“You know you’ll live with this for the rest of your life. There will be nothing we can do”, the locum GP told me. I had already been seeing GPs, physiotherapists, etc… for years. I was pregnant with my first child and still getting back pain. His words shocked me and as I left the surgery, I was distraught. Even though I was in joyful expectation of having my baby, I couldn’t help but worry for myself. My life was over before my little one’s was about to begin.
Layers of pain
I felt old and useless. Will my child be one of my carers? My back pain was worse now. I seemed to have acquired a new layer to it; I now couldn’t stand for long periods. The first back pain was just on my tailbone and felt different to the second one. I had started swimming, so that helped a great deal, giving me a spring in my step and making me feel stronger.
So, after the birth, that “second” layer of back pain went, to reveal the first one again. The first one was my constant companion. I say constant, but she appeared when she wanted and disappeared for a day or so. Quite sly, really. When she appeared, she would come without a moment’s notice, selfish and uninvited. I never understood her. When she left, I would breathe a sigh of relief, but come back she would.
That was until I read a book called, “Healing Back Pain – The Mind / Body Connection”, by John Sarno. As soon as I read the first few pages, I could see myself there, being my own fiercest critic, always trying to do too much.
Layers of Healing
He said he helped hundreds of people by getting them to do some affirmations which forced them to think differently about their back pain. I started to worry that it was too good to be true. Surely, something as easy as this, couldn’t possibly work for me? I already had that low back pain for 9 years. I had lifted a PC unit which was too heavy.
Well, I had nothing to lose. After all, many people even with harsh, diagnosed back pain had cured themselves. I tried it. In 4 weeks my back went down by about 80%. As I carried on, applying his methods, bending, twisting, feeling strong, my pain went away completely. I was overjoyed. I could pick up my child without any difficulty, worry, or pain (and all the shopping, too). That was 16 years ago.
You see, if we go by the premise that our symptoms occur perfectly, in synchronicity with the rest of our lives; everything in harmony, the results (and longed-for relief) we get are way more profound than working on the rules that there is something wrong with us. The latter is totally meaningless. Have you been given a label that you now live by?
Having trained in META-Health and helping many people with musculoskeletal issues, I’ve learnt that people with chronic pain heal at different levels. Some will heal simply be re-focusing on the pain being emotional (as Sarno suggests), some will need to do more work to find the underlying emotions and work on them and others will have ongoing work to do to help bring down their pain, but knowing WHY it’s happening, still lessens it.
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photo: pixabay (Dan Evans)
META-Healthy Life articles are created by professionals and friends of META-Health International CIC, supporting individual and global health by deepening and sharing our understanding of how resilience and well-being are achieved.