Tag Archives: Health

Kansas City, MO

A New Year, New Day, New Moment

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Photo found at: http://bit.ly/2j62K0k

I woke up on January 1st 2017 in a haze from going out the night before. I was reminded of the person I used to be and as I chugged water to shake the hang over out of my head I thought about why I worked so hard to not be that person. Every year I hope that January 1st will come and I will be sprinkled with magical fairy dust which makes me thinner, healthier, and happier. Basically not me. And nothing has every really changed. This January 1st I woke up with a sense of knowing that I am clinging to now, ten days later. It feels prophetic and immense in nature. It is a sensation that I can only describe as hope for the future in a way that feels very alive like a roaring fire inside of me.

Instead of holding my New Year’s (over)celebration against myself, I forgave myself. I opted to choose love towards myself as I tried to discover where my cell phone had gone the previous night and how I had made it home. I reminded myself that I won’t be perfect and will sometimes let myself down. I don’t want to be perfect, sometimes being imperfect is more fun… but only if I can forgive myself the next day. Otherwise it is an unbearable reality that threatens my whole self.

In 2009 while I was training to go to Iraq I jokingly bummed a cigarette, lit it, and smoked it. The exhilaration of a change in chemistry made me smoke a second, then a third, eventually buying my own packs and cartons. I swore I would quit when I came home from Iraq. It was easy to make an excuse, I mean for goodness sake, I was at war. Even my parents made that excuse for me. I came home and swore I would quit. I kept smoking. I went to Afghanistan and smoked several packs a day. I proved I could quit mid tour when I stopped smoking for 5 weeks to prove a point to someone. At the end of that 5 weeks I decided to start smoking again. I don’t think I forgave myself for smoking, I just made different and better excuses. Then I just owned my failure and said I had no excuse except I liked the taste of a cigarette with coffee and the burn of the smoke in my throat. Even that was an excuse to keep punishing myself.

When I woke up ten days ago I didn’t just forgive myself for partying too much the night before. I forgave myself for everything that has been the last 8 years and it has taken 10 days to understand.

There are two kinds of people at New Year’s, the kind that make resolutions and the kind that say resolutions are worthless. I heard a lot from both sides coming up to New Year and I didn’t make up my mind about what my goals for 2017 would be until I woke up on the 1st. Those who make resolutions choose to side with hope for themselves and for the future. Those who say resolutions are worthless side with doubt, also for themselves and for the future. I am sure that many will say they have different reasons, but when it boils down to it, don’t you think that sounds right? Setting goals is the difference between hope and doubt. Even trying and failing year after year, a person still chooses hope. Several years ago I stopped trying.

I have been trying to get back to myself. More so, I have been trying to find the me that I don’t recall knowing, the person that I love and trust. Not the person who punishes myself with bad choices and negative thoughts. I started trying a few years back, not because it was the 1st of the year, but because I knew that I could not continue unless I found a different answer than the ones that I gave myself. I work with programs like Warriors’ Ascent not just to help other people but also to continue helping myself. As I help and encourage others to meditate, do yoga, and practice introspection I still struggle. I don’t expect that they won’t struggle still and always. What I have seen in the last several years that trying is hope and it can bring new life and new breathe to a person. I have kept going, sometimes in a direction that feels like I am pushing a boulder up a hill. I have time and again reminded myself that there are answers I don’t yet have and I have to keep going. In high school I used to run, but ever since Iraq I don’t like running, likely because I feel like my whole life is running without a goal in sight.

The thing is that looking back on the years there have been many moments like January 1st 2017. It is a moment where something I have been searching for clicks. Something that I have been trying to understand or grasp or learn just suddenly makes sense and I find a sense of ease. The boulder disappears and my journey becomes a little easier. I pray for these moments. I pray that I move from knowing how to make my road a little easier to doing the actions that get me there. So I stopped.

Photo Found at: http://bit.ly/2iDNFjb

I did not go to the store for a pack of cigarettes. I told myself 5 more minutes. For Christmas my parents gave me a book called Getting There: A Book of Mentors where Michael Bloomberg says “If your mind starts to wander to past events, the only advice I can give you is don’t go. Just stop it! Think about something else. If you divert your attention, your mind won’t immediately go back to the unpleasant occurrence, and when it eventually does, simply stop thinking about it again. That’s how you quit smoking. You don’t have to stop for the rest of your life, just stop for five minutes.” He then goes on to say at the end of 5 minutes if you want a cigarette, wait another five minutes. When I read this it really started to turn some gears back into place. Whatever you think of Michael Bloomberg, his words are true. I have been using this idea to interrupt my panic attack for a couple years, but never thought to apply it elsewhere in my life.

It’s a New Year, each day is a New Day, each 5 minutes is a New 5 Minutes, and each moment is a New Moment. In a moment of time the gears finished moving back into place and as I forgave myself for one evening, that would normally disrupt the whole course of my life, I somehow started forgiving myself for everything. It’s been 10 days without a cigarette, no e-cigarette, no nicotine anything, just me and 5 minutes at a time. Just me and forgiving myself and truly starting to treat myself as if I love myself. But it didn’t happen in only one moment, it happen in a million moments that built up overtime and altered my course. It is the multitude of moments and minutes and days and years that keep moving forward to continue choosing life over death.

Each of these 10 days that I have not smoked I have spent those 5 minute intervals (the length of a normal cigarette) thinking deeply about loving myself. I have started a list of how to love myself better. I have left plenty of blank space on the list for the future ideas. I have started meditating again, am sleeping better, feel better, and am falling in love with myself.

I hope you find inspiration and seek the 5 minutes or the moments that bring you hope for the future. Happy New Year! Happy New Day! Happy 5 Minutes! Happy Moment!

Original Post on Medium.

Kansas City, MO

Thankful to be a 6/10

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I draw the pain in hopes I can release it.

We are all familiar with the question, “On a scale of 1–10, 10 being the worst pain you’ve ever felt, where is your pain right now?” It is commonly asked by health care providers, even if you’re at a 0. I live at a 3 most days, maybe a 2 if I’m lucky. If I’m unlucky I’m at a 6 or an 8, or stuck in bed or on my floor at a 10. It’s been this way since 2009, when I was in Iraq. My best guess is months of wear and tear just broke something so my shoulder doesn’t work right. There was no significant trauma, oh how I wish there had been.

I’ve been poked and prodded for 7 years. I’ve tried medication and physical therapy. I’ve had test after test. I’ve cried in offices as doctors proclaim that my tests show completely normal, and sometimes really great for someone my age. They’re tears of frustration that I feel the need to explain or apologize for. I wish they would find something wrong.

This pain interferes with my life. I want to feel better, so I spend time at the VA trying to discover what’s going on. It takes a lot out of me to go to the doctor so often. To put myself through tests over and over. To be on medication that helps me forget the pain, as well as everything else, including what I want to order at dinner, 30 seconds after making a decision.

As each specialist tells me they can’t help I look at them with tears in my eyes and ask that they keep trying. I’m only 29, I shouldn’t live in this much pain. It starts in my shoulder blade and effects my whole left arm and shoulder. It often effects my whole back. I’m amazingly strong they say, but it hurts to make the motions to prove my strength.

My pain presents in many ways, even in my imagination.

I was looking forward to Thanksgiving with my family coming to visit. I knew it would be a busy few days, but I’d cleaned and prepped and was ready. Then I woke up on Thanksgiving day to go get them at the airport and my 3 was a 6 with every movement and every breathe. It didn’t get better as the day went on, but I shouldered through (pun intended).

I thought that a good night’s sleep would help. I took my forgetting medication (gabapentin) and tried to forget and to sleep. It didn’t work, I awoke to a 10, feeling crippled. I breathed through it, took my forgetting meds, and prayed I would forget. I forgot except when I tried to check traffic as I drove. I forgot except when I tried to breathe or moved too quickly. In 7 years I’ve gotten used to breathing and moving carefully, but then the forgetting medication makes me forget to be careful.

I found that I spent too much time complaining about my pain, so I don’t mention it, as much, when my hand goes numb or it hurts to breathe. I try to not mention it when I’m having a bad day and can’t get out of bed, or I’m so distracted by it while sitting at my desk at work. I don’t want people to be absorbed with my pain scale, because I don’t want to be absorbed with my pain scale. I don’t want my physical injury to have anymore control over me than I do my mental injuries. So I try to not mention it. I still want people to care though, so I don’t feel alone in my pain, with my demons.

The reason I mention it now is because this thanksgiving, despite the pain, I am very thankful. My family is incredible, and they will listen to me complain and talk about my pain.

My TENS Unit (Electrical Stimulation) Angel.

They will discuss remedies and help me place my TENS unit that I can’t put on correctly by myself. They’ll place the lidocaine patches just so in order to provide the most help. They’ll claim sympathy pains alongside me. They rub my back and carry heavy bags. They do what they can to make me feel better.

I also think about everything I’ve learned in 7 years. I know so much about the human body that it made me a great EMT. I helped people feel better, even if my own pain is mysterious. I’ve learned to set boundaries and to care for myself to try and not cause more pain. I’ve learned it the hard way with chainsaws that cause my muscles to scream and people who now help me not feel compelled to pick up a chainsaw. Being in pain has made me lean on my friends and family for help, and I believe that has made us closer than if I were not injured. It has insisted I give more trust to doctors than I feel I should.

It helps me be grateful for the fact I’m alive. I think about selectively numbing things, if I had no pain, I’d have no pleasure. I think the medication I take to forget makes me funnier, just as much as it embarrasses me. I may be in pain when I breathe, but I’m breathing. I may lay in bed or on my floor for a while when it really hurts, but I have a bed and a floor under a roof.

I think about how when I’m in pain but wanting to still function I can pull it together for minutes at a time to keep going and enjoy my life. How I can accept the pain to feel the pleasure and to control my life instead of the pain controlling me. How I can breathe through it and be more conscious of my body when it hurts. It allows me to work harder to listen to my body.

Yes, I would prefer to live without pain, but I won’t let it control me. I have learned to deal with it, to still be functional and valuable in my disaster relief work. To be honest, open, and transparent with my capabilities and my struggles. For my weakness and my pain I become stronger. For this I am very very thankful.

We should accept our reality, our pain, and our struggle. It does not mean we give up looking for answers and solutions, but it means that we choose to win. We can make the choice to be thankful even in the roughest moments. I am thankful that I can do this, and I am thankful that I can share this with you. I hope it inspires you push through and be thankful even in the depths of pain.

Original Post on Medium.