What is our true essence?

Not that long ago my thoughts, emotions, and daily functions revolved around being sick. It was how I identified myself. I was sick, and living in a state of “I can’t.” Everything seemed like an enormous task and too big of a risk to take. I was certain that anything outside the safety of the small little zone of comfort I had made for myself would send me spiraling into the depths of my illness. I was sick. That was pretty much the entirety of who I was and the lens with which I viewed the entire world.
But I was never happy or content with that state of being. Who is? Who could possibly be? Even when we reach a state of acceptance with our illness, it does not mean that we are content living with it. I was certainly not content – a shell of my former self, and a shell of the person I could still feel inside of me. My true essence is not that of a sick person. My true essence is beauty, strength, light, love, and possibility! And I could feel each element deep inside me just waiting to burst through. Something had to change!

So I changed the only thing I had any amount of control over – ME!

Actually I did not change me so much are get reconnected with ME – the me deep inside that I had lost touch with over my many years of illness. She hadn’t gone away, she simply had been neglected. And the first thing I did to reconnect with her was to forgive myself for neglecting her, for neglecting ME. I had been doing my very best to cope with my illness given the skills and understanding I had available to me at the time. As we all know there is no manual on how to live with chronic illness. It is a complete process of trial and error. We are the pioneers of fibromyalgia. So where to begin?

I began with the simple belief that my life had much more meaning than my illness. I began to listen to my intuition, which told me things could be different, things could change. I allowed my true essence to become louder than my doubt, worry, frustration, and fear. I gave more authority to ME and less to my illness. I opened my heart to the truth of ME and began to allow hope and joy back into my life. I worked hard at not letting the once loud voice of my illness, which at times drowned out any other sounds, to again become the only thing I could hear.

And I did more work. Slowly, yet regularly I began practices and behaviors that reinforced ME and turned down the volume of my illness. I completely changed the way I ate – no more gluten, and a lot more veggies, nothing processed, everything fresh. I began a regular yoga practice, starting once or twice a month in the extra gentle, senior class, and slowly progressing over two years time until here I am today, teaching gentle yoga and practicing regularly. I began reading books, magazines, and web content that enhanced and reinforced my new focus. I found a local spiritual community where I feel love, hope, and an even greater connection to the essence of ME. I could go on and on, describing the ways I have worked over the past two years to reconnect with me, and disconnect with my illness, but I think you get the point.

I am not symptom free. I likely never will be. But what I am is hopeful, and happy, and whole. I am whole despite what is missing. I am whole despite what is different. I am whole despite my symptoms. I am whole because I am again living from my true essence, not from my illness.

We are all so unique and valuable. I believe we feel pain so intensely because we feel everything intensely. It is exactly our capacity to love that gives us this incredible capacity to hurt. We can chose to focus on the love, and the essence of our being, rather than on the pain and symptoms of our illness. It is not living in denial. It is not mind over matter. It is essence over illness. You are so much more than your illness! And you illness can never diminish or extinguish your true essence. You were born with it, and you will die with. Now is the perfect time to find your own way to tune into it and let it once again become what you live from. Your formula will be your own. You know what makes your heart sing. You know what makes you feel like a complete and whole being. You know what makes you YOU! Find a way to spend more time there. You are love, you are light, you are beauty, and you are hope! The world needs more of YOU!

Continue reading at Danette's blog

Muscle pain and myofascia

What is myofascial pain and how is it diagnosed? These questions will be answered here...

I started getting new, quite strong pain in my neck and up into my temple. I thought it might be the dreaded Trigeminal Neuralgia (Facial Nerve Pain) that I had heard about so I googled and found a most interesting article which described my pain exactly.

No it was not Trigeminal Neuralgia it was Sternocleidomastoid (SCM) of which I had never heard.

Anyway it convinced me to go to get myofascial treatment which I had heard can help fibro.

Myofascial treatment is a specific type of massage that releases the myofascial tissues. Myo means muscle and fascia means the connective tissue covering the muscles. These connective tissues become tight and painful and need to be released.

Myofascial pain is usually caused in specific tender points that need to be released. It is a constant, deep pain that I would describe as a tender muscle that is held tight. It makes me feel like my legs cannot relax and that I have clenched my muscles so much that they will not let go. I have learnt that it is in a part of my body that I had never heard of... the fascia. Also I learnt that there is a layer of fascia just under the skin and another layer deep in the muscles. 

Fascia is a thin casing of connective tissue that surrounds and holds every organ, blood vessel, bone, nerve fiber and muscle in place. The tissue does more than provide internal structure; fascia has nerves that make it almost as sensitive as skin. When stressed, it tightens up. ~ JOHN HOPKINS MEDICINE

I have had my first treatment and have felt some easing of tension in my shoulders and no face pain this week I am pleased to say. I will keep you posted about future treatments. 

Myofascial technique in the lower leg.
Image thanks to StillpointTherapeutic Massage & Bodywork.

How is myofascial pain diagnosed?

The recognition of this syndrome requires a precise understanding of the body's trigger points. Trigger points can be identified by pain that results when pressure is applied to an area of the patient's body. In the diagnosis of myofascial pain syndrome, four types of trigger points can be distinguished:

• An active trigger point is an area of extreme tenderness that usually lies within the skeletal muscle and which is associated with a local or regional pain.
• A latent trigger point is a dormant (inactive) area that has the potential to act like a trigger point.
• A secondary trigger point is a highly irritable spot in a muscle that can become active due to a trigger point and muscular overload in another muscle.
• A satellite myofascial point is a highly irritable spot in a muscle that becomes inactive because the muscle is in the region of another trigger pain. FROM CLEVELAND CLINIC

There is a book explaining the condition called Fibromyalgia and Chronic Myofascial Pain Syndrome: A Survival Manual which you read my review of here