I was feeling lost today, my mind going in many directions. I was feeling fragmented. Whenever this happens, it’s a reminder for me to pause, close my eyes, and breathe. I allowed my breath to expand my ribcage in a circumference. The mechanics of breathing in this way fill the lungs and open up the intercostal spaces. It also stimulates circulation, lymphatic flow, and colonic peristalsis. But that’s not all, put the mechanics aside for a moment, close your eyes, and breathe fully-notice what you feel in your body. For me, the “breath” traveled down my spine and got stuck at thoracic vertebrae 10 through 12 (T-10-12). T-10-12 has been bothering me on and off for many years. It can be very uncomfortable, so much so that I want someone to pop my spine back into place. Instead of asking a burly stranger for a bear hug, I contort my body into all kinds of positions trying to get my vertebrae to pop back into place.
My body said No: The problem with my thoracic spine probably originated 20 years ago or more when I was working as a waitress in a bar. The bar would get so crowded that I had to carry trays of drinks straight over my head. I didn’t have the shoulder strength or full range of motion in my shoulder girdle to do so properly, so I’d lift, rotate, and shear my ribcage and rest the load on my thoracic vertebrae.
Thrusting the ribcage shears the vertebrae forward and can lead to pain and osteoporosis of the thoracic spine.
The physical load wasn’t all that I stored there. I hated my job, I hated being poked (seriously people poke their waitresses), I was sick of breathing in the cigarette smoke (I had to run to the bathroom so often to clear my snot filled head that my boss accused me of snorting cocaine), sick of being talked down to by drunk condescending perverted bosses, hot headed cooks (a cook threw a knife at me once because I asked when my order would be ready), and belligerent customers. If I had a nickel for every time I wanted to shove a fork through someones eyeball, I would be a rich woman. …Okay, I wasn’t the most bubbly waitress for sure, but I kept my rage inside (except for the time I clobbered a man in the head with my tray for grabbing my gluteus maximus-true story). So, yeah, I was carrying some anger in my spine, too. …and then my body said NO! My body ached all the time, but I ignored it and took ibuprofen and shots of tequila. Eventually, my body said no in another way when I lost my voice. You can’t exactly wait tables without a voice; my body made the decision to quit for me. Thank you, body, I’m sorry I didn’t listen sooner.
Back to the breath and the present moment: I stayed with the breath, giving myself the attention I would give a good friend in need, not trying to fix anything- just listening with an open heart. I observed how the breath moved along my spine. A few moments into it, the breath moved through the stuck area and all the way down to my sacrum and back up to my cranium and back down again. It felt fluid, like the movement of a jellyfish in the water. The pain disappeared, and so did the feeling of being lost and fragmented. Sadness emerged in place of the pain. I say sadness, but it’s hard to describe. It probably had fear and anger wrapped in there as well, but it doesn’t matter; it’s just different ends of the spectrum. This emotion was old, stored in my spine for many years. I stayed with the feeling, accepting it and holding it with a nonjudgmental heart, until it transformed into a state of peace and warmth.
Moral of the story: There are obvious physical reasons (rib thrusting) for the pain, but whether we realize it or not, the energy from stored emotions is intertwined in the physical body unless we allow ourselves to feel and process emotion when it comes up. It’s natural to want to get away from pain or uncomfortable emotions by distracting ourselves with food, alcohol, TV, or other coping tools. But we can’t heal what we don’t allow ourselves to feel.
“The gateway to our feelings is the physical body; the key is the breath. Breath is the bridge between all levels of awareness: mental, physical, emotional, and spiritual.”– Gilles Marin, author of Healing From Within with Chi Nei Tsang.
, by Tara BrachWhen the Body Says No: Exploring the Stress-Disease Connection