Breakthrough

About a year ago, I developed a searing instantly-there-instantly-gone breathtaking pain in my right-midback.  It felt like the ghost of Bruce Lee was striking me with a fingertip jab.  And was really pissed off at me at that. 

If this happens to you, let me save you some stress.  Don’t Google.  You will become convinced that you have pancreatic cancer and minutes to live.  The silver lining is, this does make a person book a doctor appointment pretty pronto.  So, I did.  I saw a fabulous nurse.  His name is Troy.  He used to be a theatre nurse (operating, not Shaftsbury Avenue) and is very smart.  He told me the back issue was muscular, and prodded my back for a few minutes.  He said the muscle was solid and needed to be stretched.  God bless the NHS.

But, how to stretch when you’re anticipating the ghost of Bruce Lee sneaking up behind you to cut you in half? 

Chair yoga. I went to chair yoga for a few months, but the class got cancelled.  I joined the post-surgery/injury yoga class instead. 

The first week, as I turned onto my side to start getting up off the floor, I let out this yell of pain.  (Either that or I achieved Nirvana).  Frankly, a yoga fart would have been less embarrassing.  I ended up crawling on all fours to the wall, and pulling myself up like incy wincy spider.

I went back though.  The teacher was kind and yoga really started helping.  Then she left and that class got cancelled too.  Recently, I found ‘Sixty and me yoga’ on YouTube. 

This morning, I was not only able to roll onto my stomach for ‘locust’, I got up without pre-empting pain, no chair to lean on and no ghosts jabbing.

Om Shanti baby.