Some illnesses really are all in the mind

Chronic is a nasty little word which creeps up on you. When my back first started hurting I couldn't wait to leap onto a surgeon's table for him to wield his knife and remove a herniated disc so I could start life anew. Second opinion? Never needed one of those.

Six years later I'm sitting surrounded by a great big pillow at a hydraulically operated desk. In 10 minutes time I will stand up and go on working for another 10 minutes. Then I will go for a walk, roll around on the floor for a bit and start again.

And in about a year I may have finished writing this piece. I could write a guide to the osteopaths, chiropractors, physiotherapists, orthopaedic surgeons and pain management consultants of the environs of Harley Street - and my back still hurts. Badly. It's as simple or as complicated as that.

My most recent research in the ether of the desperate has led me into the realms of the psycho-emotional. Dr John Sarno is a revered professor of clinical rehabilitation medicine at New York University Medical Center. He is also a hero to his patients and a walking slap in the face to mainstream medical logic. He certainly undermines the scientific approach with his belief in the power of the mind to influence the workings of the body.

But then I am only mildly amazed that I can go and spend one hour with a hypnotist and quit smoking just like that. From 60 a day to zero. So why should we not consider other possibilities that accept the power of the mind and harness it for better health?

Look up Sarno's book Healing Back Pain on Amazon and you'll find some incredible reader reviews that practically weep with gratitude. His latest book, The Divided Mind, amplifies his arguments.

In essence, he has discovered that there are certain medical conditions that defy all attempts of cure and are the subject of misdiagnosis on a massive and expensive scale. He believes that the root of some forms of sciatica, IBS and certainly back pain are in the emotions and thus it is there that you will find the cure.

All Dr Sarno does is educate his patients to understand how their emotions (particularly anger and indeed rage) trigger what he calls Tension Myosotis Syndrome as a way of very effectively repressing feelings. Interestingly, TMS is found largely among the hard-working, the conscientious, the doers: it is by no means confined to those who were abused or abandoned as children and have lots to rage about.

We all have rage inside us, and some of us deal with it by not letting it out. And our bodies ride to the rescue and provide these brilliant diversionary conditions – which mean that we are so busy looking after our backs that we don't look after our emotions, which hide behind an iron screen of physical pain.

Dr Sarno does not believe that the pain is 'all in the mind' – indeed he empathises with it possibly more than the doctors who give us all these things that fail to fix the problem. But his solution is entirely different. Having thoroughly educated yourself about the condition and dug around to find your rage (feel the burn!) and recognise it, you pick up your bed and start walking.

When the head tells the body that the game is up, the body then gives up the game. What a relief that would be – in more ways than one. ·