https://www.reddit.com/r/longtermTRE/comments/1ifzxa1/monthly_progress_thread_february_25/
created by Nadayogi on 02/02/2025 at 15:41 UTC
10 upvotes, 11 top-level comments (showing 11)
Dear friends, I hope you're having a great day!
I was happy to see the poll results of January:
And together with the poll results of December last year,
it has become obvious that most people have a strong practice going for them. I was honestly surprised but delighted.
Let's introduce the next poll: How strongly do you experience side effects from your TRE practice?
Some examples:
Comment by elianabear at 02/02/2025 at 22:27 UTC
16 upvotes, 2 direct replies
17 months
My insomnia and oversleeping have gone away, although I attribute this to the daily meditation practice I’ve started this month. (having the discipline to get to bed on time though, that’s a different story…) Getting to the point where I can meditate is a sign of progress, as it used to worsen my dissociation.
Anxious thoughts and pelvic floor tightness made a return this month due to the political climate in the states. However, I was much more capable of recognizing the problem and take steps to address it instead of getting bogged down in frustration or denial. Ended up seeing my therapist again for the first time in nine months, which helped.
Recurring dreams I’ve had for years have started to have different endings. For example, I’ll have a dream where I have to go back to high school as an adult, and I’ll be stressed about how to pass my classes and get out. This time my dream self went to the principal’s office and said hey, I’m a grown woman, I don’t belong here. I’ve seen similar anecdotes from others where dreams start to reflect a growing sense of agency as a result of healing, so I take this as a good sign.
I’ve had some sessions this month where the tremors were pretty subtle, like a pulsating sensation in my body instead of shaking. To an outsider it probably wouldn’t look like much, which is great because my first year of TRE looked like an exorcism lol.
My drive and motivation for life has started to return, which has been hugely lacking these past few years. I find motivation to do things like chores or make plans with friends, and feel satisfaction after. I’ve started thinking more seriously about what kind of career I want and what steps to take to get there.
Comment by larynxfly at 03/02/2025 at 00:20 UTC
12 upvotes, 3 direct replies
27 months
In response to the poll - I wish there was a “nuance” answer haha. When I first started TRE, I had lots of side effects. I would sometimes get insomnia, felt like I was constantly coming down with a cold, had chills all the time. I would say moderate side effects. Now I occasionally get chills or feel more hungry but not regularly, so I would say it’s mild now. But there has been a great change in this over time in terms of that.
Otherwise, I feel like a gamechanger for me is dealing with my anger. Another user here recommended these somatic anger exercises to me and holy crap, it takes nothing for the anger to come out. It’s like this chronic tension I’ve been having for years is actually just my repressed anger, this whole time, and it’s just been sitting there under the surface for so long. I have not been doing them for very long but I already feel significant improvement! Now that I have done a significant amount of processing my sadness, I have so much anger left. And I’m sure there is more sadness under that anger, but we’ll get there. It was only suggested to me to start allowing myself to access my anger in November last year, two years into my TRE journey. I pretty strongly feel this is the next layer of release I deeply needed.
In terms of other improvements I’ve noticed pretty significant improvement in brain fog. I continue to feel better and better in my body.
I am currently doing 5-15 minutes of somatic anger release followed by 5-15 minutes of TRE at night followed by ~30 minutes of meditation. After the anger release and TRE I feel so relaxed. I never felt relaxed after TRE until I started doing the anger exercise. And I’m not always deep meditating, a lot of time is spent processing what comes up from my subconscious that needs to be processed. To be honest I cannot recommend meditation or some sort of processing enough. I felt like before I started taking time to process I was like a pressure cooker. I feel sooo much better now over the last six months since I started this practice. I feel like TRE, for me personally at least, “shakes up” what’s held within but I still have to go back in and properly process it. In a way it feels a lot like EMDR, I feel like I am sort of combining the two but it’s been working very well.
Comment by FieldsOfWhite at 03/02/2025 at 14:23 UTC
12 upvotes, 2 direct replies
30 months
Last month of January I've been feeling the beginning of reaping the benefits of long term TRE.
I've been able to put myself through stressful situations multiple times a day almost daily.
Situations that would've previously (before discovering TRE) knocked me out physically and mentally for weeks. No more.
It's awesome.
(some side effects occur like tension and fatigue in my upper back and shoulders but that's where the main chunk of my TRE work remain as of writing this post).
Comment by James_Calhoun2 at 03/02/2025 at 08:48 UTC
11 upvotes, 1 direct replies
Currently 12 months into TRE, and I wanted to share something that’s been happening consistently during my sessions lately. Almost every time I shake, my mind starts replaying old arguments or memories of things that have bothered me, stuff I thought was buried. At first, I found it a bit frustrating, like my mind was pulling me away from just being present in the tremors. But over time, I’ve realized that these mental replays actually feel good in a strange way. In these arguments, I’m finally standing up for myself something I couldn’t do back then, especially as a child. Instead of just reliving the helplessness I felt at the time, my mind is responding differently now. I’m pushing back, defending myself, saying what I wish I had said. It feels like a missing piece of me is waking up.
I’m guessing this is part of the nervous system’s way of integrating old experiences, maybe even completing a response that was suppressed at the time. It doesn’t feel like I’m getting stuck in the past, but more like I am moving through it, although it is sometimes very repetitive (the same replays over and over).
Comment by Lopsided_Prior3801 at 04/02/2025 at 07:31 UTC
10 upvotes, 1 direct replies
Been shaking on and off since 2016, but really only became consistent with it at the start of 2024.
Last year involved the release of a lot of repressed anger. I thought I was through most of that but I've had one more surge in recent times. I'm glad that phase is mostly over. It was very distracting.
During the day when I'm not shaking, I've had for months now little recollections of past bits of shame come and I'd give a little involuntary shake with my head as if to release them and forgive myself for the past. Some of these were such innocuous little moments that only I would know about.
What was also interesting was memories coming back of times when I hurt others--so often not knowingly or deliberately at the time--and it is just that this has become more clear to me now. This is not as if I got angry at somebody, but was just insensitive to them or the like.
My view of people and myself has become more nuanced throughout this process. (The harm seemingly good people can do to each other is quite immense.)
Still suffering some insomnia occasionally--trouble falling asleep mostly--which I'm not entirely sure is all related to TRE, but it would be nice if that fixed itself up sometime soon.
However, I've seen some positive benefits to my life. I almost effortlessly quit some of my social media use (no more Twitter or Facebook anyway), also quit caffeine successfully, and greatly reduced the time I spend playing video games, which I was using as a crutch when I wasn't happy. And some of my side projects just get a bit more love and care effortlessly now. I like the person I am more now even though he is still far from perfect and never will be.
Comment by The_Rainbow_Ace at 02/02/2025 at 20:20 UTC
9 upvotes, 0 direct replies
Month 8.
Hello fellow shakers!
Reducing my practise time to just 1min 30sec every other day, stopped all overdoing it effects (I was was doing 3-5 mins). After two weeks I decided to try 30 seconds 3 times a day (wherever I am just let the spontaneous shakes happen.) This was also fine and I have felt generally quite calm and better emotionally regulated this last month.
Going to stay at this practice time for another month and then start to slowly increase again.
Comment by Inner_External_6786 at 04/02/2025 at 22:43 UTC
6 upvotes, 0 direct replies
Month 3
In the beginning of the month I tremored about 20 min every second day, by the end of the month it was about 12-15 daily.
January had a lot of surprises in store, there was some overdoing in the beginning, which lead to headaches and insomnia. There were throat growls and gagging (reactions I have read about here) when I directed the shaking to my face. But the core of the practice remains “wiggling” of hips and lower back (fascial unwinding?), shoulder shaking, deep core contractions, breathing patterns, and this is new: jaw contractions.
The most important thing for me maybe: I started TRE for the persistent strong hip and back pain, I had for the last 9 months. And reoccurring for years. Inspired by a post in this subreddit, I have looked at my copy of Dr. Sarno‘s book again, and started “journal speak” a technique by Nicole Sachs, based on Sarno‘s work. I looked at my „injuries“ and some other ailments that wouldn’t heal and started viewing them as chronic pain created by stress, deeply buried fear and anger.
This insight, in theory, can already alleviate chronic pain. Unfortunately, I’m still in pain. But somewhat better.
My idea is that there is a tension pattern in my body that is so old and strong that it pulls certain bones, joints, ligaments, muscle groups into places that create blockage, constriction and pain. My TRE practice is not relaxing, it even hurts a bit, because I „wiggle“ my hip in a way that tests out and pushes the borders of these wrong patterns and constrictions. My body reacts by sending occasional flashes of sharp pain into my hip or back. The „wiggling“ seems to be intelligent, though, and moving with intention. Without enforcing it, TRE unblocked/cracked something in my sacrum the other day, the most wonderful feeling. It was an area that felt „wrong“ for many months already and the blockage had an influence on how well I could control my right leg’s movement and strength. Currently the tremoring helps me with a type of pain management too. If releases some of the painful tension that builds during a day or over night.
For me, TRE does not feel like emotional releasing when doing the exercises. But during TRE my mind often wanders to the past and reflects on memories. I do dream very vividly at night and topics long forgotten have resurfaced. So I guess, emotional work is happening (might also be aided by the journaling).
In the end I’m really tired of the chronic pain and desperately want to be better. I can tell that things are changing but I am inpatient by nature.
Comment by ReggieLouise at 04/02/2025 at 07:38 UTC
3 upvotes, 0 direct replies
I really don’t fit any of those categories. TRE has been contributing to my regular insomnia, but I had it prior to starting TRE. I experience some mild body pains, restlessness at bedtime, but I’ve never suffered from anxiety. I mean sure, everyone gets anxious sometimes, but nothing major.
Comment by Spirited_Language532 at 06/02/2025 at 04:04 UTC
2 upvotes, 0 direct replies
3.5 months
Virtually no side effects, except maybe sometimes daytime sleepiness and occasional headaches.
Comment by FaceAccomplished1862 at 05/02/2025 at 00:10 UTC
3 upvotes, 1 direct replies
1st month completed :)
1-2 times a week between 15 or 30 minutes sometimes, no side effects.
I discovered TRE from the semen retention subreddit and this past month I could noticed they do combine well.
Being retaining since July last year (current streak 1 month) and something that I noticed when started was that I didn't have sexual urges really, felt it was easier retaining but my cravings where more related to food, it was harder for me to stop eating junk food. This month seems that finally this cross wire between food and sex finally resolved, I cleaned my diet and at the end of the month I had a bit of craving to watch porn.
One time I felt I could orgasm from the tremors. Decided to stop to maintain the streak. Maybe this was a sign of overdoing? But only happened one time.
Comment by CKBirds4 at 06/02/2025 at 14:44 UTC
1 upvotes, 0 direct replies
~9 months in.
For the last few months, I've had some success moving tremors to my ankles and sometimes calves by using the recumbent bike at the gym. I've also been able to keep the tremors going when I'm on my back and lay one leg down with the other one bent. It's progress, but no movement to other parts of my body yet.
I've been working on my sleep to help with my insomnia, which is something I had long before TRE. I'm hoping this helps with integration process more. For the last month, I've been drinking chamomile tea about one hour before bed, which is supposed too help calm you down and reduce overthinking - which is an issue for me. I also journaling my negative thoughts before I go to bed and if I wake up in the middle of the night, which seems to help me fall back to sleep more easily. For the most part, this combination is giving me much better sleep.
I haven't noticed too many changes with TRE yet, other than less soreness in my back if I sit at a computer all day. I'm hoping to see some more positive results as I carry on.
I currently tremor daily for ~10-15 minutes before I go to bed.
