I Know Your Pain – I Know Your Strength

I Know Your Pain – I Know Your Strength

I originally wrote this blog in 2019. I came across it this week and wanted to share it again. Reading it was a remainder of the pain I had suffered with fibromyalgia. But what I also noticed was the reduction of the emotional charge of the memories. That is another level of healing, reminding me how far I have come in my recovery from fibromyalgia.

Enjoy the article. I hope it gives you a sense of being heard and understood along with hope that you too can recover from fibromyalgia.

Here is the Post:

A few days ago, someone told me that I didn’t know how to deal with fibromyalgia pain.  You might say that was a pretty big trigger for me.   Brought back all the memories of those who didn’t understand the pain I experienced with fibromyalgia.  Part of working through this was remembering the worst times of my life.  The pain and suffering.  The experience of living with fibromyalgia.  Of dealing with the pain for 30 years.  Of not finding solutions.  I do know how to deal with fibromyalgia.  To live with the pain of fibromyalgia.  Only to well. 

Out of that came this post.  I know that I constantly say that you can improve.  You can rebuild your health.  You can move beyond fibromyalgia.

I suspect there are many who doubt me; wonder if I am just pushing some new magic cure that doesn’t really work.  Of capitalizing on other people’s pain.  Of not knowing what I am talking about.

I am not.  I have lived the experience of fibromyalgia and I have improved tremendously to the point where I am not in constant pain and misery.  To the point where I have a life worth living.  To the point where many days I forget that I have had fibromyalgia.  Yes, it is there.  It is real.  It is possible.  

I know your pain.

I may not know the specifics of your symptoms or of your life circumstances, but I know the pain.

I know the pain of being in constant physical pain. Of being in so much pain that you can’t even think.  It takes all of your resources to be present with the pain.   I know the fear and frustration of not being able to get rid of the pain.  The fear of the pain never ending.  The confusion of why this is happening and why can’t anyone help me.  Why can’t anyone hear me or understand how much pain I am in.

I know the pain of insomnia.  Of deadening fatigue, but not being able to sleep.  Of night after night lying awake and not being able to sleep.  Of waking in the morning feeling like you have been hit by a mac truck . . . maybe two.  I remember the nights where my legs were so restless that sleep was impossible.

I know the pain of being depressed.  Of seeing life through a constant cloud of negativity.  Of feeling like you are moving through molasses.  Of having brain fog so bad that you can’t think clearly.  Of wishing you could die.  Of feeling like everyone else has a normal life . . . why can’t I.  Of wanting to just crawl in a hole and stay there.

I know the pain of chronic itchy burning skin.  Of not being able to wear anything except loose soft comfortable clothing.  Of not being able to wear jewelry because the weight of a simple neckless pains your neck.  I remember the nights that I couldn’t fall asleep because my skin felt like it was on fire or that I was being pricked by 1000 needles at the same time.

I know the pain of chronic anxiety.  Of panic attacks randomly showing up uninvited.  Of being triggered by simple normal things.  Of feeling unsafe.  Of feeling trapped by the pain, depression and anxiety.  Of walking through life terrified moment by moment.

I know the pain of endless mind-numbing fatigue.  Of waking up totally exhausted whether the sleep be deep or uninterrupted.  Of hating the thought of getting out of bed in the morning and facing the day.    Of just wanting to sleep for 6 months . . . a year . . . more.

I know the pain of going to a doctor and hear them say there is nothing physical wrong with you . . . when you know there is.  Of hearing them say it is all in your head.  Of having them give you pills that may or may not relieve the pain and provides a whole new set of symptoms.

I know the pain of loss, unrelenting loss.  Loss of confidence in your self and your body.  Of losing people, loved ones, family, friends that don’t survive your illness.  Of losing jobs, income, security, safety.

I know the pain of insecurity.  Of financial stress.  Of not being able to trust your body.  Of not being able to schedule a lunch date because you don’t know if your body will get you there or not.  Of having to cancel engagements at the last minute because your body flares up.  Of going and then being in pain and not enjoying the event but feeling tortured the whole time you are there.

I also know how it feels when you are told there is no cure.  Of wondering if you can continue to live like this.  How it feels to imagine a lifetime of this pain and unhappiness.  Of trying treatment after treatment and feeling discouraged with the results.  I know.

I know the pain of being criticized, ridiculed and persecuted for having an invisible disease.

I know the pain of missing out on family events.  The pain of feeling distanced from my family because I couldn’t keep up with their pace.  Of not being able to keep your house clean or torturing yourself to clean the house.  Of being left behind when the rest of the world is speeding forward.

I know.  I have been there.  I lived it for 30 years.  I am better now, but I remember.  I know.

 

I also know your strength  

The strength of getting up every morning.  Of facing the day.  The pain.  The depression, the anxiety, the loss, the feeling unheard.  Of feeling powerless.  Of feeling unheard, of feeling invisible.  Of feeling frustrated.

I know how hard it is to live the life with fibromyalgia as your constant experience.  I know how much strength it takes of live that way.  I know.  I have been there.  I lived it for 30 years.  I am better now, but I remember.  I know.

I know how to deal with fibromyalgia pain.  How to live with it ungracefully and how to live with it gracefully (as humanly possible).   How to breath, be present with the pain.   How to exercise within my limitations.  How to eat well to minimize symptoms.  How to function on a tank half full.  How to set boundaries to take care of yourself.  How to manage my lifestyle to accommodate a devastating invisible illness.  How to have less than I want or need because of my limitations.

I know.  I did that for 30 years.  I am better now, but I remember.

 

I also know that rebuilding your health is an option. 

I know that you can move past the experience of fibromyalgia.  To end the anxiety and depression.  To get a good night’s sleep and wake up feeling refreshed in the morning.  To feel good in your body.  To enjoy life again.

I know that you can improve.  I know because I have experienced it myself.  Improvement, release from the pain.  Finding a life that offers peace and contentment.  I know.

It isn’t a quick fix.  It takes commitment, a willingness to make changes in your eating and lifestyle.  It means looking within to discover the true source of pain and loving yourself enough to feel and heal your own pain.  It means discovering the unhealthy beliefs that rule your life and keep you in negative cycles.  It takes a willingness to change who you are.  Not from force or willpower, but by allowing life to change you, allowing the illness to transform you into a different person.  The important unchanging aspect of you will still be there, but the masks and fake part of your that you adopted to survive will be shifted, changed and/or released.  Like the lump of coal that turns into a diamond after its transformation.

It isn’t a quick fix.  It is a journey that is very rewarding and fulfilling.  You will discover a you that is healthy, whole and complete.  Who is awesome and powerful.

 

If you chose this journey of rebuilding your health, I am here to support you. 

I am here to support you, to educate you, to hold your hand if needed.  I am here to remind you when the going gets tough that you are not alone.  That you can and will make it and you will be happy and thrilled with your new self and new life.

I hold the space for your wholeness and improved health.  It is here for you to claim and embody.

My intention is to build a community of women committed to their health and wholeness.  Committed to rebuilding their health and the transformation that entails.  A community based in safety, compassion and love, where we can come together to discover love, acceptance and healing.

Please join me/us as we grow together in love, peace and harmony.

Always remember, there is hope.

💕Bindu

8 Keys to Enhance Health, Wellness and Wholeness

8 Keys to Enhance Health, Wellness and Wholeness

 Fundamentals of Health, Wellness, and Wholeness

Fibromyalgia and other chronic illnesses are challenging on many levels.  We are physically compromised, emotionally out of balance, and mentally stressed.  We want solutions to our pain and discomfort.  We search and often the solutions come up with none or minimal results.  This becomes stress on top of the stress of being ill in the first place.

What then can we do to reclaim our health and happiness . . . our wellness and ultimately wholeness?

Today’s article is focusing on what I call the Fundamental of Wholeness.  These are eight important aspects to rebuilding our wellness.  Below is a list of the fundamentals of wellness.  They create a foundation upon which to rebuild our health, wellness and wholeness.

  • Awareness
  • Compassion
  • Balance
  • Acceptance
  • Introspection / Self-inquiry
  • Self-Responsibility.
  • Insights
  • Integration

Awareness

The ability to be self-aware.  To observe our body, our mind, our emotions from a place of awareness rather than identification.  In other words, to be able to observe our self objectively.  We can be aware of the sensation and pain in our body, the emotions that we feel, the thought that we think.  We can start with our conscious thoughts, and then delve into a deeper layer of subconscious thoughts and emotions.

 

Compassion

As we meet our self with awareness, compassion is a necessary ingredient.   There are parts of us that we might judge or disown.  By meeting our self with compassion, we can identify positive and negative experiences, emotions, thoughts, and memories.  We can see the good, bad, ugly and beautiful parts of who we are.  Without compassion, we may block truly seeing because we have literally and figuratively exiled parts of who we are as they are deemed unacceptable.   Yet, until you can meet these parts with compassion, wholeness will continue to elude you.

 

Balance

Balance is at the root of health, wellness and wholeness.  Everything in nature survives and thrives because of a state of balance.  Your physical body has 12 homeostatic (balancing) control mechanisms that keep your body functioning and healthy.  Emotionally, we need a balance of positive and negative emotions to be emotionally healthy.  Mentally, we need a balance between positive thoughts and negative thoughts.  A healthy optimistic attitude with a healthy dose of reality and awareness of possible difficulties.  We need a balance of rest and activity, work and play, alone time and time with others.  When discovering the right balance for you, health, wellness and wholeness will be the rewards.

 

Acceptance

Acceptance is acknowledging what is.  That doesn’t mean we have to like it.  It means telling the truth about what is.  When we are honest about what is, we have the power to change is.  If we are denying the truth, ignoring it, or pushing it out of our awareness, we are powerless to change it.

 

Introspection / Self-inquiry

Self-inquiry allows us to go within and discover who we are, what we think, feel, need, want, like, dislike.  What are greatest joys are, what are greatest challenge are. Self-Inquiry allows us to discover internal causes of challenges and discover resolutions from within.

 

Insights

The process of awareness, compassion, acceptance, and introspection results in insights from within.  We can see parts of our self we had previously denied.  We can see how we are creating our own stress.  We can see how we have given our power away.  These and many more insights are available with meeting our self with awareness, compassion and acceptance.

 

Self-Responsibility

When I first heard the word responsibility, to me it meant self-blame.  Then I heard a new definition of the word which was, “ability to respond.”  The ability to respond rather than the old knee jerk reaction to any situation is a step to reclaiming our power.  To look at any situation or challenge with awareness, compassion, acceptance and introspection gives us needed information and insights upon which to make internal changes or take external actions, guided from within.  That is self-responsibility.

 

Integration

Integration happens as the new awareness’s, insights, internal shifts and responsible actions become integrated into our lives.  We begin to feel more empowered in our lives.  We can let go of feeling like a victim to our circumstances or feeling like the answers to our problems are outside of us.   We can let go of coping mechanism and begin to let our true self shine through.

 

Summary: 

The fundamentals of health, wellness and wholeness have the power to impact us on all levels of our being: physical, mental, emotional, energetic, spiritual and in our expression in and interaction with the world around us. 

 

This week’s introspection: 

Contemplate these fundamentals and notice which resonate with you and which don’t.  Pick one or more to experiment with becoming aware of how it operates or not in your life.    Remember, awareness is the foundation of all change.

 

May you be healthy and whole,  💗Bindu

Cultivating Joy and Kindness

Cultivating Joy and Kindness

Fibromyalgia is a devastating illness.  Not only are we in pain all or most of the time, but it impacts every area of our life.

It challenges our relationships.  It can limit our career and ability to express ourselves in the world.  It brings anxiety and depression daily.  It limits our ability to socialize and enjoy it.  It steals our sense of self worth and well-being.

It can completely take over our life and sense of self.

 

Emphasize the Positive

Yet, we can bring some balance and sense of self by emphasizing the positive.   One of my favorite teachers taught me that we had to balance our experience by emphasizing the positive.

Especially with fibromyalgia, there is so much negative experience on a daily basis it can be very easy to be consumed by it.  To the extent that it can become our identity.  We forget who we really are.

During my worst years of my fibromyalgia, I was nearly consumed by it.  My saving grace was my practice of yoga and meditation along with teaching yoga.  Those practices gave me a sense of who I was beyond the fibromyalgia.  They brought love, joy and peace into my life.  And helped me greatly.

Since then, I have learned more ways to emphasize the positive on a regular basis.

 

Challenges of Emphasizing the Positive

I understand the challenges of emphasizing the positive.  There are days that you simply can’t do it.  On those days, practice compassion and kindness for yourself, accepting where you are.  That in and of itself is emphasizing the positive.

 

Joy

The idea of cultivating joy had always been something that I didn’t think I could do.  Joy seemed to be out of my reach.  Then one of my teachers explained that Joy wasn’t jumping around in a state of bliss.

Joy could be finding peace in reading an inspirational book or listening to some calming music.  Or doing something that you love, gardening, drawing, watching a funny movie, having a talk with a dear friend.

Anything that you do that helps you to feel uplifted is cultivation joy.  The options are endless.  What do you do, or can you do that gives you a sense of peace, relaxation, or upliftment?  That is you cultivating joy.

 

Kindness

Kindness to yourself and others is a wonderful balm for the heart, mind and emotions.  Even if you are having a horrible day, if you are compassionate with yourself, that is an act of kindness.  A smile or compliment to someone, whether a family member or stranger is an act of kindness.

I used to notice things I appreciated about people, like I liked a piece of jewelry or clothing that they were wearing, or a hair style.  Then I thought, why share that with them person.  It is remarkably amazing.  Lifts my spirit and theirs.

When you have a bad fibro day, kindness to yourself is your best ally.   That could look like sleeping and resting for the day, taking a nap, having a warm cup of tea.

How do you show kindness to yourself when you are having a rough day?

 

Peace and Love are offshoots of Kindness and Joy

When you are cultivating kindness and joy, peace and love are natural and flowing.  It brings you in touch with your heart, your needs, and your self-love.

 

Contemplation for this week

This week, take some time to contemplate where you are regarding cultivating joy and kindness or love, and peace or compassion into your life.  Easy?  Hard?  Got it mastered?  Could use some work?

Then make a list of things that you do or can do to cultivate joy and kindness in your life.  Get creative around this.  Here are some questions to consider.

  • What calms and relaxes you.
  • What brings you joy and delight.
  • How do you practice self-love and compassion?
  • What do you like to do?
  • How do you take care of yourself on a bad day?

By making a list, on those days when you are having a fibro flare and life seems miserable and never ending, you will have a list of things that you can do to navigate the day.

 

May you cultivate Joy and Kindness into your life, 💕Bindu

Are You Asking the Right Questions?

Are You Asking the Right Questions?

 

I was in the library the other day and came across a book entitled “Change Your Questions, Change Your Life”.   It reminded me of another book entitled, “The Secret Code of Success” by Noah St John that I read with a similar theme of considering what questions you ask and how changing the questions you ask can impact your life.

The essence of both books suggests that if you ask negative questions in your inner dialogue, you will get negative answers and negative results.  Here are some examples:

  1. Why am I always in pain?
  2. Why can’t I find a solution to relieve my pain?
  3. Why do I always screw up?
  4. Why doesn’t anyone like me?
  5. What is wrong with me?

You get the idea.  If you ask these question, you will get these kind of answers to those questions:

  1. I am always in pain because I have fibromyalgia.
  2. There is no solution to fibromyalgia, there is no cure, so I will have to live with this for the rest of my life.
  3. The third question will bring to mind all the mistakes you have made.
  4. The fourth question will bring up all the things that you think people don’t like about you.
  5. The Fifth question will bring to mind all the things that you think are wrong with you.

This first list of questions will hold you back in the status quo and work against improving your health.

 

Consider these questions instead:

  1. How can I reduce or remove my pain?
  2. How can I recover from fibromyalgia? Or “How can I rebuild my health? “
  3. What have I accomplished today?
  4. Why do people like me?
  5. What are my best qualities?
  6. What am I grateful for?

 

Noah St John also suggests the following:

  1. Why is it so easy to reduce the pain in my body?
  2. Why is it so easy to heal from fibromyalgia?
  3. Why is it so easy for me to be competent and accomplished?
  4. Why is it so easy for people to love and appreciate myself?
  5. Why is it so easy to be an awesome person?

 

My Experience with this

Years ago, when my fibromyalgia was really bad, I often asked the questions, Why do I hurt so much?  Why can’t I heal myself?    I was working with a wellness coach that suggested that for a full month focus on these statements and questions:

  1. My body is healing.
  2. How is my body healing?
  3. What does my body need to heal?
  4. What can I do to rebuild my health?
  5. Why is it so easy to recover from fibromyalgia?

In the beginning, it felt like a lie.  But for the whole month, I stuck with my phrases even though it felt wrong and untrue.  By the end of the month, I began to believe that I could heal my body and that it was healing.

This was a turning point in my journey with fibromyalgia.  I began seeing and receiving insights and signs and information that led me to truly improving my health.  I had to be open to the insights, signs, and information that I received, and put them into action.  Otherwise, I would not have improved.

 

Can you open your mind to the possibility that you can improve your health?

The medical community has declared that there is no cure for fibromyalgia.  That is true.

But in my experience, there is a lot we can do to improve our health.  I am living proof.  I have changed from being in excruciating pain all the time. And so fatigued, I could barely function.  I hated my life and often wished I could die.  I would lay in my bed in absolute torture with physical, mental and emotional torment.  I hated waking up in the morning because I didn’t want to face another day.

The song, “Sleep is the only Freedom that she Knows” was my theme song.  At least I had a few hours of sleep to get away from the torture that I lived every day.

 

Most of my symptoms are greatly improved and some non-existent.

Some of the symptoms have completely left, like irritable bladder, brain fog, insomnia, restless legs.  Some of the symptoms are mild, like pain and fatigue.

I used to have lots of skin irritation, burning, and itching.  That is mostly gone and only flares up on rare occasions.

Even as I write this, I know that I have forgotten many of the symptoms that were part of my daily experience.  They are even gone from my memory.

 

Yet, I am not completely free from fibromyalgia.

My main symptom now is IBS. When my intestines function properly, I feel great. When they flare up, other symptoms flare up. I experience increased pain, my mind and emotions get more negative, I am fatigued. I am still limited by this. 

The good news is that this is progressively healing as well.  I now understand what flares my IBS up and have an established protocol to heal it.  The healing process has its ups and downs.  But the ups are more frequent and long lasting, and the downs are not as bad, and I know what I need to get them back on track. 

I know it is on its way out and looking forward to that.

 

Play around with some of these ideas that I am sharing with you.

See if they resonate with you.  I wish for you relief from the ongoing fibromyalgia symptoms.

 

May you improve your health and reclaim your life.  Bindu 

The Power of Kindness on You and the World

The Power of Kindness on You and the World

Our societal norm has become “me first”

The type of society we live in has become known as “me first”. We’re taught early on to look out for ourselves first, and many do that. We’re self-focused, self-possessed and find it difficult to see beyond ourselves at those around us. We often don’t see how our actions affect others.

But our actions do affect others, sometimes in large ways and sometimes in small ways that create a wave of actions. The Butterfly Effect in Chaos Theory states that on tiny event in one area of the globe can have a substantial effect somewhere else. The same is true with small acts of kindness.

Every time kindness is performed it creates a ripple effect.

It spreads from person to person, continuing endlessly. You could say kindness is contagious, like a disease in which the outcome is beautiful.

Kindness keeps us from being short tempered with others when we’re stressed and frustrated. It helps people realize we’re all on the same team.

Jamil Zaki, Professor of Psychology at Stanford University and Director of the Stanford Social Neuroscience Lab conducted a series of studies observing how witnessing kindness inspires kindness, saying it causes it to spread like a virus.

Zaki says, “We find that people imitate not only the particulars of positive actions, but also the spirit underlying them. This implies is that kindness itself is contagious, and that that it can cascade across people, taking on new forms along the way. 

When we were to look at how important an act of kindness can help someone in need, we realize how it can empower both ourselves and others.

Today, we are bombarded with social media and news media that focuses on the negative interactions that affect us.  It’s seen in the victims of bullying, of abuse, and of those who abuse their power.  Even our entertainment is often riddled with abusive comments and negative actions.

Helping the disabled person who is struggling to gather items out their reach can change the course of their day. By giving a hungry person something to eat or helping a homeless person find shelter can change their outlook on life. Helping an elderly neighbor carry in groceries, mow their yard or just check on them occasionally, can help them feel less lonely. If you say thank you, please, and hello to others who are serving you, you brighten their day.

 

If you perform even the smallest act of kindness, you have the potential to change the course of persons life, even if only for a short period of time.

But kindness not only effects the one you are performing it for. It has a positive effect on you as well.

  • When you are kind to someone, your body gets a surge in serotonin, feel-good endorphins and oxytocin, all hormones that promote a natural high.
  • These hormones reduce pain and lower bread pressure, helping you feel relaxed and loved.
  • The person you are kind to will experience this surge in hormones too. And anyone who witnesses the act of kindness will feel the same feel-good effects.

Kindness fuels curiosity to know each other better. It helps us hear each other without putting up any pretenses. It’s considering other people and what they experience and their concerns and how you can make their lives easier.

 

Kindness is contagious.

It ripples and grows, effecting the unsuspecting and the observing. One act of kindness can change thousands of lives.

In the words of Maya Angelou, “People will forget what you did, they will forget what you said, but they will never forget how you made them feel.”

Simple acts of kindness can contribute to rebuilding our health.

Simple acts of kindness remind us that we have something to offer others and the world.  When we offer kindness to another, we feel that kindness within our own heart, which helps to heal any hurt that we carry within.  The ripple effect not only impacts others, but our own heart. 

 

Contemplation for this week:

Become more aware of the balance of selfishness and kindness in your world.  What brings selfishness into your world?  What brings kindness into your world?  What can you do to tip the balance toward the kindness side?  Remember to include yourself in your acts of kindness!

 

May kindness fill your heart, mind and soul, 💕Bindu

Health, Wellness and Wholeness

Health, Wellness and Wholeness

Health, Wellness and Wholeness

Today, I would like to begin a new conversation around health by looking at the difference between health, wellness and wholeness.

 

Health is a state of the body. 

When we talk about health, we usually mean the state of functionality of the body.  Does it operate at a ‘normal’ level without pain, or at least minimal pain?  When we seek to help our body function better, we look to physical treatments.  Medications, herbs, massage, diet, exercise.  Medical doctors, naturopaths, functional medicine practitioners.  

The focus here is usually attempting to diagnose and change the biochemistry of the body.  Often this approach to health is an outside in approach meaning we need to control the biochemistry of the body in order to feel healthy.  We are doing something to our body to make it function properly. 

 

Wellness expands our concept of health. 

Along comes the wellness industry which redefines the concept of health.  Wellness expands our definition of health to include the mind, emotions, lifestyle factors and searching for happiness in our lives.  We engage in positive thinking, lifestyle modification, honoring our emotions.  Perhaps finding work that inspires, re-evaluating our relationships.  In addition to the physical modalities, we seek out counseling, therapy, life coaching.  

 

Then emerges the idea of Wholeness. 

The overriding name of my business is Integrative Wholeness.  This idea expands the concept of health to include all dimensions and parts of who we are.   It focuses on understanding our multi-dimensionality and bringing all parts of our multi-dimensionality into balance and harmony.  

Integrative Wholeness embraces our physical body, our emotional body, our mental body, our energy body, and our spiritual body.  The intent is to create balance in each dimension.  When balance in each dimension is established the dimensions begin to resonate in harmony with each other.  The soul, mind, heart and body are in alignment with each other.     

Integrative Wholeness is also a process of meeting, greeting, embracing and integrating all parts of who we are.   We each have a personality that includes parts of us that we deem acceptable.  Yet there are parts of us that are wounded and/or considered unacceptable. These parts need to be accessed, healed and integrated.  Some of these exiled parts are the innocent inner children who hold our joy, gifts and talents but were deemed unacceptable by those who raised us and/or our society at large.  When we integrate these parts, we begin to feel more whole.  We reclaim our joy and our passion for life.  

It is this experience of integration that will create health from the inside out.  When all dimensions and parts are in balance and harmony, health on all levels is the natural result.  Your body will be healthy.  Your mind will be clear and focused.  Your emotions will be balanced.  You will feel a connection with your spirit and God.  You will be expressing your gifts and live abundantly.

 

In Summary 

I began on a search for health many years ago.  I discovered that health was more that just the body.  I also needed inner peace.  I discovered that the path to health involved the process of healing and integrating all parts of myself.  

This is my vision and what I am here to teach others.  I invite you to listen, learn, evaluate and apply what feels right to you.  

 

Wishing you peace, love and vibrant health, 

Bindu