Surgery

[Alan1646]

Thank you for the excellent post Ezer.

[desperate]

If this problew stems from the mind I feel like herbs to power up the parasympathetic nervous system should woRk. Power up those kidneys and take herbs to sooth the nervous system. Make sure it's the parasympathetic nervous system though.

[ezer]

This probably should be moved to the "other therapies" section, but I'll post it here as a follow up to prior posts:

Whether you call it unconscious or subconscious mind there is a part of the mind that stores data in code that is not language and therefore that we cannot access directly.

It is the limbic system and is well demonstrated by science. The limbic system has total control over your body. It regulates body temperature, heart rate, blood pressure etc.

http://neuroscience.uth.tmc.edu/s4/chapter06.html

The limbic system of the brain is responsible for converting short-term memory (information the brain stores for a short period of time) into long-term memory (information permanently stored in the explicit memory, which you can recall when needed). The limbic stystem also stores emotional memories as well as threat memories in what is called the implicit memory.

All mammals record emotions and threats as code in the limbic system and they remain there for a lifetime. Early childhood emotional experiences in the pre-verbal stage are not processed by reasoning and are stored directly as emotional data that is difficult to recall into explicit memory (the memory that you can access). It is why childhood trauma is so harmful.

Because of the huge amount of emotional data to be stored and the need for it to be immediately available to the limbic system for response in case of danger (the fight/flight/freeze response) it is coded into the implicit memory and not stored as common language.
When a pedestrian crosses in front of your car, without thinking you hit the brake pedal. Why? You don't think about it. You just do it. In this case, it is a freeze reaction that is processed based on your previous threats and emotions stored in the implicit memory.

One school of thoughts is that most chronic pain is due to unresolved emotional conflict in the limbic system and aggravated by current day to day stress. Some say pain is a maladaptive solution to existential problems we have.

In our lives, everyone experiences emotionally distressing events. These may be due to conflicts with people or may result from events that happen to us. Most of these emotional events are processed, but some remain unresolved in the subconscious.

These unresolved subconscious emotional memories reside in the limbic system and are unrecognized by the conscious memory --you are not aware of them. They may cause no trouble, but under certain circumstances, they can cause emotional or physical distress such as chronic pain. During childhood, the flight/fight/freeze reaction can create maladaptive arrangements in our implicit memory that can trigger overreaction to events later in life.

Our nervous systems can handle brief episodes of intense stress but we are not designed for the drip-drip-drip psychological stress from modern life that forces us to repress our emotions.

An important source of strain is your constant brain chatter. Your limbic system doesn't know it is speculation. It thinks it is real and happening right now, ready to react.

Pain begins when nerve pathways from the brain to the body are fired. Over time, the nervous system learns to create chronic pain, even though there is no serious medical condition in the body, and even though any injury (if it exists at all, it can be due to dissociation) that may have started the pain has long ago healed.
These pathways get reinforced and amplified by our reactions to the pain. We react to that pain with fear, anger, or frustration.

Thoughts and emotional repression, are major factors in producing chronic pain and related syndromes.
You cannot "fight pain". You have to work with your limbic system. The side effect of your work will eventually make your pain go away.

It is possible to map all of this to the Freudian model like Sarno did (the iceberg image with the ego, super-ego, Id, conscious, pre-conscious, and unconscious). In terms of cure, it makes no difference.

By feeling your repressed emotions you extinguish their noxious effect and allow a re-consolidation of the implicit memory. In other words, you re-process those unresolved emotions.

Meditation will not resolve those emotional issues. They have to be addressed. Meditation will indeed stop the incessant worrying and negative train of thoughts which is great but for how long? 10 minutes, 20 minutes...? and then what? You resume your daily activities. It is important however to detect those compulsive and negative trains of thoughts and stop them throughout the day.

Also please consider that if you suffer from a mindbody syndrome, going down the surgery path will be extremely harmful. It will have a serious emotional, physical, and financial impact on your life that could make your pain condition worse.

To conclude, let me make the following clear:

* A psychosomatic illness is not the same thing as creating a disease to get attention or access to pain pills
* It does not mean that the pain is not real. The pain is VERY real and distressing
* You should first get mainstream medical opinion(s)
* It requires self-awareness and overcoming doubts to be successful
* This is not a mind over matter solution. It is not about putting a happy face and hope the pain goes away
* This is not a "reduce your stress therefore your pain will be reduced" methodology
* It is not run-of-the-mill Cognitive Behavioral Therapy (CBT)

[desperate]

I love how we have some very intelligent people on this forum. One day we will know more to combate this condition. Thanks for the post ezer. I'll read into all this stuff because it sounds interesting.

[ezer]

If this problew stems from the mind I feel like herbs to power up the parasympathetic nervous system should woRk. Power up those kidneys and take herbs to sooth the nervous system. Make sure it's the parasympathetic nervous system though.

I am not aware of any supplement or herb that could help.
There are experiments done with a beta-blocker, Propranolol. that is considered for PTSD patients. It is used for chronic pain as well. That sounds truly frightening to me.

Propranolol's effects on the consolidation and reconsolidation of long-term emotional memory in healthy participants: a meta-analysis.
http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/23182304
Considering the pivotal role of negative emotional experiences in the development and persistence of mental disorders, interfering with the consolidation/reconsolidation of such experiences would open the door to a novel treatment approach in psychiatry. We conducted a meta-analysis on the experimental evidence regarding the capacity of the ß-blocker propranolol to block the consolidation/reconsolidation of emotional memories in healthy adults

Beta-blocker drug erases the emotion of fearful memories
http://scienceblogs.com/notrocketscienc ... l-memories

The Forgetting Pill Erases Painful Memories Forever
http://www.wired.com/2012/02/ff_forgettingpill/

[desperate]

Has anyone tried this fairly new laparoscopic decompression surgery in Turkey ? I've been reading into it more and if the results are in fact 80% reduction in VAS that sounds quite promising. Has anyone tried this surgery and if not anyone have any info about it ??

[stephanies]

You can search this forum under "turkey" and see the opinions. I know Ali shared his experience with the forum and it was not positive.

[ezer]

http://www.researchgate.net/publication ... y_analysis

Laparoscopic pudendal nerve decompression and transposition combined with omental flap protection of the nerve (Istanbul technique).
Tibet Erdogru
A more than reduction (sic) in VAS score (>80 %) was achieved in 13 of the 16 patients (81.2 %) who were followed-up for more than 6 months.

81.2% success rate. lol.
2 members have posted about their negative outcome with that surgeon. Do we have to assume that the 81.2% "cured" or "almost cured" patients have resumed their exhilarating life and cannot spare a few minutes to tell us about their success?

[Violet M]

Dom, you can search for Ali's most recent posts under username alipasha1. He did not have a good experience in Turkey but it wasn't due to the PN part of the surgery. It was due to some other complications from surgery.

There are a couple of docs in NY who took over from Dr. Howard who perform the laparscopic approach. Dr. Benjamin and Dr. Carrillo. http://www.pudendalhope.info/node/58#NY

Violet

[lightmail]

Four have posted success. Women from the U.S. . In facebook pudendal group. In all fairness. 4 out of 6.