Establishing that mind/body connection

I mentioned in my update post that my orthopedist told me I need to rethink the mind/body connection so that I pay attention to signals my body sends when something’s wrong. It would be more accurate to say I need to start paying attention. I’ve spent my entire life disassociated from my body, so I can’t rethink something I’ve never done. Unfortunately, I’m a pro at ignoring signals from my body.

For instance:

• I took a hard fall from the top of a pretty tall slide when I was 9. Remember, I was a child in the dark ages when our playground equipment had zero safety features, and the playgrounds were hard-packed dirt, not the cushy stuff used today. I landed flat on my back and knocked the wind out of myself. My lower back felt awful, sort of unstable, but I didn’t tell anyone I’d fallen or that my back hurt. That night I remember lying on the daybed in our basement in Bryn Mawr watching the moon landing and thinking I wish my back weren’t hurting. It’s pretty much hurt ever since.*  
• When I was 19, I had all the symptoms of appendicitis for three weeks. I finally went to the clinic because I threw up (hate, hate, hate to throw up) and was in surgery three hours later. My surgeon later told me that if I’d waited one more day, I would have died. My small intestine was compromised, I had an NG tube for about 5 days and a 7-inch long incision.
• I went on to have four abdominal surgeries in five years and had a fair amount of pain and discomfort in my lower back (same place from that fall). But what’s the prevailing advice if you have back pain? Do more core work, you’ve got a weak core and once that’s strong, then your back will be good to go. I cannot tell you how much ab work I’ve done over the years. Point in fact, my core is rock solid. That back pain never went away, and I never thought to mention it to any doctor I ever saw. More about that in a moment.
• I had an MRI a few years ago to see why my ears were always plugged up. When I met with my ENT to discuss the results, he asked me how often I had sinus infections. Never, I said. He told me that I had a raging sinus infection right then and showed it to me on the MRI. That was a recalibration exercise for me right there as I realized the face melting headaches I’d had all my life were in fact sinus infections. That particular sinus infection took two rounds of antibiotics to cure.
• About that back pain. The same MRI that diagnosed my pelvic fracture also diagnosed mild degenerative disc disease in L4-L3. Guess where that is? Yup, the same spot that’s been hurting me all these years.
• And of course, I ran a 10K on Memorial Day this year with a fractured pelvis. Yes, I was in pain—enough pain that I had to walk a fair amount, enough pain that my average pace was 90 seconds more a mile than usual, enough pain that I was nearly puking the whole way through. I still didn't stop. Once I ran across the finish line, that was it. I haven’t walked normally since then.

Right this second, I’m trying to pay attention. I say trying because this is hard. Now I feel all the aches and pains, all the discomfort and it’s not pleasant. OK that’s an understatement. I’m in pain and not just from the fracture. I don’t like this at all and to be honest, I long for that disassociation because at least then I don’t hurt.

I’m sure if you aren’t wired this way, I sound utterly insane.




*By the way, I'm not dissing today’s playgrounds—I couldn’t have taken the fall I did if the slide had been both shorter and made of that industrial plastic used today. I was basically skiing down the slide with sand under my shoes. I didn't get enough sand for that trip, caught an edge of my sneaker at the top of the slide and flipped right over. I don't think you can ski down today's slides that way.