The treatment is going quite well. Although the progress is not as swift as hoped I am slowly regaining some control over my muscles and learning to control my moods and anxiety better as well, all without medication! With that said, I have been a little lax on my food and exercise regime, being occupied with things that I normally do. I have been out in the city a couple of times to see my friends and catching with some overdue work that had stacked up since I have fallen ill. It does feel good to finally have some control over my life and although it’s not perfect and sometimes it’s frustrating I am constantly trying to remind myself what I was like when I first came here. I am extremely grateful and whenever I am reminded I feel at peace.

As regards to my diet, it has been awful the past couple of weeks… I have never craved naughty food so badly in my life and cannot seem to handle it at all. I have had cakes, pastry, ice cream, fried chicken, beer and the list goes on. And it serves me right for having the most hideous abdominal pain today. It felt similar to food poisoning and it came out of nowhere when I was receiving treatments during the afternoon. Fortunately, Dr Lee gave me some sachets of dried herbal medicine for the stomach pain and told me to take it with warm water. He said most of his patients go through similar things so he has those sachets ready. So I took one (didn’t taste nice..) then I went to bed with a hot water bottle. Together with pain, I was also getting some flu like symptoms; I had the chills, dizziness and nausea. I had food poisoning before (really bad ones) and I was quite worried that it might go on for a while; it certainly is not a pleasant thing. Surprisingly, I just woke up after a 2 hour nap and I feel completely fine. Don’t think it was food poisoning, maybe it was a little telling off of my bad diet…

For the past week, I have managed to stick to a strict routine and diet, doing exercises (even started jogging!), stretching and meditating. It has been just over a month since I started the treatment and I feel normal most of the time. Dr Lee always asks me how much progress I think has been made and this week, I feel I am around 80% back to normal. I still do have odd moments when I suddenly become conscious about having muscle spasm and get quite anxious. The sensation is still there almost constantly but I think I’m learning to ignore it and not think of it as a big deal. Pain is at least 90% gone which is probably why it has been much easier to focus on the treatment and getting better rather than allowing all sorts of thoughts go through my head like I did for the first 3 weeks.

However, I have had itchy body for the past few days and quite a sensitive tingling sensation on the face, as if I am being tapped by a bunch of needles delicately, if that makes any sense. It’s not very pleasant and I’m hoping it will disappear soon.

Unfortunately, I think I’m still quite dependent on the mouth piece, worrying what will happen if I don’t have it on; a bit like the training wheels before you learn to ride a bicycle. I never got to take off the training wheels when I was younger and still can’t ride a bike… Anyway, I’m trying to come off the mouth piece slightly so I have had it out for a few hours today which has not been easy to be honest. Hopefully, I can learn to carry on with life without it soon and maybe learn to ride a bike too.

Sorry for the delay in uploading posts! I can only blame my laziness which I am ashamed of. But I promise I will finish uploading soon!

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I realised something very interesting on Friday (25^th October). I came back to the flat in the morning after having 2 sets of treatments and lied down to rest. Whilst I was lying down I noticed something quite peculiar – that my brain and my body were not in harmony at all. In fact, my body was doing exactly the opposite of what my brain was telling it to do because the more I tried to stop the muscle spasms, the worse it got. I knew anxiety and stress made spasms worse but I was not stressed at all (or at least there was nothing that I should be stressed about). It was very strange; the more I tried to focus on controlling the muscle, the less control I gained. Dr Lee had recommended trying meditation but I never tried it because I simply did not believe it would be useful. I realised then that subconsciously I was stressing myself out unnecessarily which of course did not help with muscle spasm. So I decided to try meditating, taking deep breaths and visualising my body and brain working in unity (I know this sounds weird but I could not think of any other way of meditating). In all honesty, it did not help much at first. I don’t think I noticed much difference in muscle spasm but it did help me to feel more relaxed and peaceful.

On Saturday, instead of going to the clinic, I went to see one of my friends who lives in the city. I thought it might do me good if I kept my mind off treatments for the weekend. For the first time since I started the treatment I travelled for longer than an hour on the tube. It was very tiring even though I only got to see her for a few hours; by the time I got back I was ready to go to bed. Also, it was the first time that I took off OBA for longer than 4 hours. I must admit I could not help worrying about my spasm kicking off randomly. Recently, the symptoms did not appear outwards but I wasn’t sure whether it would suddenly appear again if I was out in public for a long period of time. Despite my concern however, spending time with my friend completely took my mind off it and nothing embarrassing happened! It made me a lot more confident and reminded me that I did not have to worry so much. It also reassured me that the treatment was working.

Today, I just had the day to myself – catching up on emails, cleaning the flat and doing a few sets of exercises. I also carried on with meditating and to my surprise it really is making a difference – I actually felt that I could control the muscles better. Something odd that I observed today though – whilst my mind becomes calmer (during meditation), my heart beats faster as if I’m nervous or scared. However, I’m not bothered much by it because I know it is due to lack of control that I have over my body at the moment. All I can do at the moment is to keep telling myself it will get better soon and concentrate on positive things.

Mum left quite early in the morning. I thought I’d be crying and begging her not to go but surprisingly I was able to maintain a composed state. After she left I couldn’t get back to sleep so I decided to test something before going to the clinic. Dr Lee always stressed that I should not wear CBA for more than an hour and if I felt anything uncomfortable within the hour I should take it off immediately. But so far, I have never experienced discomfort while wearing CBA so I thought it might be more effective if I wore it for more than an hour. I woke up at 3 a.m. and could not get back to sleep so I took of OBA and put CBA on (I had already put this for an hour the day before) until 9 a.m so in total I had it on for 6 hours. I still could not feel any difference and when I went to the clinic that morning I told Dr Lee about it. He then told me that I should not wear it for longer than an hour and explained why – even if I do not feel any discomfort deflection still occurs within an hour and it is important not to wear it after deflection because it can make the condition worse. Oops.. serves me right for being rebellious!

And today, for the first time I did some walking exercises for about an hour. I did feel a little embarrassed walking around with OBA on and I was conscious that people may look at me strangely as it makes me look quite ugly (a bit like a gorilla)… I felt less tired but I felt my muscles moving around more, although it was not visible to other people). I noticed that I yawned a lot but I felt less anxious.

Morning after the horrendous day, I went to the clinic with the help of my parents. During the treatment, I found that every time I tried to reposition my body to correct my posture, I had convulsion and my body would start shaking. Spasm around the jaw was most severe. Dr Lee said after wearing CBA for up to an hour, it was important for me to continue wearing OBA and do the 4 standard exercises (known as full body exercises). He also emphasized the importance of keeping a positive mind because it helps to recover faster. He also told my parents to prepare healthy meals (balanced nutrition with brown rice) and continue with herbal medicine. After 2 sets of treatments that day, I returned to the flat and I tried to do some exercise. However, I had no energy at all and it felt as though my muscles did not have any strength. This made me doubt the treatments and I felt more depressed. During CST my body was shaking for around 2 minutes then afterwards it was fine. I noticed that the more severe the spasm became, the more anxious I got (or the other way round – it was not clear which came first but one thing that was definite was that both affected me together).