do for yourself. You need to get angry and let it go, and that’s going to be part of your therapy. Mags will teach you how to do that safely. Holding all of it in like you are now might feel good in the short term and it might bury your problems. But let me tell you all of that buried energy has to manifest somewhere and its manifesting in your back. No wonder the pain gets worse when you think about her or talk to her over the phone! It’s your body telling you that your brain needs sorting out.

I know you’ve read Sarno’s books and you’ve tried another practitioner’s program and it’s unfortunate they haven’t worked for you. I’m sorry but remember that Sarno said 15 percent of patients need additional psychological assistance and that’s exactly what Mags is there to do. There is nothing like one-on-one therapy with someone you can trust and build a relationship with. They’ll be able to guide you through any pitfalls and questions you have and give you a supportive tailored plan of recovery. I know there is probably a bit of scepticism on your part, the thing is that is good. Mags encourages you to be sceptical, to ask her questions and to really understand stress illness, and let me reassure you that I have full confidence in your recovery. You’ve tried everything the medical world has to offer and even spent thousands on stem cells and all of it in total has made only a small difference. So give this a real go and I can promise you you’ll come out on the other side a happier, stronger and pain-free person!

“I walk every day without pain”

So here you are in A&E. This is it, the end of the road. I know how hard Christmas was, how you felt the pain coming on gradually. I know that you had to try to hide it from your family and friends, and the stress and weariness that comes with those actions. You know deep down that everyone really knew what was going on but the pain was so consuming that you didn't really care. The past three days have seen pain like you never thought was possible. I remember crying in the bed, unable to move with pain wondering if this was it. And so your wife convinced you to go to A&E since the pain was so obvious to her, and I also remember how painful it was to walk into the hospital that morning, every single step was painful. And it's here where you finally admit to your wife that you're tired of hiding the pain, tired of thinking about it with your every waking moment, tired of worrying about the future.

What if I told you that in less than four months' time you would be running around playing with your kids? Last evening I played a game of football with my son. I now cycle when I want, not when I think I might be able. I walk every day without pain. And I now look forward to our new home, and all the jobs that have to be done in the garden and around the site bring me feelings of excitement not anxiety. I get up every morning pain free!!! I'm even thinking of dusting down my old surfboard, can you believe that! 

If someone had told me all of this back then I wouldn't have believed them to be honest, it's difficult to have any hope when you're in the darkness like that. But just let me tell you this much... Your future is bright.