A mind-body interaction leading to psychosomatic health issues (lately in DSM5 categorized as SSD somatic symptom disorder or IAD illness anxiety disorder). It’s quite troublesome and debilitating also. This issue started after the second relapse in 2006 and I am still suffering from it until now.
One of these psychosomatic issues I am experiencing right now is tendinitis (and overuse injury in other cases) as diagnosed by a orthopedist .
Around 3 weeks ago when working on regaining more physical strength I injured my left shoulder. Even though I used only 1.5 kg to strengthen my upper body.
Why am I so fragile physically ?
As noted in my first post I suffer from chronic fatigue, muscle contraction and fortunately nearly no muscle spasm at all for the last 2 years. Besides, I have muscles that are contracted in some parts of my body more than the general muscle contraction in the rest of my body.
Mentally I tend to catastrophize, amplify, panic, which make my ailments worse. Since I did psychotherapy around 2 years ago, I have become more aware of these destructive thought patterns. I also studied cognitive biases, mental distortions, and I study psychology on a regular basis dedicating at least 500 min weekly for this subject.
Moreover, there is a pattern that repeats itself, being impulsive when practicing sport and not implementing baby steps to level up my training and avoid injuries.
How have I improved?
When I went to my neighbor’s house, a retired businessman, we had a 40 min chat. Then I cycled for around 15 min and showered. I ended up feeling better and my shoulder pain subsided.
I grasped the importance of socializing more and avoiding isolation and going out more often. Even my psychiatrist says that I need to go out more which is already happening. Meantime, as an introvert and a person working from home, I should actively seek out opportunities to connect with others. In fact, I have two friends I only meet with often, my other friends moved out of my town and all my brothers are expats.
Seeking medical attention or not?
I made an appointment to consult a doctor then I canceled it as I knew I had to rest my shoulder more and I was able to notice that my increasing health anxiety increases the shoulder muscle contraction and pain. That is it is mostly psychosomatic.
Besides, I use a mobile app to track my training and I know the date when I stopped training because of injury. This tracking app help me pinpoint the date of the injury and I understood I can wait more.
So how did I know I needed to wait more?
The doctor I used to visit years ago very often told me to wait up to 3 weeks with these kinds of injuries, which are mostly amplified by muscle contraction, anxiety, and isolation. He even did not want to get paid once because I consulted him so much for joints and muscle overuse injury or tendinitis. These include, knee, wrist, ankle, shoulder etc. He even looked at my file and said that it looks like a file of a 70s old man when I was in my mid thirties.
Update after nearly 3 weeks of this shoulder issue?
Fortunately, I started to feel much better lately, and nearly regained all my shoulder mobility. As I have many interests, hobbies and I go out more often. Besides, this epitomizes probably more than 50 visits to orthopedists, so I have some experience with this kind of injury, and can often accurately determine when to seek medical attention or just rest, stay active mentally and physically -exercising other muscles- and be patient.
To gain more control over my life and mental illnesses I structure my days productively, using Google Calendar, a habit app, weight tracker, also a finance app. Moreover, I started using a mood and sleep tracker app called eMoods. As they say it “What is measured can be managed and improved”.
“What is measured can be managed and improved”.