Resisting What Is | Suffering

Going into the spring, I was so excited for the snow and ice to thaw and to feel the warmth on my rigid, tense body. I had been taking baths nightly and putting a hot rice pack on my face whenever I could to bring me some ease. Things were looking up and although my progress was not a straight line upward, the overall progress was forward, and I was told that this was a very good sign of my body wanting to heal.

I was seeing the osteopath and naturopath regularly and at one point in June I decided to go see my physiotherapist to get some help with my numb right foot. As per usual he worked on opening up my hips and was quite assertive with the pressure. I did a lot of running and sports in my youth, so I often struggled with tight hips etc. During the session, I kept telling myself that the intensity of his session was what I probably needed, but my intuition was telling me that it was causing more strain in my right side. Later that day the right side of my face started to flare up and my neck tension worsened. It felt like I had been kicked in the face. Hard. I was devastated. It felt like all of my progress was for naught. Three days later my back went out and that was the beginning of a quick mental and physical decline. I remember thinking “not now! I cannot handle anything else right now!” I cried. Hard.

Ever since I had my first child (14 years ago), my back would go out about once a year. When it would go out, everyone would need to pitch in as I would literally be on my back for days followed by weeks of therapy and a slow recovery. This is an important part of the story as my back issues were highlighting a long term issue that may be connected to the current symptoms in my face, neck and jaw.

Over the summer my back continued to go out four more times, each time leading to tears, frustration, sadness and eventually depression. I kept wondering “when is this nightmare going to end?” It was during the summer months that I kept having the dark thought “If someone told me I had to live this way forever, I would not want to live anymore”. I had never felt this low in my life. I honestly felt like living in this much pain was too unbearable.

For the first time in my life, I understood depression. I knew anxiety very well, but depression was something new. During this entire nightmare, I had to pull it together daily to coach my clients. I did many coaching sessions over the phone, lying down with the TENS machine zapping my back to ease my muscles. The pills were non-stop as well. Somehow I managed to feed my kids, tend to them when needed and outside of that, just deal with my situation. My husband was still working overtime hours trying to get his business going, so he was fighting his own battle. My three beautiful children were incredibly understanding and helpful and another gift from this time was that they really learned how to cook, clean and help out around the house.

There was a time that summer when we were hosting our good friends at the cottage for one week and my husband had to travel back to the city to work. I was trying to stay strong for myself and everyone else, but I truly felt so overwhelmed, anxious, frustrated and sad. I could not be myself, I could not cook, I could not play. The person I was, was unrecognizable to me. I clearly remember going out to one of the cabins and just screamed my head off and I cried and cried and cried. It was the release I truly needed as I felt a bit better afterwards.

As a coach, I know the power of affirmation and feeding your mind good thoughts. I kept trying to tell myself good thoughts, but often the pain was so all consuming it was hard to think positively. We were extremely fortunate to spend four weeks of that summer at the cottage. Once again, I wanted to be there for the joy my children experienced there, but while we were there I could not get therapy and suffered as a result. I tried to make up for it by swimming two laps around the island every day, stretching and taking care of my health as best as I could. Alcohol had been cut to zero. I was going to sleep as early as possible, and trying to eat clean. Given the state of my back, I could not sit down, so I spent that entire summer mostly on my back or standing. Looking back at this time, I realize I traded in alcohol for reading, which was a surprising gift. I was reading books quicker than ever and really enjoying all sorts of light, fast-moving fiction. Whenever I had down time, all I wanted to do was read to escape this living nightmare.

Part of my progression that summer, as my muscles were letting go somewhat, included the slow releasing of my jaw which started to painfully click, pop and grind. This was so extremely scary for me. I am a food lover and all I could think was that I was never going to enjoy any delectable foods again. Every time my jaw popped, clicked or grinded, it would set off a chain response of tension in my neck, jaw, face and head. The tension it caused was unbearable, think migraine, so I avoided it at all costs. Even just lying in bed at night on my left side (I could not lie on my right side due to pain), even just swallowing would make my jaw pop, grind and start that whole tension response. The headaches were constant too. I remember worrying about eating a chicken curry, even chopped up small, as I did not want to chew too much as I could not bear the pain that followed. It was the summer of making hot dogs and KD for my kids and lots of cereal as Mommy was not cooking. My doctor had given me a referral to an TMJ specialist, but the wait time was one year! Lot of help that was going to be and also said something about the number of other people suffering at this time with jaw issues. Thankfully I was told by my dream team that a TMJ does not often help, but more so puts a bandaid on the situation, instead of getting to the root of the issue and healing from there.

One day after one of my swims around the island, I was sitting on the dock and slowly stretching my neck. I felt and heard a massive crunch on the right side right at the base of my scalp. I initially thought it was the adjustment my neck needed to release some tension. Apparently it was not, as I only locked up my neck further and created so much more tension and pain. I could not believe this nightmare was getting worse. My neck could barely move from left to right. A few weeks later my right knee shifted out of alignment and I later found out my knee cap was tracking, making mobility even worse than before. Clearly my body was trying to tell me something.

During this time, I could not bring myself to talk to my friends and share my story. I was such an emotional mess not knowing what was going on with me. Given it was on my mind every minute of every day, I also did not want to talk about it more. I did not want to draw any more attention and energy to the pain. So I was either ignoring reach outs or making excuses to not see people. Carrying this “screaming baby” around with me made being with others totally unbearable.

It was in August that it finally hit me that it was time to go on some prescription medication. Until then I was only taking over-the-counter pain meds, along with a list of natural supplements daily but I could see my mood was slipping into a dark place. Talking to my doctor I had the clear realization that not talking to my friends about the challenges of my life was taking its toll. I did not want to talk about my husband’s business challenges for fear of judgment and I did not want to talk about my health issues for fear of crumbling and drawing attention to it. The day I had my appointment with my doctor, she prescribed me two nerve medications, one for pain (which included a mood booster for my sadness) and one for inflammation. Immediately afterwards, I called a few friends to unload what had been happening. I cried, I laughed and it was a massive relief. It is clear, I needed a whole team of help and everyone was doing their part and I was so grateful to have such love and support all around me.

Until then, I had always heard that going on RRSI meds can be difficult, but it was not until I went through it that I finally understood. For the three weeks it took for them to kick in, I felt restless, anxious, uncomfortable and unsettled. I was counting down every day in anticipation of day 21 when my body would have adjusted. And adjust, it did. I started to feel lighter. I started to smile a bit more. I could feel some slivers of me coming back. Thank goodness! I remember the day when I first looked up a recipe online and wanted to get the groceries to cook a yummy meal. The old me was coming back! I had not felt that urge in months, which was not like myself. It’s amazing how simple things like cooking can bring back that spark.

Near the end of the summer, I realized it was time I got that spot on my nose looked at as it continued to scab and peel, scab and peel and grow in size at the same time. I sent a pic to my doctor and she immediately got me a referral to a dermatologist as it looked like basal cell carcinoma to her. My appointment was booked for October, so the waiting on that one was not easy, but thankfully a bit easier with the medications I was now on.

When we finally returned to the city, I committed to getting back on my osteo/naturo appointment routine and getting rid of this pain once and for all. I was so over it. What I know now is that until this time, I had been resisting my pain, rather than accepting it. The resistance did not allow for healing to occur, and even though I knew this, I did not know how to accept the pain either. By the end of the summer I had lost roughly 15-20 lbs due to low food consumption and a weak body. I remember thinking then how when I got strong again, how I would love my size and strength. It makes me think more now when I see someone who has lost weight and not assuming it was by choice. Now more than ever I love my strong, full beautiful body and am so grateful for it.

Photo: Zero pictures of me were taken this summer. No explanation required.