DNRS for MCS - My First 3 Months

Stop, stop, stop. My brain is stuck in a rut and it's sending my body false messages.

I've been saying this in my head for the last 11 months. Before I get into my first 3 months of DNRS, I want to let you know that this is not my first attempt at DNRS. I bought the DVDs off ebay for $100 in February of last year (2020). I was SO EXCITED to dive in. After the first day I noticed HUGE CHANGES for the better. My husband and I took his grandma for a walk around the neighborhood, it was a chilly night and one of our neighbors always has their wood burning fireplace going, that night was no exception. My body usually reacts hard to smoke, I'm just used to it at this point. But, that night on the walk, I could smell the smokey air and my body had no reaction! It was incredible! The next day we went shopping and a women near us was wearing very strong perfume, I could smell it and, again... no reaction! I hadn't smelled perfume in years without a full on breakdown happening within my body where I would have to fight to keep a train of thought and not puke among many other symptoms. I felt hope for the first time.

So, why quit DNRS if you were doing so well?

COVID-19 hit and it was an election year full of chaos. You'd think being on the other side of the world would insulate me from the election year drama in the US but with social media, there's no escaping. I took a social media break. But, when I returned, nothing had changed. I thought about deleting social media but I like to see what my friends and family far away are up to as well as find inspiration through creative design accounts, etc. I thought about unfriending people but that felt petty. So, I sank. I sank into a pit and did my rounds less and less. And, eventually stopped full rounds altogether.

Then, a random wake up call.

August of 2020, a woman named Robyn posted in an MCS group I was in on Facebook asking people why they weren't doing DNRS, didn't they want to get better instead of sitting around complaining? I read the backlash of pissed off people. "How dare she!" But, I knew she was right. Staying in that group and avoiding my rounds was only harming myself more. But, I had a mountain of resistance toward doing my rounds. I felt my limbs frozen in mud when I thought of going to my meditation space to do a full round. I was fine with the tiny partial rounds that I would do in my head whenever exposed. I actually never stopped doing those but, when it came to the full rounds, where the magic really happens, I was dead in the water.

It didn't take me long to realize what was holding me back.

In February when I was hitting DNRS heavy, I was only using 2 different positive past memories as my past memories for meditation. I think Annie suggests something like 7 but, I only had 2. And, like she said, they wore off, they lost their power. I thought more good memories would come and I could use those, but they didn't. How could I do my rounds without having these solid past memory meditations? 

Ain't no shame in the guided meditation game.

Guided meditations to the rescue! I realized I could use any kind of meditation as long as it made me feel GOOD. I didn't need to rely on memories from my past. The most important part of the DNRS process is to get into a state of feeling good and stay there. I started off with meditations from this account and began to feel inspired again. I was even doing a guided meditation for my future visualization for awhile but now, I lay there and see myself happy, healthy, eating pizza and chocolate, traveling, and basically being free and full of life. It's become my favorite part of the round. 

The next thing I realized I was doing my rounds every day!

And, actually looking forward to them. So, that started me back on DNRS and back on my path to healing. Something I've realized while doing this practice is that I'm still unable to do 1 hour a day, so I tend to just do one 30 minute round each day. I want to get back into 2 a day but life is very busy right now and I'm not going to add more stress by guilting myself about it. 30 minutes a day is way better than nothing and I know if I try to push myself, I'll break down and end up doing nothing again.

Beyond the rounds, my life needed some tweaking.

I was still getting sucked into American politics. It's the curse of an election year. And, since I'm politically independent, I can see the pros and cons of each side as well as tricks the media plays to keep people on both sides trapped in an ideology, this makes me a very unpopular person. But, I stand behind my convictions. This leads to a lot of people being angry with me for not following their narrative and spreading toxicity in my feeds. So, I started to clean out my social media. I don't care about having a lot of friends or likes, I care about my health and having a peaceful life. There are so many people I don't hate or have much of an opinion about and that I don't need to be friends with on social media. I'm sure there will be those hurt by my unfriending, but it comes from a desire to have my health return and that's more important than anything else. I'm still in this clean-out process, it's hard to let some people go as they seem nice enough but really, I would like my social media, especially facebook, to be a small crowd of trusted, supportive, and kind people that I have genuine and close relationships with. It's so weird to be going through this at 39. It feels so high school.

The other area I'm working on is what I consume for entertainment. My husband and I love to watch a lot of true crime but this is all a huge 'no-no' for DNRS. The things I've seen other people suggest that are DNRS friendly, like Disney stuff and rom coms, tend to be very triggering for me with their overly saccharin style. So, I'm still searching there for entertainment that is DNRS friendly but doesn't make me want to vomit. It's a challenging area.

​Here's some of what has worked for me:

L.A. Beast: Just a funny dude eating a lot of food, often puking, and in general, torturing himself but all in good humor and fun.

Whitney Port Reacting to The Hills: Whitney was always so nice on The Hills and The City. Something you can't say often for reality tv stars. So, it's fun to see her reacting to The Hills and telling insider info. I also enjoy rewatching the series to see all the dated fashion and tech.

The Punk Rock MBA: His videos are always insightful and entertaining. They trigger a lot of nostalgia for me.

Real Royalty: Beautiful castles and history along with elaborate and often weird food. This show is light hearted and interesting.

Curiosity Incorporated: This guy and his family own an antique shop. They also buy hoarder houses and dig through all the treasure inside. A true dream of mine.

Odd Tinkering: This dude just cleans up old stuff and I like watching the process as well as seeing the how nice everything looks after. 

Bros of Decay: They go through abandoned places, often castles. There's so much beauty out there. I'd love to be able to buy these places and restore them. 

Ryan Serhant's Luxury Property Videos: It's cool to see all the luxury real estate out there and how tacky most of it is. Money does not buy taste.  

Mila Tequila: Excellent, well researched, celebrity drama stories from the early 2000s. 

Tasting History: More food and history facts, I'm into it. 

All of that aside, I'm still experiencing positive changes.

I may not be following the program perfectly but I'm still seeing positive results. 

• I've been exposed lately and not had big reactions
• My mood has improved for the better

And, strange enough my dreams have changed.

I woke up the other night from a dream where I was eating a giant chocolate bar. It was delicious! A couple of nights later I dreamt that I was smelling a cherry scented room deodorizer. A ROOM DEODORIZER! And, I enjoyed it. It smelled good! Then, yet another night, I was eating a chocolate lava cake! In these types of dreams in the past, I would have turned down the chocolate because of the sugar and caffeine. I would have had a physical reaction in the dream to the scent of the cherry deodorizer. And, that lava cake, gluten, sugar, and caffeine, no thank you. I would always wake up disappointed, thinking to myself, "Just eat the fucking cake!"

​I think my brain is learning to see these things as safe again, safe enough to not subconsciously turn them down.

And, that is a huge first step in the right direction. One, that I'm hoping will continue to build on itself and manifest in my daily life more and more to the point where I can experience normal human life again. 

My limbic system has been throwing some fits.

Healing never seems to be linear like I want it to be. There are really great days where someone doused in perfume is near me and I just smell the perfume and nothing happens and then there are the days where my limbic system is fighting tooth and nail to keep its old patterns and a small exposure to the unscented hygiene detergent we use on Mimi's bedsheets has my stomach jumping into my throat. My limbic system wants to stay where it believes is safe. But, that form of safety does more damage than protection. It's caused me more misery than comfort. So, even though some days are a true struggle, I work hard to keep on my path of healing, continue to do the rounds, and know that every little bit is adding up to create a better life.

Just because you still have symptoms does not mean you are not healing or making progress. 

Know that the symptoms will lessen with time. What really matters is continuing to redirect your thoughts. I tell this to myself every day. 

The end of December marks 3 months of DNRS. 

I'm looking forward to the next few months and I'm excited to see what happens.