Believe Your Body

Your body doesn’t lie. If something hurts, it causes you pain, and if something is wrong, it can stop you from your daily life. So what constitutes something being ‘so bad’ that you need to pay attention, finally take action, and not wonder about all the ‘what if’s’ of the past if things could have been different. This can be a tough call, especially when lab values, a new diagnosis, or a warning arises that we never could have anticipated.

During high school lacrosse tryouts we had to run two miles, and without knowing anything about running, I just grabbed my sneakers and ran. Halfway through the season, however, I had to quit because my left knee would become so inflamed it wouldn’t move- and this was happening more and more frequently. Fast forward a decade and a half later, I had happily gone back to gymnastics, until I landed a trick I considered a warm up with my knee straight enough that everyone heard the pop. I actually didn’t get physical therapy right away because I was in such shock that this was happening. I just wanted to be able to walk.

In the aftermath, I chose to slow down because my body only had a certain amount of energy, and the majority of it was utilized to heal the balloon that was around my knee. Perhaps not so ironically, I was feeling for the past few months, and even year, that I was feeling maxed out and exhausted by life- yet I went into this profession/career from passion! Something wasn’t right.

My left knee was never quite 100% since my competitive gymnastics days, but I always figured it was fine. Only post injury did I not only eventually get the help I needed for rehab (where it’s so much better now), but I took the time to reflect on the big lesson. If I wasn’t going to slow down, something was going to try and make me. I chose to take on the responsibility. In fact, it was afterwards that I was even able to create this new brand and life for myself.

Any sort of new symptom, diagnosis, concern, etc. can be unnerving. However, this is just one example in my life, and even as I see it with patients, that we then address the patterns and synchronicities, emotional and physical healing, and what it means to move forwards.

Where you can start:

-What were some of your thoughts leading up to this? Seriously.. get brutally honest with yourself. It probably won’t feel good, but it holds so much power to have this insight.

-Consider risk factors- nutrition, lifestyle, stressors, family history, lifestyle, etc.

-Check out the emotional meanings of concerns and/or where they’re showing up in your body- for example, knees are all about surrender, the left side is about receiving (so much of my life was about going/doing & achievements. It’s not bad, per se, but I realized too there’s also an allowing/attracting side to the universe). Physically, I also chose to receive more insight from others about my own physical structure, because this wasn’t ‘just’ about my knee. The alignment of my spine, bones, then musculature- have to look at the whole body.

So, what did you gather from this? Let me know in the comments below! 👏