First home

Look, I was never known for having small feelings. Everything I've ever felt has always felt immense and loud which means that the feelings that are already loud and achy were extra that and anything good felt amazing. This is wonderful to have until something bad happens; then it's torturous. And life be lifing a whole lot lately! I grew up not being able to express myself fully, and often being shushed or shut down when I showed emotions or expressed feelings, so when I became a teenager I often acted out in order to let the suffocated into silence energy out of me. I was also in a foreign land trying to assimilate and unspoken hormones were directing my actions. I started hanging out with all the people my mother didn't want me around. I wanted to do everything opposite of what my stepfather said. I was noticing holes in my most important pillars, and I needed a way out.

My voice mattered then, and it matters now. Of course, when I was a teenager, I wasn't aware of that so the agreement that I adopted then was that I was "too loud, too much, too emotional, too aware, too outspoken, too everything but at the same time not enough." I often hid myself and did what individual friends or groups wanted me to do. I was smoking cigarettes at 7, I tried weed and alcohol at 13, I was sexually active at 15. I tried to fit in. It worked until it didn't- my body is intuitive. Your body is intuitive- it knows what you need. It recognizes people, places and patterns of behavior so it gives you butterflies and chills when you're around someone you're attracted to but also a sense of cold sweat or pain when it's warning you about something or someone. All you have to do is be quiet and pay attention. I wish I knew that then because I would have saved myself lots of heartaches.

Fast forward to today, and I am learning daily to listen to my body. It's my first home regardless of the country it was born in or the parents it was granted to. My first and only true home that will reflect how I take care of her daily is my precious body. Recently, I received information from my doctor that my body already was privy to. At 27, I was gifted this gentle pause of degenerative disc dis-ease mainly in my cervical spine and some arthritis in my lumbar and hips. Now at 39, I have arthritis in my entire spine, degenerating discs in both lumbar and cervical plus new degeneration of my SI joints. My body was yelling this since 2025 started. She howled every time I sat in the car for longer than a few hours. She shouted every time I binged watched a season or 5 of some serial killer show. She bawled every time I didn't take care of myself that day. She is screaming now and I have to listen. 

I am terrified. I am staying off Google because I am not about to psych myself out. I am going to focus on PT, and a re-test in 3 months for some of the other things that showed on my lab work. My 5 year plan is not going to include a motorized scooter or wheelchair. Neither will my 10 to 40 year plan. FUCK THAT! Like a friend of mine says "God's going to have to catch me." 

Chronic baddies

Have you ever seen one of those signs that asks you how do you feel physically on a sliding scale 1-10 with 1 being mild pain and 10 being severe?- I would add 10 being even excruciating. Here is a breakdown of the scale- 1-3 mild pain, 4-6 moderate pain, and 7-10 being severe. Leaves much room for questioning, methinks.

I have not been at level 0 since I was in my teens. That's my truth. I have been at levels 3-8 the last 4 months. Call it getting older, call it degenerative disc disease, arthritis, stress, call it whatever makes you sleep better at night but for me it feels like "today, I am able to live or not live." At pain levels 8, people are shut down in a hospital while all I am getting is doctors telling me I'm overweight and to move. I AM MOVING- I am a fucking yoga teacher! It feels like pins and needles in my back when I walk, and it feels an elephant is sitting on my hips when I sit down, but oh when I lay? It feels wonderful, for a whole 5 minutes and then I sink in and start throbbing. It's great. Every day. 

A yoga sister of mine and I were chatting about pain sucking the life out of you and how wonderful it is to have people who you can vent to and talk to about important things such as trauma, physical, mental or spiritual! One of the many things we talked about, we were discussing how people ask questions as if the person they're asking hasn't thought of every question, solution, problem and googled naturalist medicine on how to solve it. I do appreciate people asking, but the questions get tiring. We are wasting time questioning things and not moving into action- sooner! If you know someone who is in pain, chronic, severe, excruciating pain and they are functioning?- Ask how you can help! We are handling the entire world that you are as well, but we are also physically worn out, burned out, torn down. Be kind. Offer help. Care. Hug them- it's been PROVEN to lessen pain!

Health care system as a whole is not equipped to TAKE CARE of people. It is set up as a business to keep people unhealthy- unless you do your research as well. You have to participate in your own life- get out of your own way! Our physical self is only one part of us but it's a big part in this energy field we call Earth! The medical business industry in the US is based on patching bullet wounds with Band-Aids, and that's been my experience since the very first doctor and the very first big ache! There is not a doctor that looks at you holistically to heal all parts of you- physical, mental, spiritual. So then you have to venture out and start your own research. Get into the western medicine in different states, and then turn to your woo woo friend and ask what they can do. Do whatever you need to in order to feel better because your life depends on it. So does a few people's.

Being without employment, there is a lot of work to do in order to keep my mind and body on some sort of schedule even though I just want to curl up and watch TV. I try to get out of the house once a day. Right now the only thing that keeps lessening my pain is movement- any activity to warm up my muscles and joints, plant medicine, somatic therapy, dancing, eating foods that make my body feel good and being around the people that keep my body/mind/soul safe. Also crying!!- I cry a lot lately!

Toodles!

Grief

We live every day trying to avoid it but it catches up. Something no one can fix. Something no one can control or change. Death. When it comes, it brings violent waves of grief. 

So an old friend of mine died a couple of weeks ago and even though we hadn't been in much contact over the last few years while she was sick, the grief has hit me in waves. Waves of days okay and not okay, as well as waves of emotions like anger, envy, sadness, and large spectrums of each. It's been a wild and weird ride. I've experienced enough death for my 39 years here on Earth, and let me say that it never gets easier. Grief never gets easier. There is nothing anyone can say to comfort you. Today, I find a friend lost his dear dog. Death, no matter how big, always brings grief, and that grief is personal and it comes in spirals for all of us.

You know, historically, grief after death was often expressed publicly through mourning rituals, but in the 20th and 21st centuries, it became increasingly viewed as a private, personal experience. Something jaded inside of me says capitalism had something to do with that and someone is definitely earning off of that idea. Anywho, grief is awful and just because there is nothing anyone can say doesn't mean you have to do it alone. You shouldn't do it alone. Grief can come for different reasons- it doesn't always come with death. Losing a job, a relationship or some dream that you were chasing after can be grieved. It can also be the death of a character you once were in your life once you start your healing journey. However, humans sometimes  always suck at being comforting. We don't know what to say, we don't know how to be there or we make assumptions someone wants to be left alone. 

I didn't grow up in a very comforting family, and when I did have something to grieve I did it alone to which I promised myself I wouldn't ever do that to someone else. If you have had a loss, know that if you call or text me those news, I won't leave you alone for a few weeks. I mean, I will if you really want me to, but I'll be in the shadows, lurking for when you need a hug or a good cry. Being alone sucks anyway and then you add a life situation and it's even harder. We weren't meant to be doing life alone- I will die on this hill! I don't mean you have to settle and partner up, but know that this life is meant to be lived with friends, family, soul tribe, etc. We are on this Earth for connections!!!

All this to say, if you know of someone who is dealing with grief, ask them what they need. If you have an anxious friend or the loss is fresh and they're still in shock, show up! Bring dinner. Watch a movie. Have a cry sesh. Have a smoke sesh and then a cry sesh. Let them tell you memories of their person. Show you pictures of their dog and reminisce. Give them long hugs! Give them permission to just need your presence in the room while they cry and do dishes. The ideas are endless! 

Grief is fucking awful, weird, exhausting and difficult. And we should never do things that feel like that, ALONE!