You can pretty much be certain that if I don’t blog anything significant for a while that there is a lot going on. I’m currently working a full day at one job, then a few hours in the evening at the job I will start next week. It is cool because they are paying me overtime, but I feel like I’m never home. Not to mention the fact that it seems like the nights I’m not working there, we have social activities to attend. (But I won’t complain. Look! Married AND social!)
Anyway, I mention that because I should have gone to yoga tonight, but didn’t because that would have been my entire evening. I’d have gotten home, changed, gone to yoga and would just be getting home now (after 9pm).
A few weeks ago my yoga instructor (who I love) was helping me in a pose because I said it was pinching my shoulder. He felt my spine and said, “Wait, scoliosis?” I’d told him before, so I was surprised that he seemed surprised. He told me to see him after class. Throughout the rest of the class, he made adjustments to my poses to help stretch out the curvature in my spine whenever we were in certain positions.
After class, he invited me into the private session room and asked if I wanted Dave to join us or not. I said yes, not knowing what to expect. Paul said he highly recommends that I see someone about my spine. I said, “Well, I wore a back brace in high school and I have been seeing a chiropractor off and on. Currently ‘off’ because I didn’t see what good it was doing me.” He said, “Well, a chiropractor is okaaaay, but I think you need to meet with someone who can help straighten your spine as well as deal with the emotions that will come up. Because emotions will come up.”
At this point I’m nearly crying. (Emotions? Regarding my scoliosis? Surely not . . .) I do know about muscles storing emotions because it was a big deal in my bellydance class. That one class I took a million years ago. Kristina warned us that we would be awakening muscles that women hardly ever use and not to be surprised if we got home and were either jubilant or crying or angry for no reason. We were just releasing emotions we’d trapped in our muscles. Also, in meditation, you observe emotions coming up seemingly out of nowhere. It happens.
I said, “Straighten my spine? I didn’t think it could BE straightened.” This seemed to make Paul angry. Not with me, but with the entire medical industry as a whole, I think. He said, “If it’s behavior that made your spine that way, behavior can change it.” I said, “Well, it’s hereditary . . .”
And I began to see how even if it was, I was still holding on to it. As something that defined me. Not just something I put down on medical forms under “other diseases,” but as something that is part of Jen. As a teenager, I didn’t want a swimsuit that showed my back because I didn’t want people to see the S-shape of my spine. (Ever tried looking for a swimsuit that covered the back??) At concerts I have to sit down after a while because my back hurts. “No, I’m cool, it’s just because I have scoliosis.” At my first 10-day meditation retreat, I sat against the wall because I didn’t think my back was strong enough to withstand sitting upright for 11 or so hours a day. Later an older Indian woman at the center fussed at me, “You do NOT need that wall! You are young! Sit up straight!” She didn’t listen to my teary-eyed scoliosis woes. And she was right. I never used a wall again for meditation. Later, even in yoga I felt like my spine was to blame for my inflexible hips.
And this is what I carry around in my spine, this is the blame I carry in the rusty muscles that are nestled comfortably, weakly, in the concaves of my S-curve.
The conversation with Paul had been an emotional one until this point. My voice had cracked but no tears fell. I asked what exactly he was recommending. He said, that first of all, he thought it was very brave of me to even ask that. (I didn’t think it was brave, I wanted to know what he was getting at.) He wants me to start intense private yoga sessions with someone I trust, someone who has the medical knowledge to help me straighten out my spine and the compassion to address the emotions that might arise. He warned me that my life will change. That straightening my spine will shift, um, EVERYTHING.
I asked who he recommended. He said there were 3 instructors he’d trust with the task of something like this: him and 2 others, both of whom I’ve taken classes from. I told Paul I’d rather take private lessons from him. He thinks that I’ll only need once-weekly classes for about a year and a half. TO FIX MY SPINE. DO YOU HEAR THAT, INTERNET?
No doctor/chiropractor has ever told me, “Yeah, let’s do this for a while and then you’ll be all better!” Or regarding my scoliosis anyway. It’s always, “Let’s do this (expensive) treatment for the rest of your life so it doesn’t get any worse.”
He told me to think about it. I came home in a daze. If the emotions that came up in that conversation are any indication of what might come up over the next year and a half, look out. Someone send Dave some protective clothing. Or a sympathy card. Or plane tickets.
Anyway, it will be pricey- they are private yoga lessons after all, but changing my life for the better seems worth it. One day getting pregnant and not having major back issues seems worth it. Releasing this scoliosis-related baggage that I’ve been dragging around for 16 years seems worth it.
We’ll start later in June. The job change as well as a few traveling dates to visit family prevent me from starting until then. But I’ll definitely keep you posted.
EDITOR’S NOTE: I just did a Google Image Search on Scoliosis. 1. Don’t do that. 2. I will at this moment quit my bitchin. 3. I meant to relate this post to my Saturn return and how I thought I was just doing so great! Stupid Saturn. However, my friend Megan pointed out that at least I was given someone to help me out with it!
