One thing that is constant in all humans is that we try to CONTROL our emotions by HOLDING them. It doesn't work of course, but we keep trying anyway. Think of all those times you've been in the passenger seat with a REALLY bad driver. During the entire trip you TENSE UP to help make a turn safely, slow the car down before your driver RAMS into the car in front of you, help your car to stay between the lines while the driver is talking to you rather than looking at the road ... all the while PRAYING that you make it to your destination in one piece. There are some COMMON areas in our bodies where this emotion is held. A MAJOR holding area for most people is the shoulders. You would have to travel a LONG way to find someone that doesn't have TENSION in their shoulders. The JAW is another tense area in most people. In fact, some people's jaws get so intense that they begin to GRIND their teeth at night. Our concern is with three other HOLDING areas. I'm referring to your knees, your tail bone area and your feet. Because these areas of your body have been TENSED up for so long with regard to your RLS, there are probably some RAW NERVES that need to be healed. Several weeks into the healing process, the OBVIOUS bonked me in the head like a soft mallet. Around the 4th day into this Program, I started TESTING what I call my TRIGGERS. These are body positions that are almost GUARANTEED to set off the twitching in my main trouble areas. After a few days of taking the vitamins, herbs and minerals, I was EXCITED about how fast the healing was occurring. I was AMAZED and wanted to check out how these trouble areas were coming along. I decided to run some TESTS and would sit or lie in ways that I KNEW would usually start up the twitching. One of my main TRIGGERS was when I would lie on my LEFT SIDE, either on the couch or in bed. This usually created an IMMEDIATE, and often INTENSE discomfort. Another trigger was when I would sit on the couch or in a chair and put MY FEET UP on a coffee table or foot stool. Again, the discomfort was almost immediate. A third trigger was just sitting TOO LONG in a chair, either watching TV, reading or sitting on a plane. I usually got a bit of a grace period, but twitching would inevitably occur if I didn't get up and MOVE around a bit. The most unfortunate trigger was when my wife held my hand while we were watching TV or sitting on a plane. It was EXTREMELY intense. As much as I would have LOVED to do that for hours on end, I couldn't for more than a few seconds. The pain was unbearable. The last significant trigger I had was putting my OWN hands on my lap while sitting. If I did that, the twitching would soon arrive. So, I had to always make sure to keep my hands to my side. It was DAY FOUR of my vitamin, herb and mineral intake, and I was VERY excited. The improvement was already OBVIOUS and DRAMATIC. Once I ran my first set of "tests" I was ecstatic! All went well. There was some twitching and irritation, but it was MUCH less than it was before I started the daily intake. It's a pretty normal curiosity to want to test out the triggers. Emotions were high, I was excited, and felt REAL hope for the first time EVER with my RLS. The problem is, I KEPT testing these triggers EVERY DAY! What I SHOULD have done is TESTED out the triggers, NOTED the improvement, and then made a point of testing them again in a COUPLE of weeks ... or even better, a month. NOT the next day, and the DAY after that, and the NEXT day after that and so on. What I ENDED up doing is re-irritating those trouble areas over and over again, rather than BACKING away and allowing the time that NATURE needs to do its healing. Imagine if I was to use this SAME strategy for a broken finger. If I had a broken finger, I would leave the splint on until I was pretty sure that my finger was able to handle the rigors of day to day living. If I felt confident, I may take the splint off after 2 weeks to test it out. At that point I would do something VERY gentle - like maybe resting my hand on a table and trying to lift my finger up. What I WOULDN'T do is take the splint off and POKE my finger against the WALL. That's going to hurt, and it would SET BACK any healing that had ALREADY occurred. If I kept POKING my finger against the wall EVERY DAY to see how much healing had happened since the PREVIOUS day, it would take YEARS for my finger to heal. So basically, what YOU need to do ... is NOT do what I did. Do what a normal person would do, which is to avoid your TRIGGER POSITIONS while the healing is going on. Have RESPECT for Nature and the TIME it takes for the healing process, rather than CHALLENGING it. Whatever your trigger positions are, please try to AVOID them for the NEXT month. This again falls under the category of PRACTICE. I know when I'm sleeping that I have no choice sometimes than to flip over to my LEFT side. The key is to try to AVOID the triggers the best you can. If the twitching starts when you LIE on your BACK at night, then TRY not to do that. If it usually starts up when you've been SITTING for 45 minutes in a chair, then make an excuse to get up every 30 minutes or so and WALK around. Even if it's a small insignificant trigger position that might not even set you off anymore, please try to avoid doing that. Do your best to avoid your trigger positions, and LET the healing HAPPEN, for at least the FIRST month.

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