Reassurance: The Lifesaver

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christinasgirl123

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might be that this is something that only worked for me , but I have ben telling it a lot to others and just thought I might put it down here. Of course this view is a good basis for discussion and I do not mind anyone telling me that in his view it is all BS and that reassurance is a lifesaver, as I said, only my view (but also my experience)...I am totally convinced that the only way of getting out of the anxiety circle is sto stop looking for Anti-ALS-reassurance. Which means: no more docs checking U for ALS , no more EMGs, no more reading on ALS sites to compare and see U R different (that does not work anyway, although we ARE different our anxious mind cannot see that), no more strength testing, no more asking fellow twitchers if this or that twitch is normal or not, no more comparing dents with other people's dents ...NO MORE REASSURANCE and learning to trust your body. I am convinced that after a few weeks on that forum you have enough information about BFS to fight that beast. Now it is actually somewhere inside your brain, you have to let that knowledge spread over your body. Seeing that other twitchers are having the same issues is helpful in the beginnings, of course, that also saved me from complete insanity. But for me, after a whoile, every bit of reassurance you have been searching and getting by someone else tells you mind: "I cannot TRUST this , I need someone to tell me it is allright because there's still the chance that it is a bad thing. As long as someone can tell me he has had XYZ as well I am fine!......which actually IMPLIES the chance that someday someone will NOT have the same things and then you will be f**ed.I am not saying that reassurance is a bad thing. If I would not have found someone on this forum who has been through all that *beep* I went through in the early days, I would have gone insane. But like a child needs to cut the cord growing up, you have to do that as well. This does not even mean to leave that site or anything, I still enjoy hanging around with fellow twitchers, but it is more about cutting that umbilical cord feeding you with reassurance....just like the baby has to learn to breathe and eat on its own, you have to look for that reasurance within yourself. Which is hard work, working on yourself, your behaviour and -even more hard- on your thoughts.
 
great advice christinasgirl123, as always.... :D) we should all take what u have said on board and see if our lives change for the better....thanks for the post
 
Hey christinasgirl123 awesome post.I just want to add that this is one of the biggest topics i had in my therapy. My therapist a specialist in behaviour therapy told me over and over again that my condition (mainly hypochondria) never will get better if i´m always seeking reassurance at other people. You are the specialist for YOUR body, not a doctor, not your friend, and not a website. You can not always ask another person if this is okay or if they think that is benign. You have to get this *beep* reassurance seeking out of your head. If you get this, you will be able to move on and be able again to give yourself reassurance when you need it, because you are the specialist.Have fun,Mike
 
I totally agree with Mike's therapist. Reassurance is okay at first because you are scared and you don't know what BFS is and you need help. But once you get past that, reassurance should really be a four letter word. Because if you need other people to constantly tell you are fine, you are never going to be fine. -You- need to learn how to tell yourself you are fine. Otherwise you will get stuck in a cycle of reassurance that you will never get out of. You will depend on sites like this telling you you are fine every single minute of the day, and what kind of a life is that? This is why I always tell people to move away from seeking reassurance. It doesn't help, and is in fact the absolute worst thing a person with BFS can be doing. Learn to reassure yourself, cut out the middle man. Let's go, let's make an effort at this.
 
Great Post, Chrissi.oAs I wrote in another post reassuring all the time trains to brain to think its ok to do so. Its just like practicing someting. At the beginning everyone did theses tests and looked for reassurance, but one better stops it asap, before it become an automatism.Greetings,LevenLevi
 
For the most part I do pretty well at keeping my emotions under control and not seeking reassurance. I trust logic, put faith in my EMG last February, and realize that even if I did not have those two things statistics alone would tell me I am foolish to fear anything bad. I have to be honest though...in spite of all that I have moments where something happens and my heart races, my fears flood my brain, and I forget logic totally. Maybe that is human nature or maybe it is just me or a few like me who still get spooked now and then. I love your post and agree with you 100%....I just can't quite practice it 100% of the time. Most of the time, yes. And thankfully that allows me to function pretty darn normally every day. Vicki
 
Of course you have those moments. Don't think I did not have them. And then I came back for reassurance. But I think I made a mistake in my early days: I thought that-if I only get enough reassurance-one day my brain will understand that everything is OK. Which would be totally logical. But at some point I felt that this is not bringing me to the point I want to get...to be honest..I thought some wires in my brain are connected in a weird way. Instead of giving me peace, I felt that foreign reassurance would make me feel better for a few hours, but then I would fall back to square one. My post was not at all meant so say: do not ask for reassurance. It is just some kind of warning: although it would be logical, reassurance will most likely not lead you to your finish line. Because the anxiety in this case is not at all logical, not in any way.
 
agree with you, Chrissi, however i must admit that for many of us the very decision of 'no external reassurance' is the hardest one.
 
it was a good day for my getting back to a normal life when I said to myself, "eff the doctors, I ain't going back or doing anymore tests!" Of course that was an internal dialogue.......which is a whole separate issue from bfs :eek: Seriously, rule out the nasty stuff and get on with it. Doc shopping will not make you feel better.Take care,Gary
 
My personal opinion on reassurance is this....to each his own.All the above opinions are very relevant and very well written. I really liked reading the above thoughts on reassurance. However, IMO, it comes down to the individual. Listen, in the end, we all know that for the most part re-assurance is not really necessary. Whether it is from an ALS specialist, a community of kind indiviuals sharing the same benign condition, maybe God, maybe a therpaist, maybe meds, maybe just time in itself. Each person with their own unique personality will find what works for their own psyche.I get it, I personally do..... as seasoned veterans and others who have nearly complete remissions of their own anxieties, or sometimes symptoms about all this, it is difficult to see others who struggle with understanding and acceptance of the benign nature. It is frustrating and exhausting. Often leaving the person feeling helpless and as if their time was wasted. Patience is tested. I just hope that we all recognize and accept that this BFS/BFCS/Fibromyalgia/benign twitching condition that we all share will require a different level of acceptance for each individual, because in the end, we are all human, but no two are the same. :unsure:
 
Someone who's looking for reassurance all the time will never get over it. It's as easy as that. Really. Going to look for reassurance means nothing as "oh, maybe its sinister anyway, i'll test it or ask someone (again and again and again)'This is how our brain is working, you are training it to stay alerted.Ask your neurologist, your psychiatrist or your psychologist. They all will tell you this. Greetings,LevenLevi
 
Chrissi,I think I agree with you. And here's why.... in my opinion, this board and the chat room are extremely valuable for people dealing with BFS. BUT, as we gather reassurance, we need to put it in our back pocket and use it so that eventually we believe what we know to be true. That this is a benign condition. If people are coming here daily for temporary reassurance but find themselves right back in the same place the next day, then yes, I think that is not doing anyone any good. Its up to the individual to gather up all the facts they need to finally believe what their (and all of our) doctors are trying to hammer into our heads. This is benign. But if people aren't at that point yet, I think reassurance is extremely valuable. Its something we can't put a time limit on. Everyone is different. IMO.-Matt
 
This is what I am trying to say....that noone can expect that external reassurance will heal him or her. That it is a process that can to a certain degree be influenced by the individual. There's no timeline at which point someone should have reached level X, because there are thousands of factors that influence that speed. BUT if people are aware of the fact that the healing process is not a totally passive one depending on the information you get from outside, maybe they take taking this in consideration when making decisions. As long as you are passive and always waiting for reassurance, you are a victim of BFS. As soon as you start step by step to make your decisions, e.g. NOT seeing another doc or NOT doing a search on an ALS site, you become a fighter against it.
 
this post is meant for me! I'm probably at the top of the list who needs reassurance! I have actually realized that through all of this, not only do I need reasurance about not having Al's I have grown to realize allot of faults in myself. I'm working on these, hope this year brings me happiness :)
 
Chrissi I do totally agree with u and I suppose everybody knows that you are right. However to get to this point is really hard work and takes time and an enormous amount of self-discipline. I once red a post called "Neurotic BFSers nightmare" which made me crack up but after a while I thought this is the unfortunate truth even if it is a bit hyperbolic. I guess BFS holds a mirror up to everyone, in the beginning it just shows a picture of misery but once you turn into the right direction it will show a person stronger than ever before.
 
Totally Issi. It indeed is a hard fight. I have deleted my older posts some time ago due to another story. If I had not, you could see how BAD ma shape was when I got here LOL, I was a real mess I can tell U. I needed so much reassurance (and got it here). That was my first steps. But at a certain point I realized that the thing that is soooooooo helpful in the beginnins can also track you in a cycle.
 
Well Chrissi, I could ask now does ur leg tremble when holding it in certain positions or do ur legs start trembling in the course of the day ?But I don`t do :LOL: :LOL: :LOL:
 

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