Tips for getting through TMS?
January 29, 2025 8:03 AM Subscribe
I'm currently in the midst of transcranial magnetic stimulation (TMS) therapy and I'm tolerating it well physically, but there's just... so much of it that my spirit is flagging. I already feel like I've been doing it forever and I'm not even a third of the way through. Seeking ideas for how to count down the time while I wait for signs of possible benefits or just for it to be over?
So this is 36 sessions, every weekday for about 8 weeks (though it tapers off toward the end to be not every weekday). While it's going on, I lose 2 hours of time every day immediately after work, compressing my free time, canceling a beloved standing social plan for the duration, and generally making me exhausted and cranky.
It's also costing an arm and a leg, which is a source of anxiety but not actual hardship at the moment. But does mean "order sushi every night" is not a viable coping strategy.
I'm lucky in that I'm not having major physical symptoms beyond fatigue and moodiness and a feeling of done-ness, but it's hard to get through work day in and day out knowing the evening will be spent getting hit by invisible hammers, dragging myself through basic life maintenance obligations, and going to bed.
What I have done:
- Found a good source of entertainment during the sessions and during my commute to treatments that I look forward to
- Started journaling daily to record my moods/thoughts/activities during the treatment
- Tried to think of TMS sessions themselves as a break, despite the invisible hammers
What I am looking for:
- Some way of marking/celebrating progress through the treatment schedule in a way that makes it feel less endless somehow, particularly on a session by session level
- Ideas don't have to be free, but ideally I shouldn't be making 36 splurgy purchases on comfort food or comfort whatevers
- Maybe some general encouragement from anyone else who has been through it?
So this is 36 sessions, every weekday for about 8 weeks (though it tapers off toward the end to be not every weekday). While it's going on, I lose 2 hours of time every day immediately after work, compressing my free time, canceling a beloved standing social plan for the duration, and generally making me exhausted and cranky.
It's also costing an arm and a leg, which is a source of anxiety but not actual hardship at the moment. But does mean "order sushi every night" is not a viable coping strategy.
I'm lucky in that I'm not having major physical symptoms beyond fatigue and moodiness and a feeling of done-ness, but it's hard to get through work day in and day out knowing the evening will be spent getting hit by invisible hammers, dragging myself through basic life maintenance obligations, and going to bed.
What I have done:
- Found a good source of entertainment during the sessions and during my commute to treatments that I look forward to
- Started journaling daily to record my moods/thoughts/activities during the treatment
- Tried to think of TMS sessions themselves as a break, despite the invisible hammers
What I am looking for:
- Some way of marking/celebrating progress through the treatment schedule in a way that makes it feel less endless somehow, particularly on a session by session level
- Ideas don't have to be free, but ideally I shouldn't be making 36 splurgy purchases on comfort food or comfort whatevers
- Maybe some general encouragement from anyone else who has been through it?
I can see the end of my course of TMS for MDD from here. I'm down to 1× a week (in fact leaving work in a few minutes). I started at 5× a week on 29 July and am freaking tired of it. The fact that it's a 90m drive one way for a 40m session doesn't help.
I joked when I started that I should have made a construction-paper chain like we used to do in school as a countdown. Something simple like that, where you can see the chain getting smaller, may help.
I also do have a wonderful nurse who is very good at her job, seems genuinely happy to see me, and always has something to talk about. It's a small perk, but a noticeable one, that I do look forward to seeing and talking to her each time.
I'm not sure what I can offer you other than encouragement and empathy. There _is_ an end to it. What has helped me is that I really couldn't see that it was doing anything until I had a few of the BDI questionnaires behind me, and it was clear to me that I wasn't as miserable as I was before.
Day-to-day I can't say that I feel all that different, and still fall pretty far down from time to time, but friends and family all say I _am_ different — they say that I even sound different. That's been my motivation, that those around me see real progress. That's all upside. I'm doing this for me, but I'm doing this for them.
posted by eafarris at 9:29 AM on January 29 [3 favorites]
I joked when I started that I should have made a construction-paper chain like we used to do in school as a countdown. Something simple like that, where you can see the chain getting smaller, may help.
I also do have a wonderful nurse who is very good at her job, seems genuinely happy to see me, and always has something to talk about. It's a small perk, but a noticeable one, that I do look forward to seeing and talking to her each time.
I'm not sure what I can offer you other than encouragement and empathy. There _is_ an end to it. What has helped me is that I really couldn't see that it was doing anything until I had a few of the BDI questionnaires behind me, and it was clear to me that I wasn't as miserable as I was before.
Day-to-day I can't say that I feel all that different, and still fall pretty far down from time to time, but friends and family all say I _am_ different — they say that I even sound different. That's been my motivation, that those around me see real progress. That's all upside. I'm doing this for me, but I'm doing this for them.
posted by eafarris at 9:29 AM on January 29 [3 favorites]
Best answer: I would get a really good box of chocolates with at least as many chocolates in it as you have sessions still to go, and treat it like an advent calendar. Look forward to the small joy of eating a delicious chocolate after you get home from the session each night. Enjoy the visible evidence (in the form of empty chocolate slots) of progress.
Not cheap, but not "36 splurgey purchases" expensive.
If there are chocolates left over at the end, you get to celebrate the final session by eating them all.
posted by ManyLeggedCreature at 9:38 AM on January 29 [14 favorites]
Not cheap, but not "36 splurgey purchases" expensive.
If there are chocolates left over at the end, you get to celebrate the final session by eating them all.
posted by ManyLeggedCreature at 9:38 AM on January 29 [14 favorites]
I assume you can't take any time off work? I have medical issues and working four days a week is the only way I am able to have a social life and keep my home together, because I can't function after work. Even one afternoon every two weeks might help.
posted by metasarah at 10:04 AM on January 29 [1 favorite]
posted by metasarah at 10:04 AM on January 29 [1 favorite]
Some sort of very visual progress cue - like the chains disappearing, or something colorful you're filling in - might help to give you a sense of progress. Sort of like the satisfaction you get when you can visibly SEE the section of tall grass getting smaller. It's like the difference between mowing a field and traveling on the highway - most of the time, you're on the highway, where you're making progress, but you can't really see the scope of the progress you've made all at once. But if you'd traveled that same distance all in a field of tall grass that you could very immediately see, it gives off an entirely different feel where the progress is much more real and present.
(I'm sorry, I can tell I'm not explaining what I mean well, but I just don't have better words for it right now - hopefully you get the general idea.)
And you're not limited to just one of these sorts of things, either. If you want one in the car, one at work, one on your phone, and multiple in your home - that's ok.
And the first few weeks aren't going to feel like much - you didn't say how far you were in - but if you use the color-it-in method, rather than the take-a-chain-away method, you get to add in and SEE all the ones you've already done, which doesn't work very well with the take-away, because they'd just disappear all at once and feel sort of useless... so the tendency is then to just leave them off, and that's detrimental, because then it can feel like the progress already made didn't count.
posted by stormyteal at 10:16 AM on January 29
(I'm sorry, I can tell I'm not explaining what I mean well, but I just don't have better words for it right now - hopefully you get the general idea.)
And you're not limited to just one of these sorts of things, either. If you want one in the car, one at work, one on your phone, and multiple in your home - that's ok.
And the first few weeks aren't going to feel like much - you didn't say how far you were in - but if you use the color-it-in method, rather than the take-a-chain-away method, you get to add in and SEE all the ones you've already done, which doesn't work very well with the take-away, because they'd just disappear all at once and feel sort of useless... so the tendency is then to just leave them off, and that's detrimental, because then it can feel like the progress already made didn't count.
posted by stormyteal at 10:16 AM on January 29
Can you schedule friends or family to sit with you during treatment, if allowed? Or hang out in the waiting room and then accompany you home after? Is not every day then once a week. It can make a huge huge difference.
For my husband's radiation treatment (seems like a similar length of treatment) we first divided it up like, 1/5th of the way through, 1/4th, 1/3rd, 1/2. There was something about the slightly irregular intervals that made it more bearable between each celebration. After half-way we started counting down each treatment.
posted by muddgirl at 10:41 AM on January 29 [1 favorite]
For my husband's radiation treatment (seems like a similar length of treatment) we first divided it up like, 1/5th of the way through, 1/4th, 1/3rd, 1/2. There was something about the slightly irregular intervals that made it more bearable between each celebration. After half-way we started counting down each treatment.
posted by muddgirl at 10:41 AM on January 29 [1 favorite]
8 weeks is a long time but it's not *forever*. I have two related suggestions:
* Have a countdown, like what stormyteal suggests. Coloring in or marking off or doing something else that shows you, viscerally, how far in you are and how close you are to finishing. A friend of mine who had a similar problem (mentally getting through a multi-month ordeal) counted out a single jelly bean for every single day she had to endure, and every day she ate one jelly bean. She saw the jar diminishing, slowly, but steadily.
* Schedule a celebration *now.* Or two - maybe something smaller and immediate for right afterwards, and then something bigger when you expect to be more mentally/physically able to enjoy yourself. It's not 8 weeks till nothing, it's *8 weeks till the party.* Then 7 weeks. Then six. Then five. Look, the party's almost here!
posted by Tomorrowful at 12:41 PM on January 29 [3 favorites]
* Have a countdown, like what stormyteal suggests. Coloring in or marking off or doing something else that shows you, viscerally, how far in you are and how close you are to finishing. A friend of mine who had a similar problem (mentally getting through a multi-month ordeal) counted out a single jelly bean for every single day she had to endure, and every day she ate one jelly bean. She saw the jar diminishing, slowly, but steadily.
* Schedule a celebration *now.* Or two - maybe something smaller and immediate for right afterwards, and then something bigger when you expect to be more mentally/physically able to enjoy yourself. It's not 8 weeks till nothing, it's *8 weeks till the party.* Then 7 weeks. Then six. Then five. Look, the party's almost here!
posted by Tomorrowful at 12:41 PM on January 29 [3 favorites]
Best answer: I did TMS and found it tremendously helpful! But it did take a few weeks for me to notice the difference.
I like the idea of using something physical , possibly that you destroy, to mark each session. Someone mentioned old school paper chains. I love this idea! Or get a bunch of small balloons and pop one after every session? My dorm RA in college put 1 ballon per final exam outside each resident’s door and popping those balloons to celebrate is a fav memory for me.
I wish I had been able to take intermittent FMLA (if you are in the US) when I was super sick to better take care of myself and still have a life. Could this be an option for you?
I found the book “How to Keep House While Drowning” incredibly helpful in helping me think of outside the box ways to make day to day life/chores easier.
posted by ticketmaster10 at 5:28 PM on January 29 [1 favorite]
I like the idea of using something physical , possibly that you destroy, to mark each session. Someone mentioned old school paper chains. I love this idea! Or get a bunch of small balloons and pop one after every session? My dorm RA in college put 1 ballon per final exam outside each resident’s door and popping those balloons to celebrate is a fav memory for me.
I wish I had been able to take intermittent FMLA (if you are in the US) when I was super sick to better take care of myself and still have a life. Could this be an option for you?
I found the book “How to Keep House While Drowning” incredibly helpful in helping me think of outside the box ways to make day to day life/chores easier.
posted by ticketmaster10 at 5:28 PM on January 29 [1 favorite]
Response by poster: Thank you for all of the great suggestions! The chocolates one caught my fancy, especially after I realized they come in boxes of 36, so I can clear out the ones for sessions I already did and count my progress through the whole course of treatment in eaten chocolates... so I'll definitely be doing that one.
I'm also looking to take some PTO as soon as it's feasible, but I need to get my workload in a good place for that first and that's not easy when everything's already overwhelming and I'm moving like molasses.
The book sounds promising also, though I would worry it might actually give the reader permission to hold their housekeeping to a higher standard than I currently do. My life maintenance is more on the order of making sure I take annoying meds, practice skills I don't want to lose, exercise occasionally, and keep myself and my clothing clean and that there isn't perishable garbage lingering in my apartment.
posted by space snail at 6:56 AM on January 30
I'm also looking to take some PTO as soon as it's feasible, but I need to get my workload in a good place for that first and that's not easy when everything's already overwhelming and I'm moving like molasses.
The book sounds promising also, though I would worry it might actually give the reader permission to hold their housekeeping to a higher standard than I currently do. My life maintenance is more on the order of making sure I take annoying meds, practice skills I don't want to lose, exercise occasionally, and keep myself and my clothing clean and that there isn't perishable garbage lingering in my apartment.
posted by space snail at 6:56 AM on January 30
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- I did add some social plans to the weekends, but this makes weekends less restful
- I live by myself so there's no one to offload life maintenance stuff to, but I'm already minimizing things I can minimize and giving myself permission to skip sometimes where I don't think it will do harm
posted by space snail at 8:18 AM on January 29