Taking care of the body

[mad_m]

Hello fellow Bodies in Motion! Wondering about your stories of healing and recovery. I'm on the road back from a long layoff from running related to overtraining and muscle imbalance, and a major rock fall last September. Without getting into the details of the problems (long, boring, trust me), I finally owned that I'm getting older and simply taking a few months off with stretching just won't cut it anymore. That was a long road of getting past depression of not being able to move the way I wanted, at the speed and with the power I used to.

I hate it when I get the advice from medical professionals or massage therapists to not run, not push it, perhaps take it easier - I found the right mix of body work with an acupuncturist. After a few months of work with her, and on my own (stretching, rolling muscles, and pushing tennis balls into my trigger points at home), I'm now able to do some walk-running, body weight exercises, and the occasional short dyno at the rock gym. I also got outside to lead a few easy sport routes over Easter weekend. I used to be too proud to mix running into my walking, wouldn't climb routes I thought were beneath me, and didn't think strength training had a place in improving my climbing (totally bought into "if you want to climb, then climb!") In short, I was holding myself back with standards that my injured self couldn't meet, standards that were arbitrarily set. After letting them slack a bit, I realized how much I really can do after all, and that I'm on the road back to where I want to be.

What are your stories of breaking and rebuilding? What personal myths did you need to overcome?

Comments

[alexseanchai]

I think I'm only just starting in the "rebuilding" part. Like. I didn't used to be this thoroughly disabled. (Or if I was, I was ignoring the fact, and what has changed is my ability to get away with that.) My brain keeps going on about "you used to could, why can't you now?" and like? hi, disabled? and we can argue about the nuances of the social model of disability from here to eternity but the word "impairment" is in there somewhere regardless?

ugh. :(

Best luck with getting back where you want to be!

[mad_m]

The mind-body connect where your brain is cajoling, then scolding, your body is a bitch, isn't it? Poor body, here's to rebuilding!